Sunday Departures

 Weekends are frequently busy times in Halifax Harbour. At one time that was due to excessive weekend overtime rates for longshoremen in New York. Ships would clear out of New York on Friday and come to Halifax, or would time their arrivals and departures in Halifax so as to arrive in New York for Monday morning.

That may or may not be the case anymore, but things were certainly busy in Halifax this weekend. Among the visitors was the auto carrier Morning Peace.

Built by Hyundai Samho in 2017 it is 66,802 gt, 22,438 dwt pure car and truck carrier, with a capacity of 7,368 car equivalent units. Operator EUKOR is combined operation of Wallenius, Wilhelmsen, American RoRo and European Car Carriers, established to transport Korean built cars.

At Fairview Cove the YM Evolution called for THE Alliance's AL1 service. It has been a regular since May 2018. 

The 47,952 gt, 57,320 dwt ship, with a capacity of 4662 TEU was built in 2014 by China Shipbuilding Corp in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. Due to its relatively small size it was an easy fit under the bridges, but still employed the tug Atlantic Fir as tethered stern escort to line up its course through the Narrows

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Rare caller - regular caller

It has been a while since a Maersk Line Ltd USA ship has called in Halifax. These ships, flying the US flag, normally sail past Halifax en route from the mid and far east via the Med to the US east coast on the MECL1 service- essentially the old Sea-Land route.
Maersk Atlanta, today's arrival, is one of 11 ships on the run, all of  6188 TEU.

Maersk Atlanta was built as Maersk Kowloon in 2006 by Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction Co Ltd in Busan. It measures 74,642 grt, 84,500 dwt. It was brought into the US fleet in 2013 when it was renamed.

Regular caller YM Evolution successfully wove its way through pleasure craft in the Narrows to reach Fairview Cove this afternoon.Sunny warm summer weather and a good breeze - a perfect recipe for sailing.

YM Evolution is one of four 4662 TEU ships on what is also ACL's AL1 transatlantic service with THE Alliance.

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APL Salalah breaks the record

As per my earlier post APL Salalah became the largest container ship to call in Halifax when it arrived early this morning. Also as predicted, it arrived in the dark and is due to sail in the dark too, thus preventing photos of it underway.

Without scaling fences, climbing communication or electricity towers or trespassing on private property (for more than a few seconds), I did squeeze off a few photos to give an idea of the scale of the ship. 

The ship was alongside and tied up by sunrise, but the cranes had not started work yet. By my estimation the ship could have loaded another tier or more of boxes. 

Although using up all of berth 41 ( 333m / 1,093ft ) and stretching into berth 42 (same length) at  347.05m long (1138.45 feet) APL Salalahleaves room for a smaller ship at pier 42. Macao Strait is barely visible at the far right, loading for Melfi Lines. Thus only two cranes were available for the large ship - surely a less than desirable situation. 

If anyone needed a comparison in size between a 10,960 TEU ship of 128,929 grt and a "normal" container ship, there was this afternoon's arrival of YM Evolution a regular caller since last May on THE Alliance AL1 service. With a capacity of a mere 4662 TEU, the 47,952 grt ship is supposedly of a size that is threatened with extinction by the larger ships.

YM Evolution rounds George's Island heading for Bedford Basin. Its tethered escort tug Atlantic Fir is already made up astern and Atlantic Willow is just coming alongside for the trip through the Narrows. The irony in the ship's name is that evolution may spell its exctinciton.

 
In fact there are many trades, such as transatlantic that currently depend on frequency more than capacity. Being able to maintain a weekly service efficiently means that "smaller" ships of less than 5,000 TEU will still find niches, where the economy of scale that the giants provide is not a factor. The risk is that with ownership consolidations, there will be fewer and fewer (but bigger and bigger) ships and shipping lines, calling in fewer and fewer ports, leaving some ports out in the cold unless they can provide exceptional service.

It is only a matter of time before more bigger ships start coming. The extension to Halterm pier C, berths 41-42 was made to accommodate two large ships at once, but that was obviously not enough to work two 10,000+ TEU ships. When the next leap occurs to to the 13,000 to 15,000 TEU range, then not even smaller ships will be able to dock at Halterm when a big ship is in.

I have sighted drilling and sounding vessels working in the area over the last few days, so some plans are afoot - but they have not been revealed to the public yet.

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Holiday Monday - for some

Most Nova Scotians enjoyed a day off as Heritage Day, but there was some work in the harbour.

Asian Moon arrived for Nirint Lines, with another cargo of nickel from Cuba.

As Asian Moon passes the Middle Ground inbound, the tug Atlantic Willow takes up a stern first orientation near the ship's stern. This will allow it to pull the ship round then push it stern first into pier 31.
 
The ship tied up at pier 31, but work to unload will likely not start until tomorrow. Built in 2006 by Jiangdong Shipyard as Aliança Inca it took its current name the same year. It is a 9956 grt, 13,670 dwt vessel with a container capacity of 1118 TEU and has two 45 tonne cargo cranes.

