Saturday ins and outs

Fog early meant no photo of CMA CGM Otello on the Columbus JAX serice. The 8488 TEU ship is similar to several other CMA CGM fleet mates that have called here before, but it is the first time for this ship.

There was better luck later in the day and in the early evening as the fog had disappeared (at least for now). Budapest Bridge arrived for THE Alliance AL6 transatlantic service. It is a sister ship to the other ships on the service, and is owned by Seaspan and on long term charter to K-Line.

 Budapest Express crosses the ferry track with the tug Atlantic Oak taking the tethered escort position aft.

Built in 2011 by Samsung Shipbuilding and Heavy Industries Co Ltd in Koje, South Korea, it has a 4526 TEU capacity on 46,444 grt, 58,200 dwt.

After it entered Bedford Basin it waited off Fairview Cove as NYU Atlas sailed. It is servicing THE Alliance also but on the long haul run which is heavily populated with NYK Line ships.

 NYK Atlas is trimmed down by the stern - perhaps to reduce air draft - as it transits the Narrows.

This one was built by IHI Marine in Kure, Japan in 2004 and measures 75,484 grt, 81,171 dwt with a capacity of 6492 TEU including 450 reefers.

Meanwhile alongside pier 9b the tanker Torm Atlantic is ballasted down by the bow for prop repairs.

Evidence of hasty renamings on the stern where the original name and port of registry (Majuro) in welded letters are still in place.  Although the ship has the Torm funnel mark it does not (yet) have the orange superstructure of typical Torm tankers.

A Medium Range tanker of 30,221 grt, 49,999 dwt, it was built in 2010 by Guangzhou International in China as Giacinta. In 2015 it very briefly carried the name Maersk Malta, before assuming its current name later in the same year. The ship arrived at Imperial Oil July 4 from Montreal. If it unloaded cargo it may be one of the unnamed ships chartered by Algoma and given temporary coasting licenses to carry Esso products.

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Queen Mary 2 night visit

The Queen Mary 2 made a very brief visit to Halifax in the wee hours of this morning. A passenger was suffering from respiratory problems and had to be landed for treatment. The nature of the ailment precluded the use of a helicopter (thick fog probably didn't help either).
The ship took a pilot as usual and entered the inner harbour, and as soon as the passenger had been disembarked the Queen got underway again and returned to sea.
The ocean liner (as opposed to a cruise ship) then resumed its transatlantic voyage from New York to Southampton.
The Queen Mary 2 has made two scheduled visits to Halifax this year and is due again on August 10 and October 4.

Now Showing

Although I am in my sixth decade of marine photography, my current show at the Public Archives of Nova Scotia is entitled Four Decades of Marine Photography. That is because I have selected images only from the 1960s to 1990s.


They are all in black and white and were taken in Quebec and Nova Scotia (with one from New Brunswick) and show a wide range of shipping related subjects from my large archive.


On Saturday, July 8, there will be an opening reception from 1300 to 1600 in the Chase Gallery at the Public Archives of Nova Scotia, 6016 University Avenue, corner of Robie Street.


The exhibit runs until July 26. Gallery hours are Monday to Saturday 0830 -1630, Wednesdays until 2100 hrs.


All photos are professionally printed on archival water colour paper, with acid free matte and framed behind glass and are for sale. Prices range from $125 to $150.

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Dartmouth III heading west

The oldest of the Halifax harbour ferries has been sold and will be heading to Toronto to work for the Toronto Island Transit Service Inc. Dartmouth III dates from 1979 when it was built by Ferguson Industries in Pictou, NS (Hull No. 205). It arrived in Halifax on May 3, 1979 but did not enter service until September 10, 1979. That was the day that it and its sister Halifax III (Ferguson Hull No. 206)
replaced the 1956 era wooden ferries Dartmouth II and Halifax II. Your faithful reporter made a one way cruise on each during his noon time lunch hour on that day.

At that time the ferry service was operated by the then City of Dartmouth, and so it was that Dartmouth III was christened by Genevieve Brownlow the wife of Dartmouth mayor Daniel Brownlow on Sunday, September 9. There was an open house and trial cruise in the harbour.

The two boats were state of the art vessels, propelled by Voith-Schneider cycloidal drives and were especially configured for the new ferry terminals in Halifax and Dartmouth, with offset wheelhouse and side loading ramps.

