Top: Leschi demonstrating its 20,000 gallon-per-minute capacity. Above: Dick Chester (left), Leschi's chief engineer, and Chris Dahline, captain of Fire Station No. 5, in front of the boat's fire monitor. "We're looking for this to be the ultimate fire-fighting platform," says Dahline. (Photos by Brad Warren) Not many vessels are designed to swamp fires with 20,000 gallons per minute — a water bombardment that would collapse most buildings. Fewer still are built to combat chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive emergencies. Meet Leschi: Seattle Fire Department's newest floating disaster-fighter was delivered this spring by Dakota Creek Industries of Anacortes, Wash., and crew members have been training and outfitting the high-tech vessel for months as they prepare to bring it into service. By any measure, this 108-foot craft is the dreadnought…
Alakai adds a fast-ferry option that hasn't been available in Hawaii since the Boeing jetfoils. (Photos courtesy of Austal USA) Alakai, the largest aluminum vessel ever built in the United States, entered service in August as Hawaii's first high-speed vehicle/passenger ferry. The vessel was built at Austal USA's expanded shipyard in Mobile, Ala., and the customer was Hawaii Superferry of Honolulu. A second high-speed ferry is under construction for 2009 delivery. The superferry has been a monumental and locally controversial project because of its cost and environmental impact. Protesters in surfboards, kayaks and canoes blocked Nawiliwili Harbor in Kauai on Aug. 26, its first day of operations, forcing the vessel to turn back to Honolulu, and its operator halted service indefinitely. The catamaran is similar in design to several vehicle/passenger…
Divers recovered the body of a missing tugboat captain in the Mississippi River, the Times-Picayune newspaper of New Orleans reported. Louisiana authorities identified him as a 35-year-old mariner and said his body was found in the wheelhouse of the tug Gate-Way. The Specialty Marine Services vessel sank while it was helping to move barges near the Shell-Motiva oil refinery. Click here to view the newspaper's story.
Lt. Cliff Harder of Sector Houston/Galveston describes procedures to Adm. Thad Allen, commandant of the Coast Guard, during a safety and security inspection of a chemical carrier in the Houston Ship Channel. Allen has acknowledged that the Coast Guard's resources have been stretched thin. (Photos courtesy U.S. Coast Guard) The Coast Guard hopes to hire hundreds of civilian inspectors and retired Coast Guard officers to bolster its beleaguered Marine Safety program. Commandant Adm. Thad Allen proposed the idea of a "blended workforce" during testimony before a congressional panel in August. Members of the House Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation -- and several mariners who testified -- stated that the Coast Guard's focus on homeland security since 9/11 has diverted attention and resources away from the inspection…
He went like one that hath been stunned And is of sense forlorn:A sadder and wiser man,He rose the morrow morn. excerpt from:The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge The recent popular news has been telling us about the wave of Boomers who are approaching retirement but still need and want to work. I count myself among this crowd. After closing my seafood business of 15 years, Maine’s Best Seafood in Hancock, Maine, in December of 2006, due to a lack of scallops, mussels, crabs and other items, and anticipating an avalanche of paperwork that would soon be required by the State for all purchases from fishermen, I brought to a close my 40 years of involvement with the Maine/New England seafood industry as both a harvester and a…
For Second Mate Shehab Mohamed Mustafa and 28 others, Charleston Harbor might as well have been a jail. The Egyptian crew aboard the bulk carrier Edco was stranded at Charleston for almost four months after the vessel became entangled in a financial dispute.Under a legal practice based on ancient maritime tradition, Edco was "arrested" by U.S. marshals after the ship's Egyptian owner was sued by a Hong Kong company that claimed economic losses related to a sister ship.While the lawsuit became bogged down in U.S. District Court, the 635-foot Edco and crew were stuck at Charleston under the watch of a court-appointed custodian and security guards. None of the 29 men could go ashore because none had a U.S. visa."We were prisoners — like we were not human," Mustafa, 28,…
In May, the Port of Long Beach began using two portable underwater robots with high-frequency sonar imaging capabilities as part of its new underwater surveillance system. The robots can be used from shore to search for dangerous objects on the port's piers, as well as the underwater surfaces of vessels, said Cosmo Perrone, director of security for Long Beach. They will be used to take underwater photos of the entire pier system to create a baseline record of existing conditions. With the help of the robots, security officials will be able "to understand everything that is going on in port" and "to differentiate what is normal activity from what is suspect," he said. The robots are part of a comprehensive underwater security system being installed in Long Beach. "If you…
With a new 57-mm naval gun and instant intelligence exchange with other branches of the military, Bertholf, the first of the U.S. Coast Guard's latest class of high-endurance cutters, is bigger and badder than its predecessors. The ship is also a reminder that all Coast Guard vessels have multiple missions. Bertholf's flight deck can handle helicopters and drones. A stern notch, unusual on a ship of its size, leads to a ramp for launching and recovering two small boats. A waterline door on the starboard side, a feature borrowed from cruise ships, allows survivors, divers or detainees to disembark easily from boat to ship. All three improvements are designed to make boardings speedier and safer. "That's our business — to do the boardings, whether we're in (the Eastern…
