You can find Maritime Monday 135 here. (Published 10 November 2008)
You can find last week’s edition here. Thanks to the crew at gCaptain for seeing that it was done in my absence!
You can find links to all the previous editions at the bottom of this post. You are encouraged to participate using the comment link/form at the bottom of the post. If you have photos or stories to tell, do email me at [email protected].
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This Week’s Photos:
This week’s photos come from the website of Malaysia’s MISC Berhard:
With a strong affiliation with our parent company, Petroliam Nasional Berhad (PETRONAS), MISC is fast becoming the world’s leading maritime transportation and logistics provider focused on energy transportation. 39 years on, we are now world renowned as the largest single owner/operator of LNG tankers.
Through our strategic partnerships and enthusiastic people-to-people relationships, MISC has helped shape businesses all over the globe. Our products and services continue to meet and exceed the demands and expectations of our growing clientele.
gCaptain has “Sea Shepherd Unveils New Weapon to Fight Whale Hunters“. I share the same opinion of many of the commenters who doubt that Sea Shepherd will be able to handle such a vessel that certainly will have zero tolerance for any contact with ice. The group seems to have no faith in proper training and this newest member of their fleet is just screaming for a crew with some.
After languishing for more than six years at the Waterfront Center in Oyster Bay, the historic Nantucket Lightship has been sold to a group that plans to move it to Boston next month and restore it.
On behalf on Indian Platform on Shipbreaking, I would like to bring to your attention the entry of the SS Oceanic (now named PLATINUM II), a convicted US ship in the Indian waters violating the US law under which it is illegal to export the highly toxic banned substance for any reason. The entry of this ship is manifestly illegal. It is reliably learnt that the name of the ship has again been changed. The new name of the ship has not been made public. The matter regarding this ship has been brought to the notice of the US authorities by Basel Action Network, a US based NGO as well.
Apparently MARAD is not exactly sure what has happened concerning this ship, at least that is the story according to the Basil Action Network. That is troubling since the only flag this ship ever held was American.
Speaking of ships, WTOP has a story supporting the missiles to Iran smuggling claim in “Ship allegedly hijacked had Russian missiles bound for Iran“. Sadly, it is easy to believe that the Russian Government would not be aware of others trading their own weapons.
Remember that story about a Finnish cargo ship with a Russian crew on board that mysteriously disappeared for weeks in mid-summer? When it turned up, hijackers were blamed. But the story is unraveling.
UGLYSHIPS.COM has some more history on the ship (see the post’s comments) as well as news of the imminent demise of the AERIA as it is towed off for scrapping. The ship was featured in Maritime Monday 183.
The authority is investigating whether a breach of a UN embargo took place. At the same time, it searched the ship itself when it called at Hamburg.
The Hansa India is chartered out to the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines. The ammunition found by US Navy forces is suspected to have been destined for Syria and falls under UN sanctions.
“I regret that bullet casings have been carried on the ship, but there was no possibility for me to prevent that,” Frank Leonhardt told Lloyd’s List.
No regrets for chartering the ship to Iran though, eh? That would have been a good way to prevent weapons smuggling on your ship. Hey, at least they are not banking in a ‘tax haven’. Doing that might result in real punishment…
Jean Zimmerman (author of Tailspin: Women at War in the Wake of Tailhook -1995) notes that there is a perception in the Navy that women sailors use pregnancy to escape deployed ship duty.
Ronald Goldstock, the Waterfront Commission’s New York representative, spoke out against the Shipping Association’s proposal. He said his agency needs to continue to regulate hiring to keep out organized crime and promote ethnic diversity in the port work force.
“There’s still mob influence on the waterfront,” said Goldstock, a former director of the New York State Organized Crime Task Force. “One of the things that gives the mob its power over the industry is the surplus of labor. We want to ensure that doesn’t occur.”
Watts Up With That? has the latest global warming lunacy, covering nowhereisland.org.
Oddly enough, despite the fact that a recent study proved that a previous stone-dropping action in Germany was effective, the outrage was tremendous. The area, which was supposed to have been protected by the Swedish government under EU law, was predominantly being fished by Danish fishermen, who went berserk and got their government to pressure the Swedes into taking action against us. The Swedish Environmental Protection Agency did just that. It appealed to the country’s Environmental Court, stating that the action would disturb the local marine environment and that we needed a license to drop the blocks.
After over a month’s wait, we finally have our verdict. The Swedish Environmental Court has dismissed the appeal , confirming that our action did no environmental harm.
I think they came upon a form of environmental action that will be both generally acceptable to the public as well as effective in supporting their goal of protecting species in the areas where they deploy this tactic.
Psst. Have I got a deal for you. For only $65 million you can be the owner of a military landing hovercraft — complete with guns, compartments for three tanks, space for 170 troops and nuclear and CBW shelters. It can be yours in just 4-5 months and will ship from Eastern Europe. And it’s for sale on the website of Portland Yacht Sales, which bills itself on the site as engaged in “International Yacht and Ship Brokerage.”