Cycloidal drives are rarely visible, and difficult to explain. The vertical vanes rotate on a turnatable. The captain adjusts the pitch of the vanes to go forward or in reverse or in fact any direction, including sideways.

 
The Cities of Halifax and Dartmouth and Halifax County formed Metro Transit in 1981 to operate the area's bus services, but it was not until 1994 that the commission took over the ferry service. In 1996 when the three municipalities joined to form the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM), the new body operated the transit services directly but it was still called Metro Transit. In 2014 it was rebranded Halifax Transit and the HRM was re-branded Halifax (minus the cross bars on the As).
[Despite all this the areas of Halifax and Dartmouth are still used in common parlance and in postal addresses, and in this blog.]

 Dartmouth III dressed all over and with a large load of passengers during Tall Ships 2009.

Dartmouth III was removed from service in 2016 after new ferries came into service and it laid up over the last winter at the former Coast Guard base in Dartmouth.  On June 5 it was towed out to Sambro by Halifax Tugger and Capt. Jim and hauled out on the slip at the Canadian Maritime Engineering shipyard.

On the slip at Sambro Head

It will be interesting to see how the Dartmouth III will get to Toronto. It might be possible to sail on its own hull, but at 8 knots and no sleeping accommodation it would make a long trip of many short hops.
It seems an unlikely candidate for a tow since it relies on its propulsion system to stay on track. Perhaps on a barge?

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Polar Prince, other royalty and...

To mark the 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, a 150 day Coast to Coast to Coast expedition, called Canada C3, will bring together scientists, educators, students and others to see and explore Canada as few others can, aboard the icebreaker Polar Prince. 

 Polar Prince disembarks some RHIBS as it approaches the lower harbour.

Organized in 15 legs, the ship will sail from Toronto to Victoria via the Northwest Passage.
The expedition has its own web site at: https://canadac3.ca/en/homepage/

The ship Polar Prince is no stranger to Halifax and Nova Scotia since it has spent several winters in Lunenburg. However it does go back further than that.
Built in 1959 by Davie Shipbuilding Ltd, Lauzon, QC the ship was named Sir Humphrey Gilbert and was stationed in Newfoundland.

In 1983 it arrived in Halifax where it underwent a major reconstruction, that included a new icebreaking bow. The old bow was broken up in Dartmouth.

Its derrick system was also reconfigured. Changing from the traditional derrick mounted on the house, with control room under the bridge, it received a new goal post type structure mounted at the break of the forecastle with the derrick house on the forepeak. It retained its old mast, less the boom. The refit was completed in early 1985 and it returned to Newfoundland. It was back in Halifax again in 1996 for a refit.

It was decommissioned then in November 2001renamed 2001-06 . It was sold to Gilbert Enterprises of Clarenville, NL and renamed Gilbert I, then in July 2002 to Norcon Marine Services in Glovertown, NL and renamed Polar Prince. Since then it has been owned by Deep Ocean Research Ltd of St.John's and current owner GX Technology Canada Ltd of Calgary. During that time it has been Canada's only commercial icebreaker (there are several icebreaker class commercial cargo ships, and a number of government icebreakers) and was last in Halifax in 2010.

It received another major modernization in 2009. For the Canada C3 expedition, it has received a new paint scheme that includes the Canadian flag.

There was other royalty in port too, as Queen Mary 2 made another visit.

Trying to get a view of the ship from a different angle this time, I managed a "going away" shot from Herring Cove.

 Yang Ming Line's YM Evolution is a regular now on the AL1 service of THE Alliance. HAPAG-Lloyd, a partner in the service seems to have no ships in this particular loop - it is all Yang Ming.

YM Evolution's bow dips slightly as she works into the swell off Herring Cove outbound for sea.

One of five sister ships, it was built by the China Shipbuilding Corp in Kaoshiung in 2014 and carries 4662 TEU on 47,952 grt, 57,320 dwt. It is registered in Taiwan.

This morning's arrival for Tropical Shipping was AHS Hamburg, one of two ships to service the line from Halifax. By late morning however its name disappeared from the bow ...

... and this afternoon was replaced by the name Bomar Rebecca.

