Traffic Control in Bedford Basin - revised

Bedford Basin, and the Narrows leading to it, was the place to be in order to see activity in Halifax harbour today, December 9. The most notable activity was the Float Off of the Arctic and Offshore Patrol Vessel AOPV 435 (see previous post). It was moved from Halifax Shipyard aboard the barge Boabarge 37 and was floated off late in the afternoon.

At Pier 9C, the last berth to the north end of the Narrows, the Dutch flag ship Schippersgracht arrived to take on an unusual cargo.

The "S" class ship from the Spliethoff fleet is more usually loading forestry products or aluminum ingots or even yachts for seasonal relocations. Built in 2000 by Mitsubishi, Shimonoseki it is a multi-purpose ship of 16,641 gt, 21,402 dwt with moveble tween decks and three 120 tonne SWL cranes. It has starboard side doors accessing internal elevators. It also has a 1134 TEU container capacity.

Today however it was loading surplus* Canadian military vehicles.

Although the vehicles are wheeled, they are not being loaded as RoRo cargo, but are being lifted onboard individually. It also appears that the ship's cranes are spotting them precisely in the ship's hold.

While lifting operations were underway passing ships were requested to make minimal wake, and this was certainly the case as the container ship NYK Daedalus passed en route to PSA Fairview Cove.

 

Tugs Atlantic Fir and Atantic Maple kept the ship under control but at slow speed as it passed Pier 9C at close quarters.

Name ship of a class of seven ships built by Hyundai, Ulsan, it was completed in 2007. The 55,487 gt, 65,867 dwt ship has a capacity of 4,888 TEU with 330 reefer plugs. It is a regular on THE Alliance's AL5 North Europe to North America service. As with many Japanese ships it was initially registered in Panama, but in 2020 registry was transferred to the Cayman Islands, a rare flag of convenience for a container ship, particularly as it does not appear to have been connected with a change of ownership. (Perhaps Panama's revised registration regulations after the release of the "Panama Papers" might have been a reason.)

Thanks to good communication and good timing, there was no conflict with the ship departing PSA Fairview Cove at the same time. Atlantic Sea made a wide turn away from the berth and went well out into Bedford Basin to make room for the NYK Daedalus to berth. With tug assistance they also stayed clear of the float-off operation off the Rockingham shore.

The small red ouboard craft, leaving a nice wake, is returning to the float-off operation after a pizza run - I'm not sure who the pizzas were for, but they might have benefitted from some reheating after a 10 minute ride in an open boat.

The Atlantic Sea 100,430 gt, 55,738 dwt, and its four sister ships are the most familiar ships in Halifax harbour as they maintain weekly calls eastbound and westbound on their transatlantic service for Atlantic Container Line. They still hold the distinction as the largest multi-purpose container /RoRo (CONRO) ships in the world. They were built in Shanghai by Hudong-Zhonghua between 2015 and 2017, and have a capacity of 3800 TEU and 1300 CEU.

The only other traffic of note in the area was the tug Glenevis YTD 642 which made a brief foray to the Basin for a compass adjustment. This may mean a return to service for the tug, which would be good news as both it and Glenbrook have been in "prolonged" refits, leaving Glenside as the only operational Glen class tug in HMC Dockyard fleet for the past year.

Two replacement tugs for Halifax have been ordered from the Industrie Océan Shipyard in Quebec, but are still some years away from delivery. One of two for the west coast has been delivered. When the Glens were built in 1976, they were state-of-art, with Voith-Schneider propulsion systems, but only 1750 bhp and 19 ton bollard pull. The new tugs will be Azimuting Stern Drive (ASD) propulsion - a much less complex system - but regrettably they will be 20th century design - that is to say - non-electric, non alternate fuel, and not state of any current art. 

 The three Ville class pup tugs, built in1974, and 365 bhp, 7 ton bollard pull remain in service. (View of the tug basin from the Angus L. Macdonald bridge, November 12, 2024.)

------------------------------------

* The vehicles may not be surplus - they may be headed overseas for use by our forces or those of a friend.

.

Mixed Bag

 It was a little bit of everything in the Port of Halifax today, February 8, including containers, automobiles, tankers and a Dockyard visitor.

