The Newtown Pentacle

- photo by Mitch Waxman

Gaze in terror at the ice breaking tug Morro Bay, stalwart arm of the United States Coast Guard, as it maneuvers about the Hudson River. In terror that is, if you mean harm to the mariners or coastlines of the United States. It is maritime Sunday at the Newtown Pentacle once more, and this time around it’s a Coast Guard vessel in the spotlight.

from uscg.mil

USCGC MORRO BAY (WTGB-106)

Abstract

The USCGC MORRO BAY was commissioned 28 March 1981 at the Reserve Training Center in Yorktown, VA and served here until 1998. The MORRO BAY was the sixth of her kind in the Coast Guard. While stationed at Training Center, the MORRO BAY was involved in training and operations on the Chesapeake Bay. The MORRO BAY is currently home ported in New London, CT.

Ship’s History

The 140-foot Bay-class Cutters are state of the art icebreakers used primarily for domestic ice breaking duties. They are named after American Bays and are stationed mainly in Northeast U.S. and Great Lakes. Although specifically desinged for ice breaking duties, they also perform law enforcement, environmental protection, search & rescue operations and support for aids to navigation activities.

WTGBs use a low-pressure-air hull lubrication or bubbler system that forces air and water between the hull and ice. This system improves icebreaking capabilities by reducing resistance against the hull, reducing horsepower requirements.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

While researching this post, an interesting factoid about the Coast Guard emerged: the hull colors of Coast Guard vessels indicate their missions. Black hull- aids to navigation, White hull- maritime law enforcement and other safety-at-sea missions, Red hull- icebreaking.

Who knew?

Of course, the “Response Boat Medium” and “Response Boat Small”- both “SafeBoats“- are orange hulled, but the color scheme indications I found at the Coast Guard website do not discuss this hue.

from uscg.mil

The 140-foot Bay-class Cutters are state of the art icebreakers used primarily for domestic ice breaking duties. They are named after American Bays and are stationed mainly in Northeast U.S. and Great Lakes.

140-foot WTGBs in Service:

• BISCAYNE BAY (WTGB 104) St. Ignace, MI
• BRISTOL BAY* (WTGB 102) Detroit, MI
• KATMAI BAY (WTGB 101) Sault Ste. Marie, MI
• MOBILE BAY* (WTGB 103) Sturgeon Bay, WI
• NEAH BAY (WTGB 105) Cleveland, OH
• MORRO BAY (WTGB 106) New London, CT
• PENOBSCOT BAY (WTGB 107) Bayonne, NJ
• STURGEON BAY (WTGB 109) Bayonne, NJ
• THUNDER BAY (WTGB 108) Rockland, ME

- photo by Mitch Waxman

The Morro Bay, like all members of its class, looks smart and sound. An attractive boat, it nevertheless looks pretty fast and capable. These shots were taken at the Metropolitan Water Alliance’s “Heroes of the Harbor” gala last fall, where Morro Bay was performing the sort of political or parade duty which occupies its time during warm weather. During the cold months, it’s tasked with weightier matters, as a front line warrior battling the winter, and as a life line for stranded mariners.

Greetings to the crew, a hearty thanks is offered for their service, sacrifice, and skill. Stay safe, and hopefully we’ll see you in the City again when it warms up.

from wikipedia

The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is a branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven U.S. uniformed services. The Coast Guard is a maritime, military, multi-mission service unique among the US military branches for having a maritime law enforcement mission (with jurisdiction in both domestic and international waters) and a federal regulatory agency mission as part of its mission set. It operates under the Department of Homeland Security during peacetime, and can be transferred to the Department of the Navy by the President at any time, or by Congress during time of war.

Founded by Alexander Hamilton as the Revenue Cutter Service on 4 August 1790, it is the United States’ oldest continuous seagoing service. As of August 2009 the Coast Guard had approximately 42,000 men and women on active duty, 7,500 reservists, 30,000 auxiliarists, and 7,700 full-time civilian employees.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

Sickened by weariness and a youth misspent, your humble narrator nevertheless has been tormenting himself lately with regret and guilty nonsense. “Not working hard enough” is omnipresent in my mind these days, and accordingly, the length and depth of my wanderings through the Creeklands have expanded. A lack of physical exercise is deadly to a poor specimen like myself, something which is difficult during the winter months due to that certain allergy to cold which has manifested – and which has become amplified- in recent years.