At the same time the ship's registry was changed from Antigua and Barbuda to Liberia. When it sailed it still had the Carsten Rehder funnel marking, but this seems likely to change at its next port of call, which is to be West Palm Beach. The new name suggests that the ship has been acquired by Boreal Maritime of London, and will  be under the management of Bernhard Schulte. It is too early to tell if the ship will remain on the Tropical Shipping run.

The ship was built in 2008 by Jingling Shipyard in Nanjing as Pacific Hawk. It was renamed AHS Hamburg in 2012. The 9957 grt, 13,760 dwt ship carries two 45 tonne cranes and has a capacity of 1118 TEU.

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Sunday comings and goings

A visitor from the Great Lakes made a stop over for bunkers before sailing for Foynes, Ireland this afternoon. Fearless is a bulk carrier built in 2001 by the Naikai shipyard in Setoda, Japan. Its original name was Bright Laker and it made several trips to the Great Lakes under that name, before it was sold and became Fearless in 2013. Its dimensions of 606'-11" x 77'-5" make it a "Seawaymax" ship. It is fitted with four 30 tonne cranes to allow it to handle a variety of cargoes such as steel.

Its tonnages are 18,049 grt, 30,778 dwt, but due to draft restrictions in the St.Lawrence Seaway it cannot load to full deadweight tonnage on the Lakes.

It made its most recent trip to the Great Lakes when it entered the St.Lawrence Seaway June 2. It unloaded cargo in Oshawa, ON and Detroit, MI before arriving in Milwaukee June 17. There it loaded its grain cargo, sailing on June 23, and exiting the Seaway June 28. Unlike some Great Lakes callers it did not top up its cargo on the St.Lawrence, but continued direct to Halifax.

We will be saying goodbye to the the tall ship Esmerelda this evening. It moved out to anchor this morning to give the cruise ship Celebrity Summit lots of room to leave pier 21 (the cruise ship over- nighted in Halifax so that passengers could enjoy Canada Day celebrations).

Back in its previous anchorage, Esmerelda battens down in preparation for heading to sea.

 Also sailing this afternoon, was the newest member of the Canadian tanker fleet. Golden Oak, which arrived June 25, has been chartered by Algoma Tankers for six months, and placed under Canadian flag. That means it has a Canadian crew and can trade between Canadian ports at will. This is a refreshing change from the flurry of coastal licenses the various tanker companies resort to when there is an increased demand. The ship was registered in Halifax on June 15.

In this case Esso refinery shutdowns have meant an increased demand for tankers to deliver fuel to the Greater Toronto Area, and southern On tarioas  a whole.

I neglected to mention in my post of June 25, that the ship was built as Sichem Berlin in 2008 but was very soon renamed  Marida Margeurite. It took its present name in 2014. 

 

Golden Oak outbound for Nanticoke, ON.

Those coastal licenses allow foreign flagged ships (and their crews) to sail in Canadian waters, sometimes for prolonged periods. Most however are for a month, which makes it impractical to sign on a Canadian crew, much to the consternation of the seafarers.


See Tugfax for one such example.

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Canada 150 Day

It was the day for festivities as Canada celebrated the 150th anniversary of confederation. Regrettably the weather was not fully co-operative in many areas, including Halifax, however I did manage a red and white themed photo.

With the lower harbour "tick o' fog"  the Narrows was the only more or less clear spot all day Canada Day.

CCGC Bickerton sailed from the Bedford Institute Coast Guard dock for its home base of East Bickerton (pronounced Beckerton).

The first Arun class high endurance lifeboat to join the CCG, it is not only the oldest of the ten boats, built in 1989, but it is also the only one with an FRG hull. Bickerton was built by Halmatic in Southampton, UK and followed the original design by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. The RNLI operated scores of these craft between 1971 and 2008. The rest of the CCG boats were built in Canada in various yards, with aluminum hull.

Shortly after delivery, Bickerton occupies a spot at the small craft end of the old Coast Guard base on Parker Street in Dartmouth. In the background CCGS Provo Wallis and Frank M. Weston and in the foreground a ubiquitous dory.

 
As delivered to the CCG, Bickerton wore the late lamented Search and Rescue colours of red hull, white stripe and yellow superstructure. Those colours were eliminated when the CCG was folded into the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and many vessels were multi-tasked to include SAR duties.

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