The container sector was represented by NYK Daedalus arriving from Antwerp on THE Alliance's AL5 service. The 55,534 gt, 65,967 dwt ship is the "name ship" of class of eight with a capacity of 4922 TEU built by Hyundai, Ulsan in 2007. Most of its sister ships have called in Halifax with this one a regular since its first visit July 21, 2014.

The NYK Daedalus prepares to make its turn to back in alongside the PSA Fairview Cove container terminal. Tugs Atlantic Oak and Atlantic Beaver are on the ship's port side.

 The autocarrier Don Carlos, another regular, arrived mid-afternoon on the Wallenius Wilhelmsen transatlantic route. The ship has made the usual round of Zeebrugge, Bremerhaven Goteborg and Southampton. After discharging cars at Autoport it will move to Pier 9C tomorrow to offload RoRo cargo.

 Tugs Atlantic Larch. forward, and Atlantic Beaver, aft, met the ship in the Middle Ground area to steer it aroiund Macnab's Island and into Eastern Passage and Autoport.

As per a previous report: "Don Carlos was built in 1997 by Daewoo, Okpo and lengthened 8.6 meters in 2006 by Hyundai Vinashin in Vietnam and is now 62,141 gt, 28,147 dwt with a capacity of 7194 CEU. When the ship was lengthened the large billboard lettering on the sides of the ship was not re-centered, giving a slightly unbalanced look."

HMC Dockyard said goodbye to a long term visitor, SD Victoria, the British ship that gives world wide support to the Royal Navy. This is the second time that the ship has spent more than a month in Halifax. In 2022 it arrived on February 10 and sailed March 30. Its most recent arrival was December 27, 2023,and it has been alongside the whole time. There was a military exercise in Halifax yesterday, but if it was a participant in some way it never left the dock

On departure today the ship gave the US Guard base in Baltimore for a destination, but it came back in to Halifax in the early evening.

The tanker Navig8 Constellation (see yesterday's post) sailed at dusk for Houston. Its place was to be taken by Algoberta which arrived from the Kildair (Sprague) terminal, St-Victoire-de-Sorel, QC this morning and has been waiting at Pier 9B.

.

Fairview Cove picks up and non-stop at Autoport

After a quiet day at Fairview Cove things picked up again today. Atlantic Conveyor arrived early at the east berth on its usual routine visit, but not on the usual day. ACL's schedule has taken a beating this winter with weather and mechanical delays.

NYK Daedalus arrived at noon time for the G6 Alliance. Built 2007 by Hyundai Heavy Industries, Ulsan the 55,534 grt, 65,867 dwt, 4922 TEU ship began calling in Halifax last July.

Just as visibility started to close down, with the onset of rain, NYK Daedalus passed the Nova Scotia Power generating station at Tuft's Cove in the Narrows.

It also passed pier 9c where the idle Harefield has been in port for rudder repairs since March 19. Tugs Atlantic Willow, and Atlantic Oak (stern escort) shepherd the ship beneath the MacKay bridge.

Meanwhile Oceanex Sanderling spent the morning at Autoport. It usually berths at Halterm first on arrival from Newfoundland, but this time it went to Autoport first. 

A clear view of Oceanex Sanderling is blocked by snow mountain in one of Autoport's temporary parking areas. The ship loads new cars and rental agency cars for Newfoundland each week, although this week it has been there twice.

Oceanex Sanderling had completed its work by noon time and moved to pier 42. As soon as it was clear the autocarrier Boheme shifted from pier 31 where it has been waiting for the berth..

Two more autocarriers are scheduled for Autoport, Harmony Leader on Sunday and Artemis Leader to follow.

.

Saturday Roundup and further updates

As usual for a Saturday, there was lots of activity in the harbour - some to do with catching up after many delays due to heavy snow, some in advance of another weather system (this time mostly rain, to herald the arrival of spring) and some just normal activity.

Sloman Hermes arrived for bunkers. The ship was here December 13 at pier 31, apparently for repair.  A small chemical tanker of 11,298 grt, 16,418 dwt it was built in 2012 by  Jiangzhou Union in Rui Chang, China, and operates in the Navig8group tanker pool.

Sloman Hermes waits for bunkers.

