Good Things (May) Come in Twos and an Update and a Correction

 It was a day (October 15) for things happening in twos - and they appeared to be, at east on the surface (no pun?), [see last para.] mostly good things.

The early morning arrivals included three cruise ships, but two of them were from Royal Caribbean International. The pair are not sister ships, but carry about the same number of passengers despite their difference in size.

First Pair 

The larger ship is the Brilliance of the Seas, a Radiance class ship of  90,050 gt, built in 2002 by Meyerwerft, Papenburg.It can carry up to 2,543 passengers and 848 crew. Its fleet mate, the 78,340gt Vision class ship Vision of the Seas, came from Les Chantiers de l'Atlantique, Saint-Nazaire in 1998. It can accommodate 2,514 passengers and 765 crew.

 The two ships occupied most of the Sea Wall, with Brilliance OTS at Pier 22 (left in photo) and Vision OTS at Pier 20 (right in photo). As usual with many cruise ships in port, there were lifeboat exercises for the crew, and both ships had boats in the water. The Vision had a couple of its tenders in the water too.

Odd man out in the cruise ship arrivals was Le Boréal from the French operator Cie Ponant. Called a "luxury mega yacht" it is a 10,944 gt ship built for Antarctic cruises by Fincantieri, Ancona in 2010. Its 132 cabins can accommodate 222 to 264 passengers with 134 crew members.

It tied up at Pier 23, with the Brilliance OTS looming over it in the background. The ship flies the flag of the French Territory of the Wallis and Fortuna Islands and it is registered in the exotic port of Mata Utu. The Vision OTS is just arriving - entering stage right.

 

Pair 2 

Another pair of ships made a move today. Although the ships are not related by owner, they are both classed as Supra-Max bulk carriers in the 40,000 deadweight tonne range.

AP Revelin is the ship that "lost its prop" (in fact it may only have lost one blade from its propellor) and has been idled in Halifax since late September. Yesterday (October 14) work got underway to transfer its cargo to the Eva Bright at Pier 27, (see yesterday's post). That work  was suspended today and both ships moved out to anchorages in the lower harbour, to allow the Nirint Lines ship Augusta Luna to come in and discharge its cargo of nickel sulfides from Cuba.

 The Augusta Luna will likely be able to unload in one or two shifts, and when it sails the other two will be able to move back alongside. By comparing the drafts of the two ships, there is still a lot of cargo move.

 Eva Bright is in anchorage number 5.

 

AP Revelin is in anchorage number 3 and will have the tug Atlantic Willow standing by as long as it is anchored without the ability to move on its own.

 

Pair 3

Another pair was the Royal Canadian Navy's harbour tugs Glenevis YTB 642 and Glenside YTB 644 caught returning to HMS Dockyard from the Bedford Basin where they had undocked the HMCS Charlottetown from the Bedford Magazine.

 

Not only is the Navy in the process of replacing the Halifax class frigates, but it is also replacing the Glen class harbour tugs. The three Halifax based Glens (the third is the Glenbrook YTB 643) will be replaced by two tugs, now under construction at Industrie Océan in Quebec.The first of these, the Canso, is fitting out at Groupe Océan's Quebec City facility and may be delivered this year or in the spring of 2026. 

 

Update:(corrected)

There were some errors in yesterday's post (October 14) on the general cargo ship Arctic Rock. Firstly - it seems to have arrived in ballast from Italy and was not carrying aircraft components. I did see the ship alongside with hatch covers removed and stacked on deck forward and aft, but did not see any loading or unloading. Correction: it was carrying aircraft components from Italy -see October 18 post for photo.

 

Crew members appeared to be cleaning the gantry tracks.

 

The offset superstructure is somewhat more visible from the port side. 

 The ship departed at 1300 hrs EDT giving a destination of Wilmington - which one I can't tell - but likely the one in North Carolina.

 

The port of Registry may not be as exotic as that of Le Boréal (see above), but Urk certainly has a distinctive sound to it.

Pair 4

And one last pair - two Royal Canadian Navy inflatables appeared off Black Rock Beach, Point Pleasant  Park, with some marker buoys set out and divers in the water.

 The location is the site of numerous reef balls, placed on the bottom to promote marine growth and fish habitat. The yellow floats may be tethered to the reef balls.

The Navy's Fleet Diving Unit Atlantic is based at Shearwater (Halifax harbour), and this may have been a training exercise. (The ocean water is still quite warm and people were swimming at some beaches on Thanksgiving Monday. Seawater temperature then and today was 15.6º C (60º F).

