Breaking the Port Congestion Logjam
The present US West Coast container logjam is a system instability that will be studied for many years to come. At this stage there is no single cause for the logjam and the various analyses of the problem tend to result in across the chest finger pointing up or down the chain. Interestingly the problem… Read more »
Golden Ray Sanity Check; Tightropes are not a Proper Way to Cross an Ocean
The National Transportation Safety Board issued their report on the Golden Ray capsize and, as is usually the case with those reports, it provides an interesting read. The NTSB provides a cause for the incident, incorrect stability calculation, and provides the following recommendations to the vessel operator: 1. Revise your safety management system to… Read more »
Time for a Closer Look at Offshore Wind Turbines
Offshore wind is inching closer to reality off the New Jersey coast. The public review process is underway and the big question is: “Will offshore wind make it past the public opinion barrier?” The advantages of offshore wind are most tightly focused to what now is becoming a screaming need to reduce carbon emissions. Wind… Read more »
Bilge Pump Switches; My Special Nightmare.
Jim Dolan and I had a discussion about a bilge pump repair that went awry and almost simultaneously we expressed frustration about the bizarre variety of bilge pump control installations in boats. We commiserated that in sinking investigations it was always a puzzle to actually figure out how the bilge pumps were configured and especially… Read more »
Aberration; Powerplant design
In my prior blog on Aberration I promised to write a discussion on the propulsion system and the whole powerplant design. It is probably most useful to describe the whole powerplant design process to see how things eventually came together. That makes it a long story, but should be an interesting opportunity to go down… Read more »
Separating Rotzooi from Technical Reality
Note: The Waterpomptang family is fictitious and occasionally a Waterpomptang story appears on the M&O website. Some say their adventures resemble real events, but that is just a coincidence. Bolle was comfortably seated in one of the creaky white oak surplus Liberty ship chairs in Willem’s office above the BuyLo Packy in Red… Read more »
Henk van Hemmen the Elder’s encounter with WWII
In the prior blog I discussed my grandfather’s favorite ship, the HEDEL. I got on the subject because of a weblink my Uncle Ed emailed me. The weblink my Uncle sent me actually referred to the JONGE WILLEM, a ship my grandfather sailed on immediately prior to World War II. During the depression he was… Read more »
Henk van Hemmen the Elder’s Hedel (TBT)
My Grandfather, Henk van Hemmen’s favorite ship was the HEDEL. She was built as AGIRA to LR class for the Norddeutscher Lloyd at AG Weser in 1930. During World War II she was named the SPREE and in 1944 she struck a mine. She was heavily damaged, but accepted as a reparation from Germany by… Read more »
Aberration; an Update and Personal Critique
Since my blog on Aberration in October last year, the concept has come to life and is now operating to a level where I can ponder my brilliance (right) and mistakes. As a designer it is particularly interesting and cathartic to find yourself on the receiving end of the design. I often write blogs to… Read more »
Dumpster Diving for Truth
As surveyors, we leave no stone unturned. Likewise, our support staff leave no dumpster unexplored.
Leadership, Passion and Commercial Reality
I only met Leon Hess a few times and then only quickly, but our company has been deeply intertwined with Hess Oil almost since Hess Oil’s inception. Since Leon Hess grew up on the Jersey Shore, he also interacted with my wife’s grandfather (who was the Chairman of the First Merchant Bank of Asbury Park)… Read more »
The Rough Road to a New Reality. My First EV Long Haul
We have had our car charger at M&O now for a number of months, but today was the first day we had two cars “achargin”. I was fun to provide the hospitality to one of our friends who came to visit, especially since recently I made my first professional EV foray into the Pinebarrens of… Read more »
All the Work that Fits a Blog
Since we updated our website with a blog function in 2011, I more or less committed myself to posting a blog each month. Somehow, I more or less stuck with that commitment, but I just noticed that we did not post a new blog for January 2021. I also noticed that this happens to be… Read more »
Make Mine Half Size (A Late M&O Christmas Present)
As usual the Martin & Ottaway Christmas present is late. But maybe I should call it a New Year’s present anyway. This year it is a story. I wrote it late in the last century. It has sort of been published in various places, one of which was a website that I can no longer… Read more »
The Big Maritime Things in 2020
I ended my 2019 annual review with an admonition not to work like a robot or you will be replaced by one quickly. The comment was intended to warn engineers to be innovative or they will be replaced by robots. Now, at the end of 2020, I have a whole new vision of the effect… Read more »
Sailing to the Future
The 29-day voyage of the “Grain de Sail” from Saint Malo, France to New York, New York, completed on December 16, 2020, was not publicized in the New York Times, USA Today, or any other big-name tabloids. Its cargo of about 14,000 bottles of wine has yet to hit the menus of New York restaurants… Read more »
If You Build It They Will Come
The movie Field of Dreams was a little too dreamy for me, but the main line of the movie: “If you build it they will come”, never quite left me. In some cases it actually could be true. Within the office we have discussed using EV’s for company cars a number of times. While… Read more »
Alla Tsiring on Throw Back Thursday
Alla Tsiring’s adventures did not start when she joined Martin & Ottaway in 1994 as our book keeper. Her adventures started in Russia and included her escape with her husband Lenny during a period of Glasnost with intermediate stops at all sorts of interesting places. However, she had never gone on a ship survey during… Read more »
Hybrid Propulsion; Stinkpotting for Raghaulers
Due to the fact that my wife became wheelchair bound recently, I am in the middle of the design and construction of a 35 foot hybrid propulsion wheel chair friendly catamaran. Together with the boat design and construction masters of Scarano boats, I am converting a 1996 medium to high performance 35 foot sailing… Read more »
Negotiations in Five Short Stories, Part Two
Note: The Waterpomptang family is fictitious and occasionally a Waterpomptang story appears on the M&O website. Some say their adventures resemble real events, but that is just a coincidence. This is Part 2, for Part 1 click here After Truus came aboard, Marina took Froetjers out her slip and headed downriver to the Shrewsbury… Read more »
Negotiations in Five Short Stories, Part One
Note: The Waterpomptang family is fictitious and occasionally a Waterpomptang story appears on the M&O website. Some say their adventures resemble real events, but that is just a coincidence. It was early morning at Watt & Fulton’s office above the BuyLo Packy in Red Bank. Willem was finishing his pork roll and egg sandwich… Read more »
So, How Much Cheaper is Containerization?
