Onego Chinook- engine failure

1. Anchors brought home, the ship has lost power and is drifting astern.

2. The re-start off Africville park was fairly dramatic.

3. Underway towards the Narrows and into bright low sunshine.

As Onego Chinook got underway from Bedford Basin anchorage this morning, she had a main engine failure. Fortunately this did not occur in the Narrows, but still it was a bit closer to shore than desirable. After drifting around (and mostly astern) for several minutes, there was a spectacular restart - with lots of black smoke- and the ship got underway again.Her subsequent trip to pier 27 seems to have gone ahead without incident and the ship tied up ready to start unloading rails on Monday morning.

The very low sun was not terribly conducive to good photography and it was a cold and breezy morning (minus 15 C and 20 knots.) The deck crew remained in position in case they had to drop anchor - they must have been colder than me!

The recent incident with sister MCP Troodos and many other ships on the St.Lawrence River in the past month, where they have had cooling water problems, may have been the cause of today's incident. In which case it points out that many ships sailing our waters in winter time are not properly prepared to do so. Ice crystalizes in the ship's cooling water intake and the engine shuts down due to overheating. It is only a matter of time before one of these ships gets into real trouble. Interestingly Onego Chinook and MCP Troodos have two main engines, which should provide redundancy in most situations. However a common cooling water system - or an unsuitable one for freezing conditions- will shut down both engines.

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Coming and Going, Big and Little

It was a day for arrivals and departures of all sizes in Halifax. With bad weather on the way later this afternoon, most ships would be happier to be in port, but several also left-good luck to them.
The bulker Onego Chinook sailed in to an anchorage in Bedford Basin. I expect she has a cargo of rails destined for pier 27, which is currently occupied by Amurborg, working the same cargo. Interestingly Onego Chinook is a sister to MCP Troodos still at anchor following some repairs. Onego Chinook is one of seven sister ships working for Onego, but managed by Interships. She was built with two 40 tonne cranes, whereas MCP Troodos was built as MCP Alstertal, a gearless ship, and had the larger 80 tonne cranes installed only last year, and operates for Interships/Hartmann directly.
Onego Chinook flies the flag of Cyprus and is5338 gross tons/ 7709 deadweight. It is operated out of Onego's New York office.

OOCL Shanghai arrived just as the snow started and tied up at Fairview Cove. A post-Panamax type of 66,289 gross tons, it carries 5,762 TEUs and is owned by ER Schiffs of Germany, flies the German flag and was built in 1999.

Nirint Hollandia unloaded her cargo of Cuban nickel ore and scurried off to sea again. She is very lightly loaded and will have an uncomfortable night at sea I expect. Built in 2007 it is owned by JW & PJ Danser (hence the "D" monogram on the bow) of the Netherlands and is managed by Wagenborg. It is a general cargo ship of 8999 gross tons and 12,000 deadweight.

The big tanker Mattea moved from her repair berth at pier 25-26 to an anchorage in Bedford Basin. This move was probably a precaution due to the high winds in the forecast. She will very likely be moving back to the pier once the system goes through. She is a Canadian flag, Hibernia shuttle tanker of 76,216 gross tons, 126,360 deadweight.

Also departing was the bulker Delos Ranger. This 31,1340 gross/ 54,057 deadweight ship built in 2008 flies the Bahamas flag and loaded gypsum. This is the first time she has ever been in Halifax and is a departure from the normal conveyor type self-unloaders we usually see. It is owned by Lagoon Shipholding Ltd and is managed by Enterprise Shipping & Trading of Athens.

And the grain carrier African Gardenia sailed with a load of food aid grain. She is a sister to several ships that specialize in carrying food aid grains. Built way back in 1981 she is a bulk carrier of 6498 gross and 9101 deadweight. Owned by a single ship company part of Elmira Shipping & Trading of Athens, she flies the Liberian flag.

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Amurborg

1. Amurborg passes Saudi Abha at pier 30 as it arrives this morning.

2. A snow flurry competes with the sun as the ship turns in toward pier 27.

The Wagenborg ship Amurborg arrived this morning at pier 27. The large Wagenborg fleet speciliazes in carrying forest products, but their ships can carry a variety of cargoes, such as today's load of rails for CN.

Amurborg is an ice class 1A ship of 11,855 gross tons and 17,323 deadweight, built in 2011.

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MCP Troodos in for repairs

1. Repairs complete, MCP Troodos went to anchor this afternoon.

2. MCP Troodos ghosts into Halifax January 7 in the the fog.

3. A fuel truck has just finished bunkering at pier 27, and Imperial Oil's flare stack puts on a show early this morning.

4. As seen from across the pier, MCP Troodos awaits completion of repairs this morning.

The general cargo ship MCP Troodos arrived yesterday and tied up at pier 27 for repairs. There was welding work going on under the port quarter, which is not visible in the shadows of the photos. The ship was en route from the St.Lawrence River, and diverted to Halifax for the work. While here it also took advantage of the opportunity to take on fuel.

Built by Shandong Huangchi in China in 2007, it is a ship of 5,272 gross tons, 7,602 deadweight, and carries two 80 tonne cranes that can work in tandem for lifts of 160 tonnes.