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Halterm tied up and other activity

Two ships that were due to sail from Halterm's South End container facility have been delayed until tomorrow.
Melfi's Catharina Schulte and Eimskip's Selfoss will remain in port tonight. That meant that Nolhanava tied up at pier 37 and did not appear to be working cargo, since pier 36 was occupied by Selfoss - it did not appear to be working either. Oceanex Sanderling which is also in port, will remain at Autoport until midnight then move back to Halterm on departure of ZIM Qingdao.

 The inbound truck lanes numbered about 40 trucks late this afternoon, with more arriving. Border Services has completed scanning inbound containers from ZIM Qingdao and their scanner truck is headed home.

Selfoss is stern in at pier 36, with Nolhanava (barely visible) at pier 37.

The tanker Falcon Maryam moved earlier from anchorage to Imperial Oil dock 3.  

Bad weather on the eastern seaboard this winter seriously messed up Tropical Shipping's two ship schedule, especially in March. Bomar Rebecca's scheduled March 6 sailing was postponed by a week and the whole schedule slid ahead at week. A maintenance period for Asian Sun was also moved along by a week. That maintenance will happen in Halifax, as the ship arrived on Wednesday April 4 and discharged all its containers, then moved to pier 9B. There was therefore no Tropical Shipping sailing this week.

 

Asian Sun flushing its anchor cable at pier 9B with the refitting Fundy Rose in the background.

 Asian Sun was built in 2005 by Jiangdong, Wuhu. The 9956 grt, 13,698 dwt ship has a capacity of 1118 TEU and carries two 45 tonne cranes. Its first name was CSAV Colon, then became Aliança Cordillera in 2007, and Asian Moon in 2008. Tropical announced new ships for the route to be delivered in 2019.

The next Tropical sailing is scheduled for next week on Bomar Rebecca and Asian Sun will be back in service for the April 16 sailing.


Just south of Halterm, the lobster season is winding down and the Eastern Passage based Oralee was not finding much in its traps off Black Rock Beach.

The boat has been lobstering in this area for many years, but has only recently begun sporting the colourful Canadian flag on its bow. It was built in 1973 in Clarke's Harbour, NS.

Out in the Basin HMCS Charlottetown was doing some helicopter evolutions. It was very windy, so likely a good test.

Charlottetown does not seem to be straining on its anchor despite heading up in to a stiff breeze. Note the crash boat, manned and ready alongside.

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Veendam - first cruise ship and other business as usual

The 2016 cruise ship season began today with the arrival of the Veendam. Built in 1996 as a Statendam class ship, it was refitted in 2009 with the extension of two decks aft and a "duck tail". Now rated for 1295 passengers (maximum) and 568 crew, it is still one of the smaller cruise ships we will see this year.
 

A pair of hardy kayakers greet the ship as is arrives for the first time this year.

A regular caller since 1996 it will have different fleetmates this year with the reassignment of former sister ship Maasdam. Instead Rotterdam and Zuiderdam will do the honours. In 2014 it had propellor problems and had to cancel three October cruises when it went into drydock for three weeks.

Veendam rounded north of George's Island on its way in to pier 22.

Otherwise it was business as usual in the port: 

The Liberian flag Callisto followed and and anchored for Asian gypsy moth inspection. It is the third ship to arrive for clearance by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. (MSC Cristiana was first March 20, and Cap Lara was the second last Saturday)

Built in 2010 by Yamanishi in Ishinomaki, Japan, the 15,861 grt, 25,981 dwt ship carries three cargo cranes. It is owned by Heinz Corleis of Germany and is bound from Providence, RI for Montreal.

In the afternoon the Canadian tanker Havelstern anchored for bunkers and will remain in port over night.

There was Naval and Coast Guard activity as SAR crews (likely CG college students) exercised with CCGS Sir Wilfred Grenfell outside, on returning to port, it tied up at the old Coast Guard base.

HMCS Charlottetown and HMCS Shawinigan both sailed.

HMCS Charlottetown takes aboard several matelots from a RHIB as it sails. This was the mooring line party that let the ship go when it slipped its berth at HMC Dockyard.

HMCS Shawinigan builds up speed after passing George's Island.

See also Tugfax.

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The Passing Parade

In the space of an hour there were six ships passing the same point in Halifax harbour. This unusual event came late this afternoon.

