Maritime Monday 189

The following is posted by Fred Fry:

Welcome to this 189th edition of Maritime Monday.

You can find Maritime Monday 139 here. (Published 08 December 2008)

You can find last week’s edition here.

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 the Semester at Sea program:

Semester at Sea’s mission is to educate individuals for leadership, service, and success in shaping our interdependent world. We are committed to providing profoundly transformative study-abroad experiences that emphasize global exchange and awareness. We will continue to make a positive world impact by developing leaders who have the knowledge and perspective necessary to promote greater understanding of all peoples and all cultures.

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Their homepage can be found here.

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This Week’s Items:

EagleSpeak has “Somalia Pirates: A Defense?“

gCaptain has “Maersk Alabama Thwarts Another Pirate Attack Using Armed Guards“. One issue about arming ships is that you cannot use them if you do not have them onboard.

gCaptain also has “S/V Noordhoek Pathfinder Launched“.

Yahoo News has a great example of how the United States is a land of opportunity for those willing to work for it in “Unique homecoming to Vietnam for US commander“.

DANANG, Vietnam – On the day his side lost the Vietnam War, Hung Ba Le fled his homeland at the age of 5 in a fishing trawler crammed with 400 refugees. Thirty-four years later, he made an unlikely homecoming — as the commander of a U.S. Navy destroyer.

Le piloted the USS Lassen on Saturday into Danang, home of China Beach, where U.S. troops frequently headed for R&R during the war, which ended on April 30, 1975, when the southern city of Saigon was taken by communist troops from North Vietnam.

Deep Water Writing explains “Cable Ops“.

US Naval Institute Blog has the interesting story: “Guest Post by Mike Walling: Coast Guard Forgotten History: A Tsarist Officer in the US Coast Guard“.

The Wall Street Journal has “If Odysseus Had GPS“.

What a momentous change. For most of human history, losing contact with a loved one was all too easy, especially when great distances intervened. Leave-takings must have been particularly fraught when one might not get word of a loved one for months, years—or ever. Laura Linney, as Abigail Adams, brought to vivid life the heartache of an 18th-century parting when John Adams left for Europe in the TV miniseries. In Crusoe’s day, in fact, most people didn’t even have pictures of one another to hang onto.

Marine Log has published it’s November Edition online.

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Lloyd’s List Newsroom Blog has “Go Slow“.

IT WAS not so long ago when every new service announcement from a container line proclaimed loudly it would the offer the fastest transit times in the market on the particular route it was serving.

Modern, faster ships were the way to go to meet the demands of just-in-time logistics. The idea of deliberately slowing down would have resulted in much hilarity.

The Journal of Commerce has some of the implications of the ‘Go Slow’ almost ‘Just-in-time’ strategy with “J.C. Penney Sees ‘Havoc’ from Ocean Carrier Cuts“. Are you finding that items you would like to buy are sold out? Shipping issues might be one reason why.

Carrier cutbacks are playing havoc with the supply chains of retailers. “Changes in sailing schedules are killing us,” said Martin Bernstein, transportation excellence director at J.C. Penney.

Bernstein said 25 percent of Penney’s routings this year have been affected by changes in schedules and reduced sailings. This scheduling uncertainty comes at a time when retailers have reduced the inventory they carry in order to cut costs and improve efficiency.

Inside GNSS has the death of LORAN in “Obama Signs Bills Cutting Funds for eLoran, HIGPS, GPS OCX“. LORAN-C dies in the US on 4 January 2010.

CGBlog has “Travel: The Krassin Icebreaker Museum in Russia“.

AP has “AP IMPACT: Some lawmakers send few to academies“. It is these same lawmakers who cry that the academies are not satisfactorily racially diverse enough. It is a double-shame given that Federal Academies are a sure ticket out of poverty.

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — As the nation’s military academies try to recruit more minorities, they aren’t getting much help from members of Congress from big-city districts with large numbers of blacks, Hispanics and Asians.

From New York to Chicago to Los Angeles, lawmakers from heavily minority areas rank at or near the bottom in the number of students they have nominated for appointment to West Point, the U.S. Naval Academy or the U.S. Air Force Academy, according to an Associated Press review of records from the past five years.

Casco Bay Boaters Blog has “NH Beach Cleanup Proves Plastic Fills Our Local Waters“.

MarineBuzz has “Suez Canal: Completes 140 Years of Navigation“.

AP has “Asian carp may have breached electronic barrier“.

Mongabay has “Using fish as livestock feed threatens global fisheries“.

Fish doesn’t just feed humans. Millions of tons of fish are fed every year to chickens, pigs, and even farmed fish even in the midst of rising concerns over fish stocks collapses around the world. Finding an alternative to fish as livestock feed would go a long way toward preventing the collapse of fish populations worldwide according to a new paper in Oryx.

“Thirty million tons – or 36 per cent – of the world’s total fisheries catch each year is currently ground up into fishmeal and oil to feed farmed fish, chickens and pigs,” world-renowned fishery researcher and co-author, Daniel Pauly, told the University of British Colombia (UBC).

Sea * Fever has “Famous Captains Compared“. Ahab, Crunch, etc…

Maritime Compass has a good source in “NMM’s expanded prints & images sites“.

eBay has available a copy of “South From Corregidor“.

intheboatshed.net has “An invitation for 5th December – see the Boatbuilding Academy student boat launch“.

The Journal of Commerce also has “Amsterdam to Lose Last Regular Box Service“.

The port of Amsterdam risks disappearing from Europe’s ocean container map, as its sole box terminal is about to lose its last major liner shipping service.

The Grand Alliance, a group of four ocean carriers, will end calls by its EU1 service at Amsterdam Container Terminal at the beginning of 2010, effectively wiping out the port’s box traffic.