It is owned by the German Oetker company, but operated by Intership Navigation Co of Cyprus. See more on their web site at: http://www.intership-cyprus.com/mcp-class

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Louis S. St-Laurent on the move (amended)

1. Louis doing donuts in the Basin at noon time today.

2. Yesterday they tried out the bubbler system. Soon after they lowered the lifeboat.

Once dubbed "the Hotel" because it remained in port for so long without moving, that is no longer the case with CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent. The rush to get the ship back in service for the Gulf icebreaking season after her centre prop repairs, saw the ship doing dockside trials yesterday and sea trials today.

After several loops around the Bedford Basin this morning to see if all was well and get all systems warmed up, the ship put out to sea for more trials. It now appears to be anchored for the night offshore.

Amendment: After going out to sea, the ship headed off to Newfoundland. It is scheduled for an alongside refit from January 26 to March 8. This would seem to preclude much icebreaking this winter.

Spruceglen to drydock

1. Spruceglen is clear of pier 25-26, and the tugs have started to turn it northbound.

2. Lining up for the Novadock with the tug Atlantic Hemlock on the bow. The ship has pumped out most of its water ballast, and is sitting very high in the water. Its steering nozzle and prop are visible.

3. Almost in position, the ship fills the length of the drydock.

4. In its original colours, and with its original name, the ship is tied up at pier 25-26 in 1986. The grain leg was needed to unload the ship, which has no unloading gear.

The bulker Spruceglen made a cold move this morning to the Novadock at Halifax Shipyard. Although there were some crew members on the ship, it did not use its own engines - the tugs Atlantic Hemlock and Atlantic Larch did all the work.

The ship has a long history with Halifax. It was built by Govan Shipbuilders in Scotland and was launched without ceremony January 28, 1983. However there was a formal naming ceremony April 15 of the same year, and the ship's sponsor was Mrs Ann Day, the wife of Sir Graham Day. He is a Nova Scotian, knighted by the Queen for his role in the reorganization of the British shipbuilding industry.

The ship was built as Selkirk Settler named for the Scots immigrants to Prince Edward Island, Southern Ontario and Manitoba, arranged by Lord Selkirk in the early 1800s. The settlements were deemed to be failures in his lifetime, but the enterprises brought hundreds hardworking highlanders to Canada.

The ship went to work for its first owners, Misener Transportation of St.Catharines, ON, in the Great Lakes and North Atlantic grain trade. It and its two sisters were among the first ocean going ships built to maximum Seaway size to fly the Canadian flag.

In 1991 the ship was sold to Fednav and renamed Federal St.Louis but was soon resold to Japanese owners, placed under the Philippine flag and renamed Federal Fraser. It was chartered back to Fednav for ten years, and changed owners several times, and was reflagged to Hong Kong and later Panama.

In 2002 the ship was renamed Fraser when Fednav bought the ship back in order to sell it to Canada Steamship Lines, where it acquired the name Spruceglen.

(Fednav and CSL had a long standing relationship, under which Fednav assisted Paul Martin in buying and expanding CSL.)

The ship also returned to the Canadian flag, but continued with some international work, generally on the east coast of North America, and working on the Great Lakes.

It was a frequent caller in Halifax in its early days, while carrying grain, and in its CSL days, usually for bunkers or repairs.

The ship still carries the black hull paint which used to denote ships of the international fleet, and gearless bulkers in the domestic fleet. Most of the gearless CSL bulkers now have red hulls, and this may be the year for the change. We will keep watching the Novadock.

The ship measures 730'-1" long x 75'9" wide (the maximum allowable Seaway size when it was built) and has an ocean deadweight tonnage of 36,281 tonnes (at 32'-8" draft) or Seaway deadweight of 26,291 tonnes (at 26'-6" draft). It is powered by a 10,880 bhp Sulzer engine driving a controllable pitch prop in a steering nozzle. It also has a powerful bow thruster.

This is a well built ship, with a long lived slow speed engine, and can be expected to give many more years of service.

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Quiet Day

1. Cranes up - no work for the holiday.

New Years Day is a "no work" day in the port of Halifax, but unusually this year, there was a ship tied up and ready for the end of the holiday.

Thailand Express (ex OOCL Seattle) arrived yesterday at Fairview Cove and is poised and ready for the resumption of work. Two ships are also anchored off the port. One, the autocarrier Pegasus Highway, was due to tie up at Autoport at 6 pm but as of 9 pm was still at anchor. The other, OOCL Shanghai, will wait until Thailand Express sails.

The work holidays for the port are dictated by the collective agreement between the labour unions and the Halifax Employers Association. Read more on their new web site:

http://halifaxemployers.com/

Although New Year's Day is not currently displayed, here are the rules for Christmas:

"No work to be performed from 12h00 (noon) on December 24 until 18h00 on boxing Day (Dec. 26), except that on Boxing Day ship work and coincident related terminal work may commence at 08h00 or 13h00 and shall be paid at double the rates shown for Holidays, to a maximum of six (6) times the basic wage rate in the appended wage schedules of the collective agreement. In addition, emergency work and lines may be performed during the no work period and the rates of pay shall be double the rates for Holidays, to a maximum of six (6) times the basic wage rate."

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