Federal Tweed did eventually move to pier 27, but there was some problem after she weighed anchor in the Basin and Dominion Diving's Halmar came out to assist. It appears that a heaving line may have become fouled in the bow thruster. In any event the Narrows was busy with arrivals and departures - see below - and  she eventually was free to move. Whatever her problem (likely a bent prop blade), it is supposed to be fixed by this evening allowing her to sail.

Federal Tweed had weighed anchor, but was holding in the Basin for arrival of the Halmar.

Federal Tweed is owned by Fednav, one of more than 100 owned and chartered ship in the Canada's largest shipping company. At 31,590 grt, 55,317 dwt, with ice class 1C, it has four 30 tonne cranes (and clamshell buckets on deck) and is considered a supramax bulker, i.e. between 50,000 and 60,000 dwt
 -smaller than (old) Panamax and thus handysize. If all these terminologies are confusing, there is a good reference available http://maritime-connector.com/wiki/ship-sizes/

Halmar under the bow, with a number of extra hands on the foredeck peering over the rail. A heaving line is barely discernible from the centre lead down towards the bow thruster.

The ship was built in Oshima, Japan in 2013 and has a new hull design with fuller bow and almost plumb stem, with smaller bulbous bow.

The Narrows was a busy spot for time this morning with the arrival of Atlantic Cartier on its regular visit. First though was Atlantic Willow, putting on a little extra speed to get ahead of the Cartier.

It is unusual to see a tug running at speed thought he Narrows.

Atlantic Cartier with Atlantic Oak tethered astern.

Its berth at Fairview Cove was occupied by NYK Daedalus which departed after the Cartier was in the Basin. Interestingly, the tug Atlantic Oak was tethered escort on both the inbound Cartier and the outbound Daedalus, with the tug Atlantic Willow, unberthing the Daedalus first then going out to the Cartier to free up Atlantic Oak..

NYK Daedalus has cleared the MacKay bridge, and is southbound in the Narrows. Escort tug Atlantic Oak is not visible, but is tethered to astern.

NYK Daedalus first called here July 21, 2014. It was built in 2007 by Hyundai, Ulsan, measures 55,534 grt, 65867 dwt, and has a capacity of 4922 TEU.  

 

Meanwhile Yantian Express was still working cargo today, with trucks lined up on several streets leading toward the Fairview Cove terminal. There have been delays of inbound rail cargo due to the heavy snow and clearing the rail yards to move cars - those same cars must be emptied to load outbound cargo.
It is indicative of the problems with these larger ships however. They have so many containers to move that they place big demands on the terminals. Expect this situation to get worse as bigger and bigger ships arrive, even in good weather. Yantian Express arrived Tuesday March 17, the day of a fierce winter storm, with 70cm of snow and there was likely no work that day or most of the following day.

Yantian Express partially surrounded by snow dumped from clearing operations in the terminal.

Yantian Express, which sailed as Shanghai Express until 2012, was built in 2002 by Hyundai, Ulsan and measures 88,493 grt, 100,003 dwt, with a capacity of 7,506 TEU (700 reefer). It has just been displaced on the Asia-Western Europe service by even larger ships as Hapag-Lloyd rationalizes its fleet. It has announced that it will sell or scrap 16 ships - all of smaller size.

Updates:

At pier 9c Harefield was receiving the ministrations of Connors Diving under its stern, thanks to ice damage.
 
At Autoport: Tosca finally sailed and Opal Ace took its place.   
At Imperial Oil: Seavictory sailed in ballast for Saint John and Prisco Irina took its berth.

And in partial answer to the burning question How Much Snow Was There? I offer this photo of a gang of workers on the roof of the New Halifax Shipyard Assembly Hall, removing snow from the lowest roof,  - by hand (they also had a snow blower). The size of the drift against the higher wall is in excess of 10 feet, and is packed hard because it faces south and is exposed to sun all day.

The accumulation of snow and ice, melting and refreezing and fresh drifted snow on top has resulted in many roofs now loaded in excess of their design capacity. Tonight's rain, will result in untold additional stress, particularly when drains are blocked. 

According to most sources there has been 100cm in March, with 70 cm on March 21 alone..

.