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I like Ships too

SkAoUt said:
And my favourite non fiction book about sailing.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ogUthJTrL.jpg
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Fuckin' Moitessiér. If ever there was a human equipped with gills, it was that one.


For those of you who don't know about him— back in 1968, he was leading the very first non-stop, single-handed, around-the-world sailing race and was on the home stretch back up the Atlantic when he decided that he liked being at sea so much that he abandoned the race and continued sailing around the world (...because I am happy at sea and perhaps to save my soul ). He finally came ashore in Tahiti after ten (10) months and 37,455 nautical miles at sea.





The Wikipedia has a decent article about him: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Moitessier



 



The USS Zumwalt and she is to be commanded by Captain James Kirk.



http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/10/31/10563518254_81b4653962-3e5cdf0d50511eb58507846f06e6b387d69c8e8b-s40-c85.jpg

by The Associated Press

BATH, Maine (AP) — Captain Kirk's futuristic-looking vessel sports cutting-edge technology, new propulsion and powerful armaments, but this ship isn't the Starship Enterprise.

The skipper of the stealthy Zumwalt is Navy Capt. James Kirk, and yes, he's used to the jokes about the name he shares with the TV starship commander played by actor William Shatner.

Kirk takes it in stride.

"I don't take any offense," he told The Associated Press in an interview. "If it's a helpful moniker that brings attention to help us to do what we need to do to get the ship into the fleet and into combat operations, then that's fine."

While it's no starship, the technology-laden Zumwalt taking shape at Maine's Bath Iron Works is unlike any other U.S. warship.

The Navy's largest destroyer will feature a composite deckhouse with hidden radar and sensors and an angular shape that minimizes its radar signature. Its unusual wave-piercing hull will reduce the ship's wake.

It's the first U.S. surface warship to use electric propulsion, and its power plant is capable of producing enough electricity to light up a small city and to power future weapons like the electromagnetic rail gun.

Inside, it's just as unique. The number of sailors needed to stand watch will be reduced through the use of cameras and video monitors that show what's going on outside. The bridge will indeed look like something from "Star Trek" with two chairs surrounded by nearly 360 degrees of video monitors.

A handful of reporters accompanying Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on Thursday got a first look at the ship's interior while it's under construction. It's due to be christened in the spring.

The 610-foot-long ship has the highest level of automation on a U.S. surface warship, with systems in place to combat flooding and to put out fires, among other things. Because of automation and technology, the number of sailors needed to run it will be nearly half the current Arleigh Burke-class destroyers.

All this whiz-bam technology comes at a price that sailors couldn't have imagined in the 1960s, when the first episodes of "Star Trek" aired on television. The first-in-class Zumwalt will cost northward of $3.5 billion, a price tag so high that the Navy was forced to reduce the number of ships in the series to just three.

The "Star Trek" comparisons were inevitable even before "Star Trek" actor George Takei used his popular Facebook page to point out the similarities of Kirk's name.

Kirk, a Bethesda, Md., native and 1990 Naval Academy graduate, said the jokes about his name began early in his career, with colleagues telling him that they couldn't wait for him to reach the rank of captain.

The Navy skipper points out that his name is actually James A. Kirk, while the fictional Starship Enterprise captain was James "Jim" T. Kirk. But that didn't stop him from earning the call sign "Tiberius" — the fictional Kirk's middle name — while working with an aircraft carrier strike group. That was later shortened to just "T."

While he doesn't mind the Starfleet jokes, Kirk said that people sometimes focus too much on the technology incorporated in the futuristic-looking Zumwalt.

"Yes, we're going to talk about all of the wonderful technology, but it still requires the sailors who are going to bring her to life," he said.
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​
 


The World's Largest Ship

​
The Launch:
http://youtu.be/TrBSi405Ous



http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/...argest-vessel-enters-the-water-in-south-korea

by Alan Yu

Shell has just floated the hull of the world's largest vessel out of its dry dock in South Korea. It's so massive that if you stood it up, it would be 1,601 feet tall, reaching higher into the sky than the Empire State Building.

The vessel, called the Prelude, will actually be used more as a floating island than a ship. It won't be able to travel under its own power. Shell plans to tow it and anchor it about 300 miles off the coast of western Australia for 25 years.

There, the 600,000-ton Prelude will serve as a liquefied natural gas, or LNG, facility, which lets the company tap into the natural gas deep at sea. The gas will then be chilled into a liquid, which makes the gas easier to store and ship.

Smaller ships will come and pick up the natural gas and transport it to customers. Shell's Prelude is so huge it can store enough liquefied natural gas (LNG) to fill 175 Olympic swimming pools. It will stay in place during stormy weather and is built to withstand a Category 5 cyclone, according to the company.

The Prelude will allow Shell to tap into natural gas reserves that have previously been too expensive to extract, according to Kayla Macke, a U.S. spokeswoman for the company.

She declined to comment on the cost of the drilling project, but noted that Samsung, the South Korea company that built the Prelude, put the cost of the vessel at $3 billion back in 2011.