The New York Times has “L.I. Harvests May Signal a Comeback for Scallops“. This is a little different from the tuna issue in that it was the local that saved the industry, partly in order to profit from it.

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Puget Sound Maritime has photos: “A rare look at the Ballard Locks“.

Helsingin Sanomat (Finland) has “Mine clearance vessel arrives in Gulf of Finland – Gas pipeline clearance work to begin in short order“.

One Free Korea has “Somali Pirates Hijack North Korean-Crewed Ship“.

National Geographic has the photo: “Blue Lagoon“.

Space War has “India eyes unbuilt British carrier” as they tire of getting jerked around by the Russians.

Both sides have “dug in their heels” on what they are willing to settle for, according to Indian media reports.

The Russians want $2.9 billion for the work on the 45,000-ton Kiev-class Gorshkov, set to be commissioned in the Indian navy as INS Vikramditya, originally in 2008.

India is willing to pay $2.1 billion for the work.

Hellenic Shipping News has “Curbs to ship pollution would stoke global warming, study says “.

Shipping is slowing climate change by spewing out sunlight-dimming pollution but a clean-up needed to safeguard human health will stoke global warming, experts said. “So far shipping has caused a cooling effect that has slowed down global warming,” Jan Fuglestvedt, of the Center for International Climate and Environmental Research Oslo (CICERO), told Reuters.

“After some decades the net climate effect of shipping will shift from cooling to warming” because of cleaner fuels, he and colleagues in Germany, Britain and Norway wrote in this week’s edition of the journal Environmental Science and Technology.

The Monitor has Canada’s “Ferry service awash in problems“.

The Maritime Executive has “Current Events + Costly Regulations = Cottage Industry Opportunities“.

The Horse’s Mouth has “Fish On Fridays. Liz Clark, A Wahine Who Fishes, Sails And Surfs!“

The Merchant Marine Express has “What a trip so far!“

AMVER Blog has a list of ships that joined the program last week in “Welcome Wednesday!“

BitterEnd Blog has “Balckwall Decision: 1869 Supreme Court Case that set Salvage Prescendce“.

CargoLaw has photos of the damage from a collision between the MSC KALINA and the M/T ALJALAA in “Singapore Sling“.

BarentsObserver has “Icy oil spill easier to clean, scientists say“.

Terra Daily has “Japan whaling fleet leaves for Antarctic waters: Greenpeace“.

Information Dissemination has “On Being A Captain….” Written by a ten year old.

Steeljaw Scribe has the photo “Picture Perfect“.

Danger Room has “In Nod to Global Warming, Navy Preps for ‘Ice Free’ Arctic“.

The Old Salt Blog has “Lady Washington Needs Volunteer Tall Ship Sailors“.

The brig Lady Washington, which is currently operating on the Columbia River, has an immediate need for volunteer tall ship sailors to bring her home to Grays Harbor. No experience necessary; new volunteers will be enrolled in the ship’s Two Weeks Before the Mast program, which includes comprehensive training, meals and a bunk. Experienced volunteers are encouraged as well.

The Misunderstood Mariner has a summary on “Oil Rigs“.

Shipgaz has “Capesize rates jump above USD 100,000“.

On the Australia–China trade, fixtures are reported above USD 105,000 per day. A year ago, rates on this trade were fixed below USD 2,000 per day.

The Brothers Brick has the Lego build:”The gales of November came early for the SS Edmund Fitzgerald“. The impressive model is 8.5 feet long.

YouTube has video: “riding the shaft“.

anchored on the mississippi river, riding the propeller shaft on a 700 foot, 13000 horse power steam tanker. the shaft is freewheeling due to the heavy current of the river. I have control of the engine. its at STOP! ZERO!

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Fairplay Daily News has:

Mermaid pod suit advances – CARNIVAL scored a major victory today in its mega-lawsuit against Mermaid pod providers Rolls-Royce and Converteam, as a judge refused to dismiss most of the cruise giant’s claims.

Carnival filed suit last December, seeking $100M in damages and alleging fraud, conspiracy and negligence. It argued that the Mermaid propulsion pods installed on Cunard’s Queen Mary 2 have never functioned as promised, requiring repeated repairs, bearing replacements, unscheduled drydockings and hefty costs.

Rolls-Royce and Converteam (Alstom Power Conversion) filed motions earlier this year to have the claims dismissed. But today, the Florida District Court judge threw out most of their arguments, allowing almost all of Carnival’s claims to proceed.

Both Rolls-Royce and Converteam argued that Carnival’s claims were barred by a four-year statute of limitations, dating the alleged misrepresentations to 2002-3. But the judge sided with Carnival, which maintained that claims first arose from a November 2005 drydocking.

Defendants also sought to use procedural arguments for dismissal of fraud, misrepresentation and conspiracy claims. The judge backed Carnival and declined to dismiss almost all of the claims. The judge did dismiss Carnival’s warranty allegation against Converteam and one of five fraud claims against Rolls-Royce. – Fairplay Homepage (Used with Permission)

AND:

Canada could end duty – CANADA could drop its duty on imported ships, which has been attacked by companies that see it blocking replacement of Great Lakes ships.

The federal finance department has asked for comments on a plan to end the duty on ships of 179m-plus, including cargo ships on the lakes and in East Coast waters.

The Canadian Shipowners Association has lobbied for years against the tariff, which Ottawa could end as early as January.

But Canadian Shipbuilding Association president Peter Cairns said members want to keep it for ferries and smaller vessels, which they can build.

Chamber of Maritime Commerce president Ray Johnston said the duty imposes adds C$10M ($9.5M) to C$15M to the price of a new ship.

He cited one owner who called the duty like “paying for five ships and only getting four”. – 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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