It’s amazing the ways that your body changes as you grow older, sometimes it seems as if there’s some feeble alien creature within that is pushing and tearing a path to the outside world through your very flesh.

from hplovecraft.com

Y’ha-nthlei was not destroyed when the upper-earth men shot death into the sea. It was hurt, but not destroyed. The Deep Ones could never be destroyed, even though the palaeogean magic of the forgotten Old Ones might sometimes check them. For the present they would rest; but some day, if they remembered, they would rise again for the tribute Great Cthulhu craved. It would be a city greater than Innsmouth next time.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

Carrying forth, however, is something compelled rather than desired. My team of doctors has advised me of decaying homeostasis, entropic processes, and general decline. Their suggestions are to step up, exert more effort, and seek even greater frequency for these long walks while avoiding the pleasures and poisons of the west. Luckily, the ancient pathways and avenues which surround and inform that nearby slick of languid infamy known as the Newtown Creek supply ample locations to inspect, never failing to intimate some hidden meaning or vaguely shadowed terror.

Who can guess, all there is, that might be buried down there?

from hplovecraft.com

“The nethermost caverns,” wrote the mad Arab, “are not for the fathoming of eyes that see; for their marvels are strange and terrific. Cursed the ground where dead thoughts live new and oddly bodied, and evil the mind that is held by no head. Wisely did Ibn Schacabao say, that happy is the tomb where no wizard hath lain, and happy the town at night whose wizards are all ashes. For it is of old rumour that the soul of the devil-bought hastes not from his charnel clay, but fats and instructs the very worm that gnaws; till out of corruption horrid life springs, and the dull scavengers of earth wax crafty to vex it and swell monstrous to plague it. Great holes secretly are digged where earth’s pores ought to suffice, and things have learnt to walk that ought to crawl.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

Paranoid wonderings, lunatic ideations, unnameable desires- all haunt me during the seemingly aimless steps. Delusions of self importance, hubris, and vast ennui are my only companions on these often cobbled streets. A discarded landscape with a lost history, this is a place given to the dead, the diseased, the barren… a perfect home for one such as myself. There seems to be a current in the air, a taste of anxiety on the tip of my tongue which is all pervasive, and it feels as if something is about to happen.

Ahh… I’m all effed up.

from hplovecraft.com

I do not recall distinctly when it began, but it was months ago. The general tension was horrible. To a season of political and social upheaval was added a strange and brooding apprehension of hideous physical danger; a danger widespread and all-embracing, such a danger as may be imagined only in the most terrible phantasms of the night. I recall that the people went about with pale and worried faces, and whispered warnings and prophecies which no one dared consciously repeat or acknowledge to himself that he had heard. A sense of monstrous guilt was upon the land, and out of the abysses between the stars swept chill currents that made men shiver in dark and lonely places. There was a daemoniac alteration in the sequence of the seasons—the autumn heat lingered fearsomely, and everyone felt that the world and perhaps the universe had passed from the control of known gods or forces to that of gods or forces which were unknown.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

Jules-Felix Coutan designed “Glory of Commerce” for Grand Central Terminal in 1911. A neat contemporaneous account of the construction of this statuary, which was carved in Long Island City I would add (by the firm of William Bradley & Son, 547 Vernon Avenue, which I suspect to have been located somewhere around Queensbridge Park), and can be accessed at nytimes.com.

from wikipedia

The Hermetic literature added to the Egyptian concerns with conjuring spirits and animating statues that inform the oldest texts, Hellenistic writings of Greco-Babylonian astrology and the newly developed practice of alchemy (Fowden 1993: pp65–68). In a parallel tradition, Hermetic philosophy rationalized and systematized religious cult practices and offered the adept a method of personal ascension from the constraints of physical being, which has led to confusion of Hermeticism with Gnosticism, which was developing contemporaneously.

As a divine source of wisdom, Hermes Trismegistus was credited with tens of thousands of writings of high standing, reputed to be of immense antiquity. Plato’s Timaeus and Critias state that in the temple of Neith at Sais, there were secret halls containing historical records which had been kept for 9,000 years. Clement of Alexandria was under the impression that the Egyptians had forty-two sacred writings by Hermes, encapsulating all the training of Egyptian priests. Siegfried Morenz has suggested (Egyptian Religion) “The reference to Thoth’s authorship…is based on ancient tradition; the figure forty-two probably stems from the number of Egyptian nomes, and thus conveys the notion of completeness.” The Neo-Platonic writers took up Clement’s “forty-two essential texts”.

