It was a day (October 15) for things happening in twos - and they appeared to be, at east on the surface (no pun?), [see last para.] mostly good things.
The early morning arrivals included three cruise ships, but two of them were from Royal Caribbean International. The pair are not sister ships, but carry about the same number of passengers despite their difference in size.
First Pair
The larger ship is the Brilliance of the Seas, a Radiance class ship of 90,050 gt, built in 2002 by Meyerwerft, Papenburg.It can carry up to 2,543 passengers and 848 crew. Its fleet mate, the 78,340gt Vision class ship Vision of the Seas, came from Les Chantiers de l'Atlantique, Saint-Nazaire in 1998. It can accommodate 2,514 passengers and 765 crew.
The two ships occupied most of the Sea Wall, with Brilliance OTS at Pier 22 (left in photo) and Vision OTS at Pier 20 (right in photo). As usual with many cruise ships in port, there were lifeboat exercises for the crew, and both ships had boats in the water. The Vision had a couple of its tenders in the water too.
Odd man out in the cruise ship arrivals was Le Boréal from the French operator Cie Ponant. Called a "luxury mega yacht" it is a 10,944 gt ship built for Antarctic cruises by Fincantieri, Ancona in 2010. Its 132 cabins can accommodate 222 to 264 passengers with 134 crew members.
It tied up at Pier 23, with the Brilliance OTS looming over it in the background. The ship flies the flag of the French Territory of the Wallis and Fortuna Islands and it is registered in the exotic port of Mata Utu. The Vision OTS is just arriving - entering stage right.
Pair 2
Another pair of ships made a move today. Although the ships are not related by owner, they are both classed as Supra-Max bulk carriers in the 40,000 deadweight tonne range.
AP Revelin is the ship that "lost its prop" (in fact it may only have lost one blade from its propellor) and has been idled in Halifax since late September. Yesterday (October 14) work got underway to transfer its cargo to the Eva Bright at Pier 27, (see yesterday's post). That work was suspended today and both ships moved out to anchorages in the lower harbour, to allow the Nirint Lines ship Augusta Luna to come in and discharge its cargo of nickel sulfides from Cuba.
The Augusta Luna will likely be able to unload in one or two shifts, and when it sails the other two will be able to move back alongside. By comparing the drafts of the two ships, there is still a lot of cargo move.
Eva Bright is in anchorage number 5.
AP Revelin is in anchorage number 3 and will have the tug Atlantic Willow standing by as long as it is anchored without the ability to move on its own.
Pair 3
Another pair was the Royal Canadian Navy's harbour tugs Glenevis YTB 642 and Glenside YTB 644 caught returning to HMS Dockyard from the Bedford Basin where they had undocked the HMCS Charlottetown from the Bedford Magazine.
Not only is the Navy in the process of replacing the Halifax class frigates, but it is also replacing the Glen class harbour tugs. The three Halifax based Glens (the third is the Glenbrook YTB 643) will be replaced by two tugs, now under construction at Industrie Océan in Quebec.The first of these, the Canso, is fitting out at Groupe Océan's Quebec City facility and may be delivered this year or in the spring of 2026.
Update:(corrected)
There were some errors in yesterday's post (October 14) on the general cargo ship Arctic Rock. Firstly - it seems to have arrived in ballast from Italy and was not carrying aircraft components. I did see the ship alongside with hatch covers removed and stacked on deck forward and aft, but did not see any loading or unloading. Correction: it was carrying aircraft components from Italy -see October 18 post for photo.
The ship departed at 1300 hrs EDT giving a destination of Wilmington - which one I can't tell - but likely the one in North Carolina.
The port of Registry may not be as exotic as that of Le Boréal (see above), but Urk certainly has a distinctive sound to it.
Pair 4
And one last pair - two Royal Canadian Navy inflatables appeared off Black Rock Beach, Point Pleasant Park, with some marker buoys set out and divers in the water.
The location is the site of numerous reef balls, placed on the bottom to promote marine growth and fish habitat. The yellow floats may be tethered to the reef balls.
The Navy's Fleet Diving Unit Atlantic is based at Shearwater (Halifax harbour), and this may have been a training exercise. (The ocean water is still quite warm and people were swimming at some beaches on Thanksgiving Monday. Seawater temperature then and today was 15.6º C (60º F).
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