BBC Houston headed for Erie, Duluth with wind turbines
The 482-foot BBC HOUSTON has departed Montréal and is now heading up the Seaway, with a big load of turbines from Tuticorin, India for Erie and Duluth. Germany’s BBC Chartering formally named its newest vessel in a ceremony in Houston, Texas, on Monday, September 23, 2024.
The 13,000DWT vessel will be operated by BBC Chartering while ownership will remain with the Briese Group. Construction took place at Taizhou Sanfu Heavy Industry in China.
The vessel belongs to a series of 15 triple-deck ships built to transport heavy lift and project cargo. The ship’s two cargo holds are box-shaped and offer room for almost 26,000 cubic metres of cargo on a floor space of close to 5,000 square metres, when two tween decks are in operation.
The bridge and the crew accommodation spaces are located at the front of the ship, while two cranes with a combined lifting capacity of 500 tonnes are located portside. This allows for an unobstructed 2,830 square metres of space on the weather deck.
The vessels are certified to operate with open hatches. Whilst intended for worldwide trading, the design of the BBC vessels has been optimized to still fit both the St Lawrence Seaway and the Great Lakes.
Ship Junkies – Lakes, Locks & Rivers (LL&R) – Janey Anderson
Mainers speak out against Coast Guard plan to remove buoys from coastline
Editor’s note: Although no plans have been revealed as yet to implement buoy removal on the Great Lakes or Seaway, we are publishing this for informational purposes.
SOUTH PORTLAND, MAINE – The U.S. Coast Guard is proposing a wide-reaching plan to remove or alter hundreds of navigational markers along the New England coast.
In Maine alone, the Coast Guard is considering removing more than 150 buoys and other navigation aids along the coastline that have long helped mariners navigate coastal and inland waterways safely. The Coast Guard says the removals are intended to modernize navigation aids to deliver effective, economical service.
Harbormasters say this is also about cutting the Coast Guard’s budget. “The message we got from the Coast Guard was that it was to help with budgets,” Portland Deputy Harbormaster Hattie Train said.
Train and many of her family members work on the water.
She’s concerned about the coast guard’s plan to remove buoys that help boaters safely navigate the coast, forcing them to instead rely on GPS technology.
“You can’t always guarantee that the new technology is 100 percent accurate, whereas if there’s a marker on a ledge, you know that marker’s on the ledge,” Train said. “It’s not going to be somewhere way off because of a satellite.”
“I mean, every time I go by a buoy, I’m looking to see the number on it, to make sure it’s the right one,” Maine lobsterman Gregory Turner said.
Turner says in a snowstorm or thick fog, he relies on Coast Guard buoys to confirm what his navigation system is showing him.
“When you become disoriented in the fog, and you go alongside a buoy to see what that number is, if there’s no buoy there, how are you going to figure it out?” Turner said. “You’re not supposed to rely on only one kind of navigation. I have paper charts from years ago.”
“I don’t think that all of them should be removed that they’re planning on removing,” Train said.
The deputy harbormaster says boaters have voiced concerns about three buoys in Casco Bay on the removal list: one at Broad Cove Rock in Cape Elizabeth where a boater died in a crash, and two off Harpswell that warn boaters about Green Island Ledge.
“The Green Island Ledge, if you look with sonar down on bottom, there’s still a granite barge, and that barge must have sunk for a reason,” Train said.
Portland pilots, local marinas and even weekend boaters warn if the Coast Guard goes ahead with this plan, it will be a mistake.
“Take the buoys right out of the water, that’s when you’re going to have a problem. When someone wants to find out where they are, and there’s no buoy there,” Turner said.
“We need to think about the price of people’s lives, and the fact that being on the water is dangerous,” Train said.
WGME
Two groups offer raffles for trips on the Edwin H. Gott
The Lake Superior Marine Museum Association and The Soo Locks Visitors’ Center Association are raffling off a round-trip cruise on the 1,000-footer Edwin H. Gott.
Visit these websites or see fliers in the gallery below.
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1052918876872355&set=a.458641912966724
https://www.lsmma.com/
