Saturday - a bit thin (plus addendum)

The usual Saturday round up fell flat today with so little action in the harbour as to be laughable.
There was no Maersk ship today (nor is one scheduled until early next week) so Halterm was idle. There were no ships at Fairview Cove either. In fact there were no working ships in the harbour except two tankers at Imperial Oil and one taking bunkers.

What activity there was was limited to:
A very early morning departure of the ostentatious yacht Sea Owl from an anchorage in the Northwest Arm.
After a week or so at Salters pier it moved around to the Arm yesterday.

 At the stern a gigantic Bahamas flag flies over a retractable articulated and slewing gangway, which is being stowed (hydraulically).

 Regular washdowns are needed to keep the ship pristine.

(Contributed by friend Tom)

Once anchored in the Arm it deployed its tender. It had an 0445 hrs pilot call for this morning and headed for Chester.

http://www.superyachtfan.com/superyacht/superyacht_sea_owl.html.


Meanwhile down at pier 9B workers began to apply stick-on letters to the starboard side of the ferry Fundy Rose. They completed the port side yesterday, after which the ship turned so that the work can be done from the land side.

It can't be too much longer before the ship is ready for service.

Surprisingly Bay Ferries has done away with the red ball logo and adopted the wave pattern used by its sister company Northumberland ferries.


Late this afternoon the CCGS Alfred Needler arrived at BIO. It has been working out of Halifax for the last few days, doing short trips. Built in 1982 by Ferguson Industries in Pictou, the research trawler originally served for the old Fisheries Research Board, and was painted in a white over grey colour scheme,

When the Department of Fisheries took it over, it was painted white, in line with the hydrographic and oceanographic vessels based at the Bedford Institute of Oceanography.

Finally in 1997 when DFO took over the Coast Guard it became red. A serious fire in 2003 resulted in a major rebuilding, which has extended its life considerably, but it is unlikely that it will see its 40th birthday in government service.

Three new Offshore Fisheries Science Vessels (OFSVs) will be delivered by Seaspan under the NSPS program during 2017, replacing four current vessels, Teleost, Alfred Needler and Wilfred Templeman on this coast and W.E.Ricker on the west coast. It is apparent that there will only be two of the new vessels on this coast. (Wilfred Templeman was retired in 2011.)

Read more on the progress (the first block is already under construction) from the June 12 briefing in Ottawa:
http://www.tpsgc-pwgsc.gc.ca/app-acq/sam-mps/2015-06-12-eng.html


Addendum:
The first OFSV will be named CCGS Sir John Franklin. What this British explorer had to do with fisheries science is hard to determine. It is another example of the present government's politicization of the arctic and the promotion of its policies and favourite topics while blithely ignoring science.
There is no doubt that Franklin was a great man and some of his early explorations were notable, even if his last one went so wrong. He was not however noted for taking the advice of the indigenous population, something that the current government has unfortunately chosen to emulate.
Renaming the ship for some of the muzzled fisheries scientist who have quite in frustration over current policy would be a good first order of business for a new government to be elected in October.

http://gcaptain.com/seaspans-vancouver-shipyard-cuts-steel-on-canadas-first-nsps-vessel-sir-john-franklin/#.VZFgYk3bIdU

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