Monthly Archives: November 2017

Addtional Announced CSC Bids

Bids for the CSC were due today, and 2 additional bids have been publicly announced. the French/Italian consortium has proposed their FREMM Design, used by France, Italy, morocco and Egypt, and under consideration by Australia. in an interesting twist, the consortium maintains the 15 ships can be built by Irving at the original 30 billion project estimate.

A bid was also received from Alion Canada, offering the Dutch  Provincien Command frigate. this ship went into service with the dutch navy in the early 2000’s so is only somewhat newer then the current Halifax class. I have no record of this ship class visiting Halifax.

UPDATE:

A 4th bid has been announced coming from Spanish firm Navanta. The F-105 is a variation of the Spanish Álvaro de Bazán-class frigates and is the basis for the Norwegian Fridtjof Nansen class (Pictured above), and the under construction Australian Hobart Class.  The ships use the American Ageis system.

Container Service to Portland Maine

Icelandic carrier Eimskip has announced a short sea feeder shipping service between the Port of Halifax and Portland, Maine. This new service feature will begin today with the arrival of the Selfoss at Halterm.  To deliver a weekly service, Eimskip is adding a third vessel to its Green Line rotation.

 

Eimskip did this once before in 2015, and of course AFL New England ran a short lived service.

Olympic With Returned Soldiers

During the first world war, The main deep water facilities were located at pier 2, now Jetty NB at the Dockyard, next to the Casino. (there was a land swap with the DND in the 60’s transferring the piers to Navy.) I found the Photo Above in the Cities archives, and it Matches Pretty closely to Arthur Lismer’s Painting.

During the War, she was pressed into Military service by the British admiralty in may 1915, and striped of civilian fittings, and armed as a Troop ship. She was eventually chartered by the Canadian Government for transatlantic troop movements, working in that service in 1916/1917 and receiving a Dazzle paint scheme in 1917.

 

The National War Museum notes that the painting was completed in 1919, and depicts Olympics arrival on Dec 14 1918. the ship was returning with 5300 soldiers, and during the war transported more then 200,000 earning the nickname old reliable.

Noble Regina Allen heads out.

Noble Regina Allen departed for the Sable offshore Gas Field yesterday afternoon. As of 4:30 She had yet to leave the IEL dock at Woodside. She was towed by Secunda vessels Venture Sea ,Trinity Sea and Burin Sea. once she is on Location, we should see a steady stream of supply vessels making return trips to the platform while the gas wells are decommissioned.

Cranes Coming Down

The scrapping of the original Halterm Gantry Cranes continues. The process has just gotten under way at Ceres.

 

these cranes date back to the late 60’s and 70’s, and are now too small for most ships calling on Halifax.

November 11th.

100 years on, Vimy Ridge is almost idealic. the trees are mature the grassy rolling landscape hides the the knowledge that 100 years ago this was mud, and each roll is a shell crater, so close together they  merge. Up on the ridge, you can walk through the trenches – the German lines so close you could yell at them.

The fence warns of live munitions. the surrounding countryside has been plowed over and returned to agriculture. Shells and other explosives are to this day still dug up accidentally by locals. its one thing to hear the stories. its something else to walk the grounds, and see for yourself.

 

 

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