Posts Tagged ‘Tugboat’
secret assemblages
It’s National Mac & Cheese Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Well, I guess it’s kind of been “Creek Week” around these parts this last week, so let’s finish things up with a tugboat!
As mentioned in Monday’s post, one has been desirous of capturing a few last shot of the old Koscisuzcko Bridge before its deconstruction is engaged, just for the record… y’know? While setting up my gear for a night shoot, the Donjon Tug Brian Nicholas, which appeared in Wednesday’s post briefly, suddenly appeared. I hadn’t affixed the camera to the tripod yet, so I got busy with the clicking and the focusing.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Brian Nicholas has been in many, many posts at this – your Newtown Pentacle – over the years. Just below is my favorite ever shot of this tug, from 2012.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Some 75 feet long, with a gross tonnage of 104 GRT, the Brian Nicholas is owned by DonJon towing and powered by 2 850 HP engines. Brian Nicholas was built in 1966 and retrofitted in 2010 as a “green tug.”
from docs.google.com
This past June, Donjon completed the top-to-bottom refit and replacement of the main engines, generators, gears and related equipment of its tug Brian icholas. The refit was performed in house at Donjon’s Port Newark, New Jersey facility under the supervision of Donjon’s Gabe Yandoli and Robert Stickles. As a result of the refit, the Brian Nicholas is now a “green” tug, compliant with all applicable EPA and Tier 2 marine emissions regulations.
The rebuild included a repowering of the main propulsion with Cummins K38-M Marine engines, which were specifically developed by Cummins to meet EPA and Tier 2 marine emissions regulations. The new engines also meet the IMO, MARPOL and EU Stage 3A requirements. Similarly, the generators were upgraded to incorporate John Deere 4045TFM75 engines, also Tier 2 compliant. In addition to the replacement of the aforementioned engines, the project required virtually total replacement of exhaust lines and routing of new control lines and panels in the engine room and wheelhouse.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Brian Nicholas was towing a barge of what looked like shredded metals and construction debris, which would mean that it’s coming from one of the waste transfer locations found along the English Kills tributary further east.
As I’ve said in the past – whether they’re pushing or pulling, tugs are always towing – that’s what the term is.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Brian Nicholas was headed for the East River, and ultimately it would likely head over to New Jersey, where the recyclable metals on its barge could be packaged up, loade on a container ship, and be then sold on a global commodities market.
See you next week, with something completely different, at this – your Newtown Pentacle. Also, I’m doing a tour of Dutch Kills tomorrow – come with? I’ll show you something cool.
Upcoming Tours and events
13 Steps Around Dutch Kills Walking Tour, with Newtown Creek Alliance – July 15th, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m..
The “then and now” of Newtown Creek’s Dutch Kills tributary in LIC, once known as the “workshop of the United States.” with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek Walking Tour, with Atlas Obscura – July 22nd, 11 a.m. – 2 p.m..
Explore the hellish waste transfer and petroleum districts of North Brooklyn on this daring walk towards the doomed Kosciuszko Bridge, with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
odd pantaloons
It’s National Fried Chicken Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Pondering just what the hell I’m doing with my life is something that happens everytime I cross the Pulaski Bridge, for some reason. As a matter of fact, existential pondering on that subject is a mental activity reserved specifically for crossings of the Pulaski Bridge, and a point is made of not wasting time on such matters elsewhere. I have other locations around Newtown Creek, all of which are assigned to different sets of worries, such as pooping my pants whilst conducting a tour and figuring out how to deal with the public shame and embarrassment (I worry about that at the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge) – but that’s another story.
I’m all ‘effed up.
Anywho, that’s the Mary H. Tug entering Newtown Creek while towing a fuel barge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Mary H. is a regular on the Newtown Creek, working for the Bayside Fuel people whose facility is coincidentally found alongside the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge, over on the East Williamsburg side of the world. Technically speaking, Bayside Fuel is on the English Kills tributary and if memory serves – they’re 3.1 miles back from the East River.
Personally, I’ve always thought it pretty cool that tugboats service an industrial dock some 3 and change miles deep into Brooklyn, but that’s me.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A bunch of the photographers I know have been doing the aerial drone thing of late, so this view of a tug has become rather commonplace in recent years, but I still prefer doing the old fashioned way – finding a high vantage and waiting for it to come to me. I worry about losing my technical edge when I’m over on the Hunters Point Avenue Bridge, if you’re curious. You don’t want to know what I worry about on the Borden Avenue Bridge… brrrr.
Upcoming Tours and events
13 Steps Around Dutch Kills Walking Tour, with Newtown Creek Alliance – July 15th, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m..
The “then and now” of Newtown Creek’s Dutch Kills tributary in LIC, once known as the “workshop of the United States.”with NCA Historian Mitch Waxman – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
failing light
It’s National Hazelnut Cake day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the tug Sea Lion in the shot above, hurtling across the Kill Van Kull with an industrial section of Bayonne, New Jersey and the skyline of Lower Manhattan providing a backdrop. One hasn’t been focusing in on the harbor all that much in recent months for one reason or another, but it’s nothing personal, rather it’s an “art” thing. There’s only so many ways to frame and shoot a passing vessel, when you really get down to it. I’ll figure out some way to make it interesting again, as I was trying to do in the shot above by shooting “wide open” and going for depth of field rather than my normal “tack sharp” narrow aperture method for maritime shots.
Sea Lion is looking pretty good, given that she sunk a few years ago off the coast of Long Island – check out NY Media Boat’s page describing that disaster.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Passing out of the Kill Van Kull, and into the Upper Bay, three McAllister tugs were observed “wrassling” a cargo ship into position for it to exit NY waters. There’s two tugs pictured above, the Eric and Bruce A. McAllister’s, and the third one was on the other side of the cargo ship.
