Ships and the Sea

[captain kong]

Mighty Ships episode on UK Quest TV is a voyage on m.v. PEACE IN AFRICA. The `Peace in Africa` dredges the sea floor off South Africa, for diamonds. Every 24 hours the ship sucks up enough mud and sand to fill 15,000 dump trucks, while a giant floating factory separates the precious stones from it.
QUEST TV(Channel 38 Freeview) and SKY TV Channel 154

Tues 8TH Dec. @ 2100 GMT
Weds.9TH Dec. @ 1400 and 2200 GMT

[captain kong]

Mighty Ships episode on UK Quest TV is a voyage on the Wind-Turbine Installation Vessel MAYFLOWER RESOLUTION.

FREEVIEW U.K(QUEST TV -CHANNEL 38 ) AND/ SKY TV Channel 154
Tues 22ND Dec. @ 2100
Weds.23RD Dec. @ 1400 and 2200
The MV Mayflower Resolution is the first ship custom-built to install wind turbines. With six mechanical legs raising her ten metres above the sea, this jack-up vessel is unique.
http://www.ship-technology.com/projects/mayflower

FREEVIEW U.K(QUEST TV -CHANNEL 38 ) AND/ SKY TV Channel 154
Tues 22ND Dec. @ 2100
Weds.23RD Dec. @ 1400 and 2200

[brian daley]

I could'nt resist posting this plate,any sailor who has worked on the Thames will immediately recognise where it is , The name of the wharves ring with romance ,Galleons Reach, Deadmans Wharf, Tobacco Wharf etc.etc. this scene was much the same in the 50's and 60's when the place was bustling with commerce. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do,another piece of gold fom the Book of Pictorial Knowledge,
BrianD

[brian daley]

Here are two more plates from the book of Pictorial Knowledge,the first shows a sailors place of work,the Bridge,unchanged for generations,and it was only with the advent of modern technology in the late 60's and 70's that the bridge lost it's familiar setting and became a place for tech heads. The house flag plate shows just some of the many shipping company's that we sailors had the pleasure of working for,sadly, all gone from our shores now,
BrianD

[captain kong]

Hi everyone, With Kevs Help I am back on line again. I am off to Fleetwood for a few days back on Friday.
Cheers
Brian.

[brian daley]

I came across this poem by Masefield whilst browsing through yet another volume of Pictorial Knowledge. reading it I was transported back to my classroom in in Gilmour, Heath Road, it was the subject of our english lesson and I was struck by the beauty of the words. More than a few sailors know this poem,and many thousands like me,traversed the English Channel on a "mad March Day......,I hope you like it,
BrianD

[brian daley]

Here is another from that wonderful volume,written for children by Rudyard Kipling ,it is a very truthful piece of poetry
BrianD

[brian daley]

Here is a picture that I am sure that Captain kong and Malcolm will recognise,inideed anyone who sailed through the Suez Canal before 1956 will remeber it. The Egyptians tore it down after the Franco British invasion in that year,when I sailed through at the beginning of 1959 ,all that remained was the plinth;I believe it stands there still,
BrianD

[Samsette]

I remember it well, with raised right arm as if to guide us into his canal and the Far Eastern world
beyond. In 1961, while serving with UNEF, I went for a walk along the mole with an American
canal pilot who lived in Port Said. He told me that he had seen the statue in a wharehouse in
the port area. Seems the Egyptians had not blown it off its pedestal, as I had believed.

I would like to see it put back there, someday.

[Ron Ham]

I came across this poem by Masefield whilst browsing through yet another volume of Pictorial Knowledge. reading it I was transported back to my classroom in in Gilmour, Heath Road, it was the subject of our english lesson and I was struck by the beauty of the words. More than a few sailors know this poem,and many thousands like me,traversed the English Channel on a "mad March Day......,I hope you like it,
BrianD

Loved that Brian because it brought to mind when I was on one of J Monks 'dirty little coasters & butting into a cold North wind in the Irish Sea & as I was on the wheel I quoted the last verse of that poem , the Irish mate was enraptured & I had to repeat it on several occasions for him ! Ron

[captain kong]

57 Years ago today, the ferry Princess Victoria sailed from Stranrare for Larne in N.I. In a short time the wind and sea got up and eventually it was hurricane force blowing down throuigh the North Channel, the same storm that flooded south east England killing over 500 people and thousands in Holland., The sea stove in the stern doors and she took water on the cardecks, the free surface effect gave her a ever increasing list The Maydays went out, the Sparky died at his Post and was awarded a posthumous GEORGE MEDAL, Unknown to the rescue services she was blown over 30 miles south of her reported position No one was able to find her. 133 passengers and crew died, all women and children died.
The wind was reported to have gusted up to 120 mph,
I was on an Everard tanker, Amity, we had sailed from Heysham for Belfast early that Saturday morning.
I was on the wheel just before noon when I heard the Skipper talking to Portpatrick Radio,they wanted all ships to proceed to the area. We were being smashed around in some of the most horrendous seas I have ever seen in 42years of seafaring.we were like a submarine.we could not make much head way against those seas and wind. I remember us being in touch with the Pass of Drumochter, another small tanker and Donoghadee. By the time we got off the Copelands it was dark and no sign of anything except a screaming gale and heavy seas. We searched around not knowing where to look , until Sunday morning we then crept into Befast Lough, the saddest thing I saw was HMS Contest and the minesweeper, HMS Woodbridge Haven . They were overtaking us quite close, with the dead bodies lain on their quarter decks.
The Princess Victoria had drifted 30 miles to the south that is why no one could find her. The strange thing was, she was never out of sight of land in all that time.

[pablo42]

Nice one Captain.

[brian daley]

This is anopther picture from the Pictorial Knowledge,it was taken in the 1930's and it shows just how busy the Manchester ship canal used to be. I'm told it is getting busier ,is this true? when I worked on it in the 60's it was a very busy place,but,as I've driven over the Thelwall viaduct in the past decade or so, I've hardly seen any ships making passage through the canal,

BrianD

[Waterways]

The canal is busy up until Runcorn - within the Mersey estuary. Most of the canal is not busy at all. A few ship a week go up to Irlam, just before the docks. Another small ship/barge goes up to the Tesco's wine bottling plant after wine if offloaded at Liverpool. A barge takes containers up to the canal as well.

Peel have this idea of Port Salford, just a length of the canal side, taking containers from Seaforth by barge to Salford. It will not work, another ploy by them to increase land prices - they are a property company. It is quicker and cheaper to take container by rail from Liverpool and especially to their final destination.

The canal was a white elephant and lasted just over 80 years to supply the docks at Manchester. It would have been cheaper if they built 4 large docks at Eastham,that can take far larger ships than Manchester, and railed up freight to a terminal in Manchester. Much, much cheaper and more flexible.

[captain kong]

Having just done a long sea voyage it made a nice change to sail up the Canal to Manchester, To see the green fields and trees and sheep and cattle, it wasnt all industry. It was the same when outward bound, the last sight of trees and grass for maybe many months.
and I was only ten minutes from home.

In the `old` days cotton camefrom Batton Rouge 200 miles up the Mississipi, down to New Orleans on barges to be loaded onto a Harrison boat and all the way to Manchester then unloaded onto barges then up the canal to the town center of Bolton, to make Bolton the `Cotton Town` of the world, the cotton travelled all those thousands of miles and had never been on a road.What a wonderful way of transportation.