The Hermetica, is a category of papyri containing spells and initiatory induction procedures. In the dialogue called the Asclepius (after the Greek god of healing) the art of imprisoning the souls of demons or of angels in statues with the help of herbs, gems and odors, is described, such that the statue could speak and engage in prophecy. In other papyri, there are recipes for constructing such images and animating them, such as when images are to be fashioned hollow so as to enclose a magic name inscribed on gold leaf.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

The 1.3 billion gallon a day flow of New York City’s sewage really should be defined as a third major river.

That’s 1,300,000,000 gallons a day or 474,500,000,000 gallons of night soil a year.

1.3 billion is approximately the population of China.

Pictured above is the DEP Sludge Vessel M/V Newtown Creek. A veteran, she was was laid down by the Wiley Manufacturing Co. in 1967. Just under 324 foot long, M/V Newtown Creek can carry 102,000 cubic feet of cargo and weighs in at 2,557 gross tons.

from nywea.org

The largest vessels, M/V Newtown Creek and M/V North River, are semiautomated motor vessels with more than twice the capacity of the original sludge vessels. The crew size was reduced to eight in 1980 and reduced again in 1987 to the current size of six. In 1987, MPRSA was amended, and ocean dumping was moved from the 12-mi site to a 106-mi site. As a result, the operation of the M/V was changed to in-harbor work transporting sludge to four newly constructed New York City ocean-going barges for disposal to the 106-mi site.

In 1991, to comply with the Ocean Dumping Ban Act (ODBA), the M/V Newtown Creek, North River and Owls Head began transporting sludge from plants without dewatering facilities or other means of conveyance to plants with dewatering facilities for processing. Since barges were no longer needed, three were retired, and one, the Udalls Cove, was kept as part of the fleet for emergencies.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

Forty-four and change years is a long time to be working any job, especially one with the city.

M/V Newtown Creek was cruising along the East River one winter’s afternoon, just before sunset, and your humble narrator was similarly crossing the water- only I was upon the Queensboro Bridge’s pedestrian walkway, en route to the Shining City.

from nyc.gov

Presently, NYC-DEP Marine Section uses these three sludge vessels for the transportation of liquid sludge from wastewater treatment plants without dewatering capabilities.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

The DEP people actually refer to these ships as “Honey Boats”, by the way, or at least some of the ones that I’ve interacted with have.

It’s gallows humor, the refined and thickened sludge that these vessels carry does not have the appearance and seeming viscosity of honey, rather it is said to be darkly colored and resemble pea soup.

from wikipedia

The New York City Department of Environmental Protection (NYCDEP) manages the city’s water supply, providing more than 1.1 billion US gallons (4,200,000 m3) of water each day to more than 9 million residents throughout New York State through a complex network of nineteen reservoirs, three controlled lakes and 6,200 miles (10,000 km) of water pipes, tunnels and aqueducts. The DEP is also responsible for managing the city’s combined sewer system, which carries both storm water runoff and sanitary waste, and fourteen wastewater treatment plants located throughout the city. The DEP carries out federal Clean Water Act rules and regulations, handles hazardous materials emergencies and toxic site remediation, oversees asbestos monitoring and removal, enforces the city’s air and noise codes, bills and collects on city water and sewer accounts, and manages citywide water conservation programs.

Emily Lloyd was the commissioner of the Department of Environmental Protection until resigning in 2008. On November 30, 2009, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg appointed Caswell F. Holloway to be the new commissioner of NYCDEP. Following Holloway’s appointment as the new NYC Deputy Mayor for Operations, Mayor Bloomberg appointed Carter H. Strickland, Jr. to be the new commissioner of NYCDEP on August 17, 2011.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

The Working Harbor Committee will be presenting the annual Tugboat Race this Sunday, and I hope you’ll be able to make it. The shots in this post are from last year’s race, which I had the privilege of attending.

This is a rare opportunity, from a photographic point of view, to witness this sort of thing. Dynamic, colorful, quick moving- a challenge.

from workingharbor.com

19th Annual Great North River Tugboat Race and Competition Set for Sunday, September 4

Hudson River Park Pier 84 at West 44th Street, Manhattan – 9:30 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Events include a tugboat parade, a mile-long tug race, nose-to-nose pushing contests, line-throwing, spinach-eating and tattoo competitions.

Best viewing is from a Circle Line spectator boat that will follow the on-the-water action.

Good viewing from shore along the West Side riverfront, at Pier 84 and at the Intrepid Museum pier.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

To attend the race, one must simply show up at the pier and enjoy, however the best views (and photos) will be available form the Circle Line observer boat which will labor to keep up with the fleet of contestants. Details on ticketing for the Circle Line boat appear at the bottom of this posting.