Only one other container ship was in port today. YM Evolution arrived and sailed on THE Alliance's AL1 service (North Europe / East Coast North America). The 4662 TEU ship dates from 2014 when it was delivered by the China Shipbuilding Corp in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. It measures 47,952 grt, 57,320 dwt and is one of four sisters of the "E" class on the AL1 rotation.

YM Evolution outbound in the Narrows on the eastbound leg of its trip. Bound for Bremerhaven, the ship is carrying lots of containers, but is high in the water, signifying a lot of empties.

Factoid: In the year 2000 there were 2,617 container ships in the world, carrying 67mn TEU. Since 2011 there have been about 5,000 ships. Although the number of ships has not increased very much since the 5,083 in 2012 (it is now at 5,192) the size of ships has increased dramatically, as has the trade volume: from 155 mn TEU in 2012 to 192mn TEU in 2017, and still growing.
Last week Yang Ming announced that it will order twenty new ships, ten of 11,000 TEU and ten of 2,800 TEU.


With today's fine sea conditions, it was a good day for CCGC Baie de Plaisance to do some more trials work. (It was out in Bedford Basin on Saturday too.)

The first of twelve new rescue cutters to be delivered to the CCG, it arrived in Halifax from builders Chantier Naval Forillon Inc in Gaspé in November. It will take up station at Cap-aux-Meules, Magdalen Islands as soon as ice conditions permit it to make the trip.

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Polar Prince, other royalty and...

To mark the 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, a 150 day Coast to Coast to Coast expedition, called Canada C3, will bring together scientists, educators, students and others to see and explore Canada as few others can, aboard the icebreaker Polar Prince. 

 Polar Prince disembarks some RHIBS as it approaches the lower harbour.

Organized in 15 legs, the ship will sail from Toronto to Victoria via the Northwest Passage.
The expedition has its own web site at: https://canadac3.ca/en/homepage/

The ship Polar Prince is no stranger to Halifax and Nova Scotia since it has spent several winters in Lunenburg. However it does go back further than that.
Built in 1959 by Davie Shipbuilding Ltd, Lauzon, QC the ship was named Sir Humphrey Gilbert and was stationed in Newfoundland.

In 1983 it arrived in Halifax where it underwent a major reconstruction, that included a new icebreaking bow. The old bow was broken up in Dartmouth.

Its derrick system was also reconfigured. Changing from the traditional derrick mounted on the house, with control room under the bridge, it received a new goal post type structure mounted at the break of the forecastle with the derrick house on the forepeak. It retained its old mast, less the boom. The refit was completed in early 1985 and it returned to Newfoundland. It was back in Halifax again in 1996 for a refit.

It was decommissioned then in November 2001renamed 2001-06 . It was sold to Gilbert Enterprises of Clarenville, NL and renamed Gilbert I, then in July 2002 to Norcon Marine Services in Glovertown, NL and renamed Polar Prince. Since then it has been owned by Deep Ocean Research Ltd of St.John's and current owner GX Technology Canada Ltd of Calgary. During that time it has been Canada's only commercial icebreaker (there are several icebreaker class commercial cargo ships, and a number of government icebreakers) and was last in Halifax in 2010.

It received another major modernization in 2009. For the Canada C3 expedition, it has received a new paint scheme that includes the Canadian flag.

There was other royalty in port too, as Queen Mary 2 made another visit.

Trying to get a view of the ship from a different angle this time, I managed a "going away" shot from Herring Cove.

 Yang Ming Line's YM Evolution is a regular now on the AL1 service of THE Alliance. HAPAG-Lloyd, a partner in the service seems to have no ships in this particular loop - it is all Yang Ming.

YM Evolution's bow dips slightly as she works into the swell off Herring Cove outbound for sea.

One of five sister ships, it was built by the China Shipbuilding Corp in Kaoshiung in 2014 and carries 4662 TEU on 47,952 grt, 57,320 dwt. It is registered in Taiwan.

This morning's arrival for Tropical Shipping was AHS Hamburg, one of two ships to service the line from Halifax. By late morning however its name disappeared from the bow ...

... and this afternoon was replaced by the name Bomar Rebecca.

At the same time the ship's registry was changed from Antigua and Barbuda to Liberia. When it sailed it still had the Carsten Rehder funnel marking, but this seems likely to change at its next port of call, which is to be West Palm Beach. The new name suggests that the ship has been acquired by Boreal Maritime of London, and will  be under the management of Bernhard Schulte. It is too early to tell if the ship will remain on the Tropical Shipping run.

The ship was built in 2008 by Jingling Shipyard in Nanjing as Pacific Hawk. It was renamed AHS Hamburg in 2012. The 9957 grt, 13,760 dwt ship carries two 45 tonne cranes and has a capacity of 1118 TEU.

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