Jade C brings more track for CN

1. Jade C at pier 27, with hatches open and aft crane at work unloading rail. (January 17 photo)

Arriving January 16 the Jade C has a load of new rail for CN. The railway line has been spending around $ 1 bn per year for the last few years on upgrading its infrastructure of tracks, road bed and bridges. Much of the new rail has come in through Halifax from rolling mills in in Europe. 
Jade C was built as Jade-C for the Carisbrooke Shipping group by the Damen Hoogezand Shipyard. In 2009 the hyphen was dropped but ownership remained with Jade C GmbH of Germany, and management with Carisbrooke Shipping Management GmbH of Leer, Germany. The ship is registered in Douglas, Isle of Man. It is a multi-purpose general cargo ship of 7767 gross tons, 10,684 deadweight tonnes, and fitted with two 80 tonne cranes, and variety of tween decks and moveable grain bulkheads. It can carry 665 TEUs. It has pontoon type hatches which are lifted with a small traveling gantry (called an iron deck-hand on Great Lakes ships.).
Carisbrooke has become a sizeable company, now with 71 ships in its fleet.
See: http://www.carisbrookeshipping.net/
On its first visit to Halifax in April 2005, the ship loaded tunnel boring equipment.

Vectis Harrier - Super Greenship

The first Super Greenship and the first "Cross-Bow" ship to call in Halifax arrived today:

1. Alongside at Fairview Cove, the distinctive fine bow is evident.

2. Entering the Narrows from Bedford Basin, outbound. A travelling gantry, stowed forward, is used to lift off the hatches.

Carisbrooke Shipping  of Cowes, Isle of Wight, UK, is building a fleet of super efficient ships. The first series are called the Super Greenship 8500 class. Based on a design by the Dutch firm of Groot Ship Design, the 8500 tonne deadweight multi-purpose ships feature the distinctive "Cross Bow" * form. Intended to reduce pitching and slamming at sea, the bow also claims to produce greater efficiency of operation when combined with a new propellor design and other features. The ship is also rated as Finnish Ice Class 1 A.
Built by Jiangsu Yangzijiang Shipbuilding Co Ltd in China and delivered earlier this year, Vectis Harrier tied up at Fairview Cove this morning and sailed at noon. While there it took on bunkers from Algoma Dartmouth but did not seem to work any cargo.
Aside from the bow, the ship looks like most small general cargo/bulk/container ships of 6190 gross tons, 8557 tonnes deadweight. It is fitted with two 80 tonne cranes and has a single box shaped hold, with lift off hatch covers.
The ship seems to be a throw back to olden years when knife-like ship's bows were all the rage. Their effectiveness in slicing open other ships in collisions (the Empress of Ireland being a prime example-it was sliced open by the collier Storstad) lead to the development of the "soft bow" which gave way in collisions, and tended to protect the forward collision bulkhead also.
[* a similar looking bow form called the "Axe Bow" has been developed by Damen Shipbuilding and similar versions are widely used in new offshore support vessels.]
Footnote:
Vectis Harrier is a fairly tame energy saver compared to the ship I saw on the St.Lawrence in August. E-Ship 1 is wind assisted. There are no sails however. The ship is fitted with four rotating cylinders which assist the ship to varying degrees, depending on wind speed and speed through the water. When I saw it on August 21 it was not getting much help from the wind.

3. E-Ship 1 downbound from my front porch in Quebec. The ship is about 5 miles away, and the church spire is more than 10 miles from my vantage point, so this is the best that can be expected from a 300mm lens.