THE ISLOMANIAC has “The Islomaniac U.S. Congressman” as Congressman Flake spends a week on a deserted island. So how can we get the rest of them out there?
The Maritime Executive has “Jones Act: In Extremis?” which includes the following observation:
The disaster represented by the bankruptcy of the Hawaii Superferry because of a bungled regulatory assessment has left a decidedly bad taste in everyone’s mouth. And the potential hit represented by the Maritime Administration’s (MARAD) $136 million Title XI federal loan guarantee for that project may have sealed the fate of additional projects of this scale.
In an effort to stem the surge, unmanned U.S. military surveillance planes called MQ-9 Reapers stationed on the island nation of Seychelles are being deployed to patrol the Indian Ocean in search of pirates, Moeller told The Associated Press in an interview at command headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany. The patrols began this week, military officials said.
The 36-foot-long Reapers are the size of a jet fighter, can fly about 16 hours and are capable of carrying a dozen guided bombs and missiles. They are outfitted with infrared, laser and radar targeting.
San Diego Source has “Hawaii regulators approve first US tuna farm”.
Unlike many tuna farms around the world which capture immature tuna and fatten them until they’re ready for harvest, Hawaii Oceanic expects to artificially hatch bigeye at a University of Hawaii lab in Hilo.
After the fry grow, the company will take the fish to giant ocean pens about three miles offshore where they will grow until they reach 100 pounds.
AFP has one reason for me to stop thinking about whether or not to move back to Finland with “Unemployment looms over Finnish shipyards“. I am not a Finn (my wife is) which makes finding work there so much more difficult as a foreigner, even though I speak the language.
I was talking to someone who was bragging about how great their employment contract was yesterday, and he said “My contract is in both Chinese and English, and it says that in the case of a difference in the translation, the English language version takes precedence.”
Am I the only person who sees the potential abuses of this, when given to someone who cannot read Chinese? If the Chinese language version says the opposite, he’s screwed, right?
Marenostrum has a photo of the five-master “SV PRUESSEN“.
Attorney General Eric Holder this week issued new guidelines for U.S. attorneys, advising them not to pursue people for prosecution who use marijuana in clear compliance with state laws allowing medical use.
Afterward, DOT began receiving calls about whether that medical-use situation could exempt transportation workers, in states where it is legal. DOT requires that people who test positive for marijuana be removed from jobs that can affect safety pending a review and treatment.
“We want to make it perfectly clear that the DOJ guidelines will have no bearing on the Department of Transportation’s regulated drug testing program,” wrote Jim Swart, director of the Drug and Alcohol Policy office. “We will not change our regulated drug testing program based upon these guidelines to Federal prosecutors.
UK cadets face job squeeze – UK CADETS today will fear a drop in job prospects, despite earning of their first certificates, as shipowners seek to stem losses in the recession.
The UK Chamber of Shipping told Fairplay today that it had joined the maritime unions RMT and Nautilus to seek more support from the UK government. But the proposals, first lodged nearly three years ago, are still gathering dust at the transport ministry.
The chamber and its partners were trying to ensure that UK officers remain at the upper end of the world competency scale. Cadets graduating each year from UK colleges number about 1,000.
Openings aboard British-flagged ships are dropping. AP Møller-Maersk, for example, is removing 15 ships from the UK register with the loss of 113 jobs.
And any reduction in the size of the active UK fleet not only cuts the number of training places for cadets, but also reduces employment prospects for those junior deck officers on the first steps of the ladder. – Fairplay Homepage (Used with Permission)
AND:
Breakers brake for green light – CONTROVERSY is swirling around US cruise ship Platinum II, which is waiting 60km off Alang in India for green clearance before being dismantled.
Indian government investigators have completed its inspection for possible presence of toxic substances, sources at the Gujarat Maritime Board told Fairplay.
The board had earlier cleared the 26,600gt vessel on the basis of findings by its pollution investigators but green groups complained and urged Delhi to send out its own inspection team.
Meanwhile, Komalkant Sharma of Leela Ship Recycling, which will be dismantling the vessel, told Fairplay that his yard is equipped to handle safe disposal of complex vessel types.
“We can safely dismantle even nuclear-powered vessels,” he added, but said his main worry relates to the state of the ship.
“The vessel is taking in water,” he warned. “If the ship sinks, the environmental impact can be disastrous.”
An official at the board played down that concern. “There was some water in the engine room, but repairs have been completed and the ship is safe,” he told Fairplay. – Fairplay Homepage (Used with Permission)
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Submissions for future editions:
Please submit articles for inclusion in next week’s edition using the following submit form at Blog Carnival. You are also welcome to email stories and photos to [email protected] for inclusion in future editions as well as suggest areas of coverage.
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Previous Editions: As linked below or click on the tag ‘Maritime Monday’ for all gCaptain editions.
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