Note: As a disclaimer, I’m a member of Working Harbor Committee, but strictly as a volunteer (It’s a non profit organization and I receive zero proceeds for promoting the event).

also from workingharbor.com

Schedule of Events – Sunday, September 4, 2011

• 9:30 a.m. – Spectator Boat departs Pier 83 (boarding begins at 9 a.m.)
• 10 a.m. – Tugboat parade heads north from Pier 84
• 10:30 a.m. – Race begins off Pier i at 70th Street and the Hudson River
• 10:45 a.m. (and earlier) Tugs cross the finish line at Pier 84
• 11 a.m. to noon – Nose-to-nose pushing contests and line-toss competition off Pier 84
• 11:30 a.m. Spectator boat returns to Pier 83
• Noon to 1 p.m. -Tugboats and crews gather for lunch at Pier 84; public is invited to participate in spinach-eating contest and amateur line-toss and knot-tying events
• 1 p.m. – Crew tattoo contest and awards ceremony
• Public Transportation: Any subway to 42nd Street, westbound 42nd Street crosstown bus to the last stop.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

Working Harbor comes up a lot here at Newtown Pentacle, whether it be in the context of the Newtown Creek boat tours or the many “Hidden Harbor” trips which they produce. What doesn’t get mentioned that much are the groups many efforts at promoting and revealing the harbor as a career choice for kids from the inner city, it’s annual Senior Tours (produced in conjunction with the offices of the Borough President of Manhattan) which offer a free day on the water to senior citizens, and a host of smaller events which go largely unsung.

They’re a good bunch of joes.

also from workingharbor.com

New York, New York, August 30, 2011: The Great North River Tugboat Race and Competition-one of New York City’s most popular Labor Day weekend events-returns for the 19th year on Sunday, September 4.

More than a dozen tugboats, the maritime 18-wheelers that normally dock ships and push barges, will thunder down the Hudson River Sunday morning as they vie to be named the fastest boat in their class.

The race, on a one-nautical-mile Hudson River course that extends from about West 70th to West 44th Streets, typically draws thousands of spectators, some watching from shore; others getting right in the middle of the action aboard a Circle Line spectator boat that travels alongside the tugs.

This year, tugs will range from 100-foot, state-of-the art 5,000-horsepower workhorses to a 25-foot, 200 horsepower workboat, named The Bronx, to a century-old harbor tug, now a museum ship, named Pegasus. Working boats from many of New York Harbor’s major towing companies will also complete, including tugs from McAllister Towing and Transportation, Miller’s Launch and Donjon Marine. A handicap system will give smaller and less powerful boats a chance to win trophies.

The race typically draws thousands to the riverfront, which is one of the reasons the tug companies enjoy participating. “New Yorkers sometimes forget they are surrounded by water, and that there is a whole maritime industry working here. This tug competition is the one time a year people can really see what we do,” explained Craig Rising of McAllister Towing and Transportation, one of the largest and oldest tug companies in the country. It is also a field day for the tug crews, many of whom bring their families aboard.

- photo by Mitch Waxman

This is a great party on the Hudson, and a tremendous boost for the crews of the maritime tugs which seldom get a chance to show off their skills and incredible hardware to the public. In addition the race itself, there are “best maritime tattoo” and “spinach eating contests (Popeye brand spinach, natch)“.

Line throwing contests are scheduled, as well as nautical knot tying classes for kids. Family friendly, the event will be at Pier 84 (just south of the intrepid and just north of 42nd street), and the spectator boat will be boarding at the Circle Line pier at 42nd street and the Hudson River.

Hope to see you there.

also from workingharbor.com

The tug race spectator boat will be a Circle Line Sightseeing Boat. It will depart at 9:30 from Circle Line’s Pier 83 at 43rd Street and 12th Avenue (boarding will begin at 9 a.m.), and it will return at 11:30 a.m., so that passengers can walk just one block north to the events on Pier 84. Tickets are $30 adults; $25 for children under 14. Free for ages 4 and under. Tickets can be purchased in advance online at www.workingharbor.org or at the Working Harbor Committee tent on the north side of Pier 83 on the day of the event. Admission to the Pier 84 events is free.

The race is organized by the Working Harbor Committee, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to spreading the word about the rich history, current vitality and future potential of the New York/New Jersey Harbor. The organization also provides Hidden Harbor Tours® and runs an extensive youth educational program.

Full information is available at www.workingharbor.org.

Friends of Hudson River Park and Circle Line 42 are co-sponsors.