Besides all other Coronavirus upheavals, it has also affected our intern program. Joseph Schwarz, starting Penn State Engineering Junior was supposed to join us for the summer, but with an office that practices social distancing a face to face internship became quite impractical. In order to provide Joe with a meaningful training experience it… Read more »
USCG Day and History
Co-Authored by: David Del Corso, Jim Kline, and Tomer Chen Today marks the 230th anniversary of the establishment of the Revenue Cutter Service. Established in 1790, under the direction of the Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, their mission was to enforce the tariff laws at U.S. seaports enacted by Congress under the newly signed… Read more »
Pitching your Tent in Dog Doo
Living is nothing more than postponing the moment where you kill yourself. So far so good, but I have come really close a number of times. And retrospectively, mostly due to a lack of attention to the details. One that continues to stand out to me was when I was a student at Virginia Tech…. Read more »
Decarbonization of the Maritime Sector
Since we last discussed Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) as a maritime fuel in our April 2014 blog on Methane Slip and the Marine Industry there has been much research and development in the LNG industry, particularly as it relates to ship powering, methane slip, and GHG emissions. Recently, articles and research point to LNG as… Read more »
Oceans as a Renewable Power Source on a Global Scale
This week and next, 7th to 16th of July, the United Nations holds the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (UN-HLPF 2020) via webinars and UN TV. The HLPF is the annual assessment of the progress made by the UN Member States on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals – the SDGs – agreed in 2015…. Read more »
Coronavirus; Why don’t we think through the problem first?
While our coronavirus experience seems so novel, in the arc of maritime history, pandemics like this are far from unusual. Actually, the most unusual part of the present pandemic is that we have not had to deal with a pandemic like this for over 100 years. Taking into account that in those 100 years… Read more »
New Jersey Global Warming Data to Defeat Deniers
I was searching for some local rainfall information and came across a lovely meteorological summary of New Jersey weather posted on the NJ State Climatologist website. It provides a long listing of temperatures and rainfall, and Mirna captured New Jersey average temperatures since 1895 in the pictures below. In reviewing the data I found myself… Read more »
U.S. National Maritime Day
Co-Authored by: David Del Corso and Tomer Chen The year 2020 marks the 75th anniversary of the ending of World War II. As usual, most World War II memorial monuments show tributes commemorating the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and sometimes Coast Guard. However, there is one branch that rarely gets recognition, yet had… Read more »
A Method for Providing Audience Reaction in Zoom Style Meetings and Remote Broadcasts
During the pandemic Martin & Ottaway has been conducting a lot of its business in Zoom style meetings. In some ways these meetings are quite effective in resolving technical issues. However, when the meeting revolves around a presentation, the presentation can become quite dry since funny asides, quips or jokes become total fails because… Read more »
COVID-19 and Subchapter M: Will the coronavirus affect the upcoming Towing Vessel compliance date?
The Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Act of 2004 has sent uncertainty as well as additional audit and survey demands across the towing industry. Even with a compliance date “phase-in period,” companies are scrambling to meet federal regulations enforced by the U. S. Coast Guard. As a result, companies are concerned as to whether they… Read more »
Introducing James “Jim” Kline
While Martin & Ottaway has always worked very closely with the United States Coast Guard, we have never had a Martin & Ottaway consultant with a United States Coast Guard background. There was never a specific reason for that, except to note that possibly the right mutual opportunity never presented itself. However, today, it gives… Read more »
COVID-19 Field Work Procedure
Since the New Jersey government has formally announced a stay-at-home order on March 21, 2020 to curtail the spread of coronavirus, the Martin & Ottaway office doors have been closed. However, even as many other states continue to implement stay-at-home orders, as marine engineers, surveyors, naval architects, and appraisers, our doors are always open. In… Read more »
Office COVID-19 Protocol
At this moment the M&O office is operating. We are fortunate to have a spacious office where there are inherently large social distances, and personnel can choose to work from home whenever they feel it helps the overall situation. We developed our own office Coronavirus fighting procedures based on CDC