Previously, the world's largest vessel was the Jahre Viking, an oil tanker that's 1,504 feet long, according to Guinness World Records.

Macke says the Prelude will be similar to the offshore rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, adding that there will likely be around 100 workers who will perform two-week shifts at sea before heading back to shore.

Energy companies are increasingly going far offshore for oil and natural gas.

The Malaysian national oil company Petronas is also building a floating natural gas facility, though at a little under 1,000 feet, it won't be nearly as big as the Prelude.

The U.S. Geological Survey, in a report last year, estimated that there are large potential reserves of oil and gas in the oceans of southeast Asia, off the coast of Australia and around Cuba.

The Wall Street Journal reported last month that deep-water drilling is the "next big frontier for oil and natural gas production."

Australia could be a big winner. By 2020, the country is projected to more than double its gas production of 49 billion cubic meters (1730 billion cubic feet) in 2010, according to this year's gas market report from the Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics in Australia.

Earlier this year, the Economist noted that by "eliminating pipelines and other onshore costs, floating LNG production may prove the blessing Australia needs to stay in the gas game."
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JohnnySavage said:
I would actually enjoy (except for the cold) being on this ship and waiting to be freed from the ice. It'd be exciting and a great story to tell, that would only get better with each retelling
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Especially as the icebreaker sent to rescue it is unable to get through.
 



http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2014/01/02/ap570458694928-315ddc7521c6a270286387a377b492e47866bcd2-s40-c85.jpg

Consortium Threatens To Pull Plug On Panama Canal Expansion
by Scott Neuman
January 02, 2014


...Cost overruns are threatening to shut down a multi-billion dollar expansion of the Panama Canal aimed at allowing the world's largest ships to pass through the short-cut between the Caribbean and the Pacific Ocean.

A European consortium funding the project says it won't continue the work until Panama coughs up the extra cash — which amounts to $1.6 billion over and above an original $3.2 billion bid to build a third set of locks...

More—
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way...eatens-to-pull-plug-on-panama-canal-expansion
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MADRID—A consortium in charge of expanding the Panama Canal said Friday that work on the $3.1 billion project has been suspended, pending a response from the Panamanian authorities on its latest proposal to share cost overruns.

In a statement to Spain's stock market regulator, the GUPC consortium said it remains committed to finding a solution to the conflict with Panama's Canal Authority. But it added that the Authority has so far refused to take on extra costs incurred during the project.

The statement—filed by Madrid-based construction firm Sacyr SA, SCYR.MC +2.34% the leading company in the consortium—is the latest development in a conflict triggered last month when GUPC set a deadline for the Authority to contribute extra funds to the project.

The deadline has since been postponed, but discussions remain focused on $1.6 billion in overruns. A Miami-based arbitration court will have the final word on a series of small cases on unexpected costs, referring to the expense on the concrete used and the delays caused by events such as bad weather and labor strikes. But the parties disagree on who will pay for the remaining work, before the arbitration court decides on their disputing claims.

Panama says it is already paid some funds in advance, so GUPC must put up any additional funds needed to complete the work as signed. GUPC, meanwhile, says Panama must keep paying installments agreed on the original contract, on top of the funds delivered in advance, to ensure that the work will be completed by 2015.

"Despite all of these issues, GUPC is still seeking a co-financing deal," GUPC said in its statement Friday. "A deal is the only solution to allow that work will be resumed immediately and the project will be completed in time."

The pace of work on the project, 70% of which is finished, has been slowing over the past few weeks, as GUPC complained of a lack of funds, and virtually ground to a halt earlier this week. The new waterway being constructed seeks to ensure that bigger ships can fit through the 100-year-old Canal, and it is widely seen as fundamental for the development of Panama's economy.

The storied canal, built by American engineers, is among the world's most vital shipping routes, acting as a shortcut between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans that shaves nearly two weeks off travel times for ships that otherwise would need to travel around South America.

Countries including the U.S., which is fast becoming a net exporter of natural gas as it uses new drilling technology to boost production, are looking to take advantage of the wider canal to boost their shipments to Asia.

Earlier this week, Jorge Quijano, the head of the Panama Canal Authority, a government agency, said GUPC is to blame for the collapse in negotiations, accusing the consortium of demanding "exorbitant" and undeserved funding for cost overruns that haven't been substantiated.

For its part, the U.S. Embassy in Panama said later Friday that it would like to see a quick resolution to the dispute. The expansion project, which will allow larger ships to pass through the canal, has prompted many U.S. ports to upgrade their facilities.

Julia McKay, the embassy spokeswoman, said in an emailed statement "that timely completion of the Canal expansion is important to these ports and to U.S. trade."

"We look forward to a rapid resolution of the current work stoppage and the full resumption of activity," Ms. McKay said.
 
trysail said:


I swear I felt the earth move.



What in hell was going on in attempt #1?


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Local Pilot!

A sad end for a fine ship. I have crossed the English Channel on her as 'Pride of Calais' many times.
 
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