First along was the Stadt Cadiz returning from (I am presuming) successful sea trails after engine repairs. As reported yesterday, the ship then went to anchor in Bedford Basin to await orders. The ship's place in the Maersk - CMA/CGM service is to be taken by EM KEA ex Cape Egmont, ex Cap Norte, a ship built in 2007 by Stoc. Szczecinska Nowa in Poland. The ship took its present name in April of this year. A gearless container ship of 3108 TEU, owned by Eurobulk Ltd of Athens, the former Hamburg-Sud ship is capable of 22 knots.

Shortly after HMCS Charlottetown came storming in. It did not reduce speed as it neared Ives Knoll and made a high speed sweep into number one anchorage and east of George's Island.

The reason for this rapid arrival was the outbound Dalian Express which needed most of the channel for its departure.

As soon as it was past Zim Luanda sailed from Halterm.

Meanwhile HMCS Glace Bay was making its way in.

It was then that it was possible to see three container ships all at once.

The inbound Zim San Francisco took the main channel inbound to Halterm as Zim Luanda used the western deep water channel, as it headed to sea.

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Harbour Miscellany

HMCS Charlottetown - cold day for boat work

A thin skim of frozen spray coats the hull of Charlottetown as it arrives this afternoon to disembark some of its people. There is frozen spray on the waterlines of Algonova (left) and Atlantic Condor (right background)

HMCS Charlottetown arrived from sea mid-day today and disembarked some people to an open boat. At -20C it was the coldest day so far this winter, but with a good breeze blowing the wind chill was truly frigid.


Onego Trader - buttoned down for sea

After a lengthy port stay to unload rails Onego Trader was finally finished working its cargo today and had its cranes stowed for sea. According to AIS its next port of call will be Bull Arm, NL.

 The ship arrived February 4, and even allowing for several days delay due to weather conditions, it still took a very long time to unload. Perhaps there was some problem with the cargo - either it had shifted during the voyage or was frozen in place, or there was limited room on the pier for more cargo to be landed.

Tasman Strait - finally sailed this afternoon

Colds air but calm seas for Tasman Sea as it heads outbound.

The Melfi Lines ship finished loading and sailed today after several days off. Late arrival of cargo by train is the suspected cause of the delay. The rail line between Halifax and Moncton was blocked for several days due to a stalled train. So much outbound cargo had backlogged in Halifax that there was no room in the Rockingham rail yard for inbound cargo. The ship arrived February 18 and shifted to pier 26 for the weekend to make room for other ships. It was back at pier 42 yesterday, and it appears to have taken on an almost full load of containers.

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Halifax Shipyard - one in, one out

Two moves this week at Halifax Shipyard, one in  and one out.
First was the "in". HMCS Charlottetown arrived in the Graving Dock for the beginning of the shipyard portion of its FELEX project.

It takes a very wide angle lens to get the whole ship in one picture once it is in the graving dock.

The "out" was CCGS  G.Peddle S.C. which was rolled out today. It will be a few months yet before it is ready to launch. The ongoing construction of a new electrical sub-station and three new power poles in the shipyard means that the previous vantage point for roll outs is now gone.

The old vantage point (right by the catch basin along the curb) was bad enough with the double layer of security fencing, but the new spot  leaves a lot to be desired. Boo Hoo.

HMCS Charlottetown-back after 247 days.

HMCS Charlottetown returned to Halifax this morning after completing one of the longest overseas postings in the history of the RCN. The ship left Halifax January 8 and spent four months for NATO in the Mediterranean. It then shifted to the Arabian Sea. Its mission included counter terrorism and drug interdiction work. The ship spent two days in St.John's and hastened opn to Halifax in advance of post tropical storm Leslie.

It actually arrived at CFB Shearwater during the night. It embarked VIPs this morning and made a ceremonial arrival at HMC Dockyard for 10 am. In the photo it is seen clearing the Eastern Passage heading for Halifax.

Charlottetown dispatched to Libya

1. On June 29, 2010, HMCS Charlottetown is wreathed in smoke as she fires the salute to the Queen on board HMCS St.John's at the beginning of the International Fleet Review.

2. Charlottetown is dressed all over in preparation for the International Fleet Review.

HMCS Charlottetown sailed today in response to the crisis in Libya. Although orders are not clear at his point, she is headed for Malta to be ready in case needed for whatever international action my be taken. There is a small Canadian military presence in Malta related to aircraft, but no infrastructure. Charlottetown will provide command facilities, and may deliver aid or take part in a blockade or even in military action.

Her ceremonial sailing at 1000 was marred somewhat by her return to port later in the day, due to the discovery of an unwanted magnetic field. The ship went directly to the degausing range in Bedford Basin and as of 2030 this evening was still there.

She is expected in Malta in about a week.

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