I was onboard a NY Waterways boat hired by the Working Harbor Committee for a tour of Newark Bay, in my capacity as the group’s official photographer. These WHC trips have become quite a melancholy experience for me in the last few years, as I spend most of my time onboard reminiscing about a few buddies whom I always enjoyed hanging out or working with on these excursions that have left this mortal coil – Bernie Ente, Capt. John Doswell, and most recently John Skelson.
Absent friends… lift glasses… clink.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I didn’t observe the usual post op ritual which the WHC crew enacts this time around, heading over to a hole in the wall bar on Pearl Street for a pint to compare notes about the trip. Queens was calling, and given the intensity of my schedule during the month of May, I was of no mind to delay getting home to our Lady of the Pentacle and Zuzu the dog.
The 5 line carried me from Lower Manhattan to the 59th and Lex hub, where an R line transfer was enacted, which carried me home to the rolling hills of almond eyed Astoria.
Upcoming Tours and events
Newtown Creek Alliance and Riverkeeper Visioning, June 3rd, 1-4 p.m..
Imagine the future of Newtown Creek with Riverkeeper and NCA at the Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) – details here.
Newtown Creek Alliance History lecture with NCA historian Mitch Waxman, June 3rd, 5:00- 7:30 p.m.
An free hour long lecture and slideshow about Newtown Creek’s incredible history at the gorgeous Kingsland Wildfowers Green Roof (520 Kingsland Avenue in Greenpoint) followed by a walk around the roof and a Q&A – details here.
Green Drinks Queens LIC, June 5th, 6:00- 9:00 p.m.
Come celebrate UN World Environment Day with Green Drinks: Queens on the LIC Waterfront! This year’s theme is “Connecting People With Nature.” – details here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
country seat
It’s National Turkey Neck Soup Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Racing thoughts, cold sweats, night terrors, or existential anxieties notwithstanding – one is happy to report that the Hell Gate Bridge Centennial has been marked. Last weekend, one attended a walk conducted by the estimable Richard Melnick of Greater Astoria Historical Society celebrating the event. Mr. Melnick was joined by Dave Frieder, a photographer and bridge expert, as well as around fifty enthusiasts. For me, it was nice just to be around people who weren’t chasing or deriding.
Pictured above, a CSX freight train heading eastwards over the bridge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
While following our course, the usual grand panoply of sights were encountered along the east river, including the transit of an articulated tug and barge – the Bouchard corporation’s “Evening Star” tug towing a fuel barge… It’s all so depressing, really.
As always, one reminds that whether they’re pulling or pushing, Tugboats are always “towing.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Hell Gate bridge overflies Astoria Park, of course, and one spotted the curious tableau seen above while there.
I’ve been warning all of you about Lovecraftian phenomena occurring in Queens for years, and now at last I can demonstrate the presence of the Shoggoths amongst us.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This looked like the kind of fun I would have enjoyed having as a child, in those halcyon days before my soul had been blackened to a crisp by the unrelenting fires of adulthood. Life – it’s become a neutral gray for me nowadays – banal, ashen, joyless.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Greater Astoria Historic Society has a full calendar of Hell Gate related programming coming up, and this summer the folks who live in “Astoria, Astoria” or plainly Astoria’s north side are planning a few summertime celebrations for Lindenthal’s triumphant arch bridge over the East River.
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flaming thing
It’s Tag des Deutschen Apfels (German Apples) day in the Bundesrepublik Deutschland.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The bright passage, it’s a not unlikely spot to find a group of cultists dropping a bizarre golden diadem into the water hoping to contact those who might lie below the seething waters. Hells Gate, with its bizarre and blasted subterrene topography, cannot possibly host a race of non human intelligences, can it? That would be crazy.
I mean, is this Queens or Innsmouth?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Speaking of alien intelligences with unintelligible plans for the future, the DEP’s MV Red Hook sludge boat slid through the bright passage while one was contemplating what sort of life might inhabit the craggy bottom. Between the strong cross currents of the tide, all the endemic pollution… it boggles.
It’s almost as if the area is being terra formed for a different and quite alien species.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One was pleased that a concurrence of maritime and locomotive subject matter occurred as Amtrak’s Acella came rolling by on the Hell Gate bridge at the same time as Buchanan 1 tug slid through the Hells Gate narrows of the East River. When I left the house this day, I rued not having the time to visit Staten Island and the Kill Van Kull – my original intention for the afternoon. What with the sun setting in the late afternoon, it’s kind of difficult to complete that journey from Point A in Astoria while the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself is still hanging in the sky.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Back to worrying about the ones who cannot possibly exist in the deepest waters of Hells Gate, and their land dwelling acolytes who surreptitiously accompanied the wholesome Hellenes during their 1970’s migration to Astoria, did a humble narrator’s thoughts turn.
There are too many individual and quite minor clues to mention which lend credence to the theory of their presence – odd smells and sounds, brief flashes of unrecognizable shapes seen when walking past closing doors, the popularity of Bosnian cuisine, bizarre chanting. This is an entirely different “thing” than the occluded witch cult operating out of St. Michael’s cemetery, incidentally, but perhaps I’ve already said too much.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The sound of chitinous scratching on my second floor garret window will no doubt resume after this posting, and the whispered calls to leave this life behind and to either go into the water or dance with the night ghouls of Nephren Ka across the rooftops and tombstones of western Queens will no doubt follow.
Who can guess, all there is, that might be buried down there, beneath the waters of the Bright Passage?
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
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