Posted on 12/21/2020 12:03:36 PM PST by Oatka
I can just imagine a Castaway 2 movie except this time the castaway finds a couple of shipping containers full of everything he cannot directly use but somehow does, like pontoons made from thousands of condoms....
Looks like a model ship made of Legos that went bad.
Some time in the '90s, a container load(s) full of sneakers got washed overboard and broke open. For a few years after, marine scientists were tracking ocean currents via the sneakers.
I dunno, but I was thinking that this would be the perfect cover for an international arms heist.
"Sorry, that container of Russian surface to air missiles fell overboard. It wasn't sold to a drug cartel or anything..."
We used to carry green hides from the Pacific Northwest to Asia. They dripped smelly salt brine all the way over. Until they figured out better packaging we had to replace steel decks after a few years of that.
As a container ship captain, I always took care of my ship, crew and cargo. I went around storms or slowed in heavy seas. I was never late. The other ship captain I alternated with never slowed down and was also never late. You could see the damage to the ship and cargo after he came through a storm.
Drinking and driving often leads to trouble...
Are you playing in your bathtub again..? ;))
On the other hand, steel sail boats, believing they have the right of way over fully laden containers ships, far poorly. Seen it happen.
I’m guessing it’s not a guarantee, but probably a hell of a lot better protection that fiberglass.
You need a twin M-2 50 cal. mount on the bow.
Martin Mull Song.
What amazes me is if the storms are that brutal to such a giant ship, how does a 30 foot sailboat survive at all?
A 30 foot sailboat is like a corked bottle. The size of the waves are not relevant. The keel on the bottom means it always turns right side up. (With or without a mast intact, that is another question.) But unless it hits a reef or is run down by a ship etc, it won’t just sink. Just like a corked bottle.
The “El Faro” freighter that sank a few years ago between FL and PR, drove right into a hurricane. Ships like El Faro have a “point of no return,” where if it rolls past a certain degree, it’s going over, and it’s not coming back.
Due to extreme rolling, its lube oil pumps cut out, and its engines died. Then it lost directional control, went broadside to wind a waves, was rolled over and sank. A giant ship.
A tough little sailboat in the same storm, like a hard little nut or a corked bottle, would have survived (with or without a mast.)
Now, the humans on the El Faro or on the sailboat are in for a very rough ride. A non-stop roller coaster does not come close. But the humans in the floating sailboat would have been alive at the end. On the El Faro, the humans went down with the ship.
SS El Faro
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
SS El Faro was a United States-flagged, combination roll-on/roll-off and lift-on/lift-off cargo ship crewed by U.S. merchant mariners. Built in 1975 by Sun Shipbuilding & Drydock Co. as Puerto Rico, the vessel was renamed Northern Lights in 1991, and finally, El Faro in 2006. She was lost at sea with all hands on October 1, 2015, after steaming into the center of Hurricane Joaquin.[4]
El Faro departed Jacksonville, Florida, bound for Puerto Rico at 8:10 pm EST on September 29, 2015 [rest at link]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_El_Faro
All a question of weight placement. But not on the bow, because a sailboat is not a chaser, it is a “chase-ee.” Everything else is faster, so threats are coming up on the stern.
In my last novel (probably forever) “The Red Cliffs of Zerhoun,” the 60 foot steel trading schooner has an ex-Soviet-era 12.7mm “Dushka” on the stern. Like a cheaper version of the Ma Deuce M-2 fifty caliber.
On a sailboat, you just need to defend the stern. You can always turn the stern to the danger as the faster attacker approaches.
There’s no point to a gun on the bow. Everything else is faster than you are.
https://www.amazon.com/Red-Cliffs-Zerhoun-Matthew-Bracken/dp/0972831053/
Interesting phenomena with the very large ships, they actually do not ride very large seas as well as a smaller vessel. A large following sea that one of these ships must slow for will cause it to roll with increasing list on each roll.
A correct speed and course is critical and is usually found out the hard way in each class of these new larger vessels.
It’s been over 25 years since I retired and it takes me awhile to remember the sea stories, never mind the technical.
The damage displayed on that container ship was most likely from increasing synchronous rolling with tremendous inertial forces causing catastrophic failure of the container lashings.
Those containers breaking free probably kept the ship from capsizing.
Sailing Doodles - youtube.
See a clip of what he went thru. Cost estimate is $100,000 to repair and the insurance company will not cover.
On Fire, Sinking, Rescued by the Coast Guard
149,990 views
•Dec 16, 2020
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELa66tQU3f4
I thought man controlled nature.
For large ships they also have to worry about the length of the waves rolling under them as they could be on the crest of one for the bow and one for the stern but nothing holding up the middle as it breaks water. Then crack...
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