Three Ts

 It was a return to busy days in the port today, Monday May 9. And there were three ships in port with names begining with the letter "T".

The Norwegian shipowner Wilh. Wilhelmsen is well known for giving all its ships names begining with the letter "T". However today's arrival at Autoport, the Titus, was a member of the partner company Wallenius Lines. The two companies combined their operations in 1999 and in 2017 formed Wallenius Wilhelmsen Ocean to operate a fleet or 123 or more autocarriers. Each company still owns ships, through subisidiaries and charters them to WWO. Wallenius still names its ships after operatic characters, and by coincidence their choice for this ship is the title character from Mozart's opera La Clemenza de Tito. Titus is loosely based on the Roman emperor Titus Vespasianus Augustus.

Built in 2018 by Tianjin Xingang in China, it is  a 73,358 gt, 23,889 dwt ship of the Hero class. It has a capacity of 7656 RT43 and is served by a 320 tonne capacity stern ramp.It has no side ramp. The ship was delivered in traditional Wallenius colours. It will be interesting to see if it receives WWO colours when it is drydocked next year. The current paint appears to be in good condition, so repainting may be considered an undue expense.

PSA Halifax's Atlantic Hub southend container pier had three ships alongside. Tropical Shipping's Atlantic Hope [see yesterday's post], Eimskip's Lagarfoss and MSC Tamara.

A regular caller on MSC's Canada Express 2 service, the Tamara tops up containers en route from Montreal to Italy and Spain. It will also call westbound to reduce draft for the St.Lawrence River. With a capacity of 4254 TEU including 500 reefers, it is a 41,225 gt, 50,446 dwt ship, built in 2007 by Zhejiang Yangfan Shipbuilding Co. It only required one crane to handle the loads.

Arriving at Pier 27 (now relocated from Pier 31 due to iminenent construction activity at Pier 30-31) Nirint Shipping's Trinitas is appropriately the third of today's trinity of T-ships.

The ship is on  its regular run from Moa, Cuba for Europe and is carrying a quantity of mixed nickel sulfides to off load. It was last here March 25 of this year, when the sun was on the right side (actually the port side) for a better picture. I gave more detail on the ship in that time.

The ship's hull was built by Damean Okean, Mikolayiv, Ukraine and completed by Damen Hoogezand, Foxhol. Mykolayiv is very much in the news lately and has been under Russian attacks.

.

Busy, busy - catch up

 There was a lot of activity in the harbour as the port caught up with weather delays. Very high winds starting yesterday resulted in suspension of pilotage operations until this morning when ships began to sail and arrive again. Most of the arriving ships had spent the night circling offshore waiting for the pilot boat to resume operation.

Among those sailing was the MOL Emissary a familiar caller for THE Alliance.

Built in 2009 by Hyundai, Ulsan the 54,940 gt, 67,170 dwt ship has a capacity of 5087 TEU including 330 reefers. As the ship is on long term charter from Seaspan Corp, it may well serve out its charter in MOL colours rather than take on the ONE magenta hull paint that owned ships would get.

Among the arrivals this morning was the Wallenius Wilhelmsen Titus which went first to Pier 31 to unload special RoRo cargo. It will shift to Autoport this evening to discharge cars.

The 73,358 gt, 23,889 dwt ship, with a capacity of 7656 cars, built in 2018  by Tianjin Xingang, is among the last to be delivered in the old paint scheme of its Wallenius parent.  Since mid 2019 ships are being painted in a new scheme of the merged Wallenius Wilhelmsen Ocean. Wilhlemsen ships were red/orange and Wallenius were green. The ships still retain the traditional naming themes, with Wilhelmsen ships beginning with the letter "T" and Wallenius named for operatic characters (some of whom have "T" names.)

There was lots of traffic for National Gypsum today too. Algoma Verity docked on arrival from Tampa. A familiar caller since it was built in 2000 as Alice Odendorff it was renamed in 2019 when Algoma acquired the three Oldendorff ships in the CSL self-unloader pool.

The 28,747 gt, 47,404 dwt ship is readily identifiable thanks to its unusual crane/ conveyor/ hopper self-unloading system. It was built by Shanghai Shipyard as a conventional four crane bulker, with the conveyor/hoppers added as a conversion.

A stiff northerly breeze across the Basin meant a wet ride for the tugs' deckhands.

Next in was Algoma Integrity from Baltimore. It was last here November 15, so I will not repeat its details.

With Algoma Verity along side at National Gypsum, Algoma Integrity will cool its heels at anchor until the berth is free.

.