Winter Ducks

It's time for the winter ducks to show up in the harbour again. The American Wigeons have been away since May, but they are back for the winter. Female (top) male (bottom).

Scrub the rig again!

It looked like a perfect day for the rig Rowan Gorilla III to sail, but it was not to be. After several days of very high winds, it dawned bright and sunny, with a light wind. Pilots were called, the tugs Maersk Challenger, Hebron Sea and Ryan Leet were called. The harbour tugs Atlantic Spruce and Atlantic Hemlock (called in from Saint John to cover for the Atlantic Oak, which has gone to Bull Arm) all showed up at the rig.

Something went amiss however and the departure was called off. The tugs recovered their gear and returned to their berths.

Zélada Desgagnés on trials

The Canadian cargo ship Zélada Desgagnés made a brief trials trip this morning and returned to pier 9B. The ship was damaged in a grounding in the late summer (see September 10 posting below) and had been in the Scotiadock floating drydock until Monday for bottom repairs.
Her grounding and Point Halifax's encounter with ice are reminders that sailing in the north is still a risky business.
A third ship, Avataq had an engine failure while heading north, and needed a tug to tow her around to various northern Quebec ports to unload her cargo.

Update December 11. The ship apparently passed its trials and sailed early this morning for parts unknown.

Point Halifax back in town

Point Halifax returned to port this evening after lengthy repairs to her thrusters. She was damaged in ice in the Strait of Belle Isle last summer and has been out of service since late August.

In the black and white photo she is shown on February 8, 1987- almost brand new.

The upper photo is one of her thrusters under repair - note the size in comparison to the truck.

Rig on the Move

The jack-up drilling rig Rowan Gorilla III will be leaving this morning for work off Sable Island. The mammoth unit will be drilling for 200 days on the Deep Panuke gas field.
Maersk Challenger, Hebron Sea and Ryan Leet will tow the rig out.
Pilots are called for 0900.
Update: The rig move was cancelled and tugs returned to the dock. A weather system moving in on the weekend is likely to blame. High winds and snow are predicted.

Canadians buy British Ports

Despite the economy and the downturn in shipping port may still be a good investment. According to the Maritime Journal

"PD Ports goes to Canadian owners
25 Nov 2009

The Middlesborough UK based ports and logistics business PD Ports confirmed last Friday that it is under new ownership, following the sale of 100% of its equity to Canadian based Brookfield Asset Management.

PD Ports plans to spend more than £300m on the Northern Gateway Container Terminal.
The sale was part of a broader transaction with Babcock & Brown Infrastructure (BBI) in which Brookfield, as the cornerstone investor, led a recapitalisation of BBI.

Brookfield formed a new holding company, Brookfield Ports (UK) Ltd to complete the purchase of PD Ports. BBI was the previous owner of PD Ports from early 2006 until last Friday.

PD Ports is involved in three business sectors. Port operations is split into two business streams, bulks and unitised cargoes. This includes Teesport, which is a top three UK port, with flows of containers, bulk traffics and finished cars, handling over 40m tons of throughput per year. PD Ports also owns and/or operates ports on the Humber estuary, Rivers Trent and Ouse, and at Medina Wharf, Isle of Wight. Service offerings include ships’ agency, chartering and stevedoring services. PD Logistics offers warehousing and distribution services at UK locations throughout the North East, Humberside & East Anglia, including at Felixstowe.

Development plans for port operations include the Northern Gateway Container Terminal, a major new deep sea container terminal planned at Teesport on the South side of the River Tees. The £300m+ development will have a capacity of 1.5m TEU and is anticipated to deliver over 5,500 jobs to the Tees Valley when fully operational.

Portcentric Logistics is a new concept promoted by PD Ports for locating the storage and distribution of imported goods close to the point of arrival at a UK port. This concept avoids the slow handling and return of empty containers as well as eradicating unnecessary UK road mileage, which occurs when delivering to a traditional inland import centre, such as in the Midlands.

Property includes port land at Hartlepool docks, which is highly attractive to the growing renewable energy sector, including offshore, windfarms, and biomass plants. PD Ports’ long term strategy is to further develop Hartlepool docks as a centre of excellence for the offshore support sector.

Commenting on the purchase, PD Ports’ Group CEO David Robinson said, ‘I am pleased to confirm that PD Ports is now under the new ownership of Brookfield. This is very positive news and will enable PD Ports to move forward and focus on growing our business. As a result of the sale, PD Ports has a new financial structure, which will provide a stable platform to support our future growth and development.’ "

Does this sound like any Canadain port you ever heard of?
No big goverment hand outs are mentioned (although there may be ones.)
This appears to be a private industry initiative.
Note also how they are reducing truck traffic.

Rig Activity

No photo this time, but there was a major flurry around the oil rig Rowan Gorilla III at noon time. Maersk Challenger, Hebron Sea and Ryan Leet all gathered round the rig for a few minutes. Shortly after they returned to their bases.
The first two are tug/ supply vessel and Ryan Leet is a standby/ emergency towing tug.