Louis S. St-Laurent - in the Basin

1. At anchor, at anchorage number 10, Louis powers up the bubbler. 

CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent has sent the day in Bedford Basin doing ice bubbler trials.
With plus 12 degrees C (record high) temperatures in Halifax, there is no ice to bubble, but the ship is more comfortable doing the trials than it would be out at sea with gusts of up to 100 kph.
The system, consisting of a 2,000 hp thruster forces water up on either side of the vessel reducing friction and to prevent ice from adhering to the ship, increasing its efficiency through heavy ice.

2. The ship then upped anchor, moved to anchorage number 8, anchored again, and powered up the bubbler once more.

REWRITE: Louis S. St-Laurent

1. Back in March 1970, CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent, then still a steamer, occupied pride of place in the graving dock at Halifax Shipyard. It now appears she won't be drydocking after all.

Word has reached me that the CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent's drydocking will not take place, as the ship is urgently needed on the Saguenay River. Several other CCG icebreakers are out of service, and the remaining ships can't handle the amount of ice on the Saguenay and lower St.Lawrence.
This morning the Louis moved to Imperial Oil dock No.4 to fuel up, and will sail as soon as she gets all of her crew back aboard. In fact some may have to join the ship later since there are ships in actual trouble.
CCGS Martha L. Black, working out of Gros Cacouna is one icebreaker on the job, but she is doing urgent work off Méchins with the bulker Cedarglen which is beset in ice close to shore. Others, such as Terry Fox, tied up in Quebec City and Des Groseilliers in Trois-Rivières are apparently unserviceable.
Henry Larsen has also been brought in, and is working the Saguenay single handed at present.
Amundsen is in Port Weller to be re-engined, and Radisson is working its usual beat farther up river at Trois-Rivières.
The need for more than one large Canadian icebreaker is made again and again.. So far the feds have announced one sole replacement for the Louis. But what if she had been in pieces on the drydock and couldn't respond to this situation? In view of the physical features of its name sake, may I suggest it is time to plan for CCGS Brian Mulroney ?

Saudi Diriyah - takes its final bow

1. Saudi Diriyah sails this afternoon.As a thirty year old ship, heading for the scrap yard, she has not been overly maintained in the past year.

Today marked the final visit to Halifax of Saudi Diriyah. She is the second ship of the National Shipping Company of Saudi Arabia to take its last bow in Halifax in the last two months.
All four sister ships, built in 1982 and 1983 are leaving the fleet as new ships come on lime.
Saudi Abha was the first ship to retire, and its replacement was delivered by Hyundai MIPO Dockyard in Korea on January 23.
Saudi Diriyah's replacement will be coming on line in March, and will take its place in the lineup.
As with its sisters, Saudi Diriyah was built by Kockums AB, in Malmo Sweden.It was delivered in March of 1983 and measures 44,171 gross tons, can carry 2310 TEUs, 534 cars and has capability of handling a variety of other RoRo cargoes. It features a huge stern ramp, capable of loading oversized cargo.

2. Sailing in 2003 the ship did not look overly maintained even then. Note the small side door just forward of the letter "A"

Zim Qingdao - briefest visit - plus THE REAL STORY

1. Zim Qingdao sailing at 1300 hrs. There are no boxes on the aft-most bay.

Ships of ZIM Container Service are usually in port for a full working day, and sometimes longer. Today's visit of Zim Qingdao was certainly not typical - it lasted only a half day. It appears that the ship loaded some refrigerated containers and may have unloaded a few boxes too, but that was it.
Weather delays and re-routed cargoes on other ships are the likely explanations for this situation, as the ship may have had to skip some port calls to maintain schedule.

The real story
 I hear that the ship was turned back form New York because it was carrying 15 containers for Cuba. The US embargo on trade with Cuba has not been lifted (although President Obama has suggested that he would like to do so). Therefore the ship was sent back to Halifax to unload the boxes, then return to New York to carry on with its normal run.
Canada, and the port of Halifax have certainly benefited from the Cuban embargo for many years, with the presence of Melfi Lines and Nirint (which trade directly with Cuba)  and other lines such as Zim interchanging Cuban cargo in its hub port of Kingston, Jamaica. 

Highlanders - sailing now

1. Highlanders at pier 27-28 today - lights on ready to go?

Highlanders is getting underway as I write this. There were several problems that kept the ship i port beyond its expected sailing day of Saturday. That was first postponed to Sunday morning then again to Monday noon. At that point it was expected that the ship would go to anchor because all problems had not been completely resolved, but the Novadock had to be cleared to set the blocks for CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent. However at 1500 on Monday when the ship was finally ready to go it appeared that she would be heading directly to sea after her compass swing.
That was not to be, and Shipfax was asleep at the switch on that one! On completion of the compass swing the ship headed in to pier 27-28 for the night (I missed that until this morning.). Another departure was schedule for early afternoon, but that was put off until this evening,. Even that time has stretched for an hour.
Now at 2000 hrs AST the ship has been cleared to sail (again). Her ETA for North Sydney is about mid-day tomorrow.

CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent - back home

1. CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent occupying most of the extended BIO pier this morning. 

CCGS Louis  S. St-Laurent returned to Halifax this morning in preparation for drydocking. The only drydock on the Atlantic coast that can berth the ship is the Novadock at Halifax Shipyard. In view of this, the wisdom of transferring the ship to the Newfoundland region is brought into question (again).
The ship's home was the Canadian Coast Guard base in Dartmouth. The lengthy process of decommissioning that base and moving all admin functions to a new building at the Bedford Institute site has largely been completed. An extension to the BIO pier was built too, but it was not large enough for the Louis at the same time as the rest of the DFO fleet, because the political decision had already been made to send the Louis to Argentia, NL, using specious cost reasoning. The added cost of housing the Louis in such a remote location would certainly have defrayed the cost of building a proper base for it in Halifax, and the nonsense of extra steaming time to the arctic is disproved every time the ship sails into Halifax for drydocking.
For today's arrival CCGS Earl Grey had to move to the old CCG base to make room! What did that move cost?

2. CCGS Earl Grey had to move from the BIO pier yesterday to make room for the Louis.

And what about the much touted replacement for the Louis? The yet to be built CCGS John G. Diefenbaker, (Vancouver Shipyards has the job to build it, but no contract yet) will presumably also require a base. Is it to be stuck out of the way in Argentia too, as a tribute to political whims? I'm not sure The Chief would have approved.
The Minister of Fisheries and Oceans from 2006 to 2008 made the decision to transfer the ship to his home province of Newfoundland. Now that he is Canadian ambassador to Ireland, and safely out of the political spotlight, perhaps it is time to review the decision, and bring the Louis back to Halifax where it belongs, and build a proper pier for it.

Highlander sails - finally AMENDED

A number of harbour watchers have been waiting patiently for Highlanders to sail. We thought we were smart to be in view of Halifax Shipyard at noon today when she was due to leave, but some problems arose which took until past 1500 to resolve. In the meantime the tug Atlantic Larch stood by, and was joined by Atlantic Oak at 1300. At last she came off the Novadock and proceeded to the lower harbour for compass adjustment before leaving for North Sydney. Instead the ship tied up at pier 27.

1. The ferry enters the lower harbour, dwarfing its tugs and the Corporal Teather C.V. returning from sea trials.

2. Once south of George's island the ship begins its compass adjust by completing a 360 degree turn. A solitary Canadian navy Sea King helicopter flies overhead.

AMENDMENT:

3. Highlanders tied up at pier 27-28 on the morning of January 29. It is due to sail this afternoon, but we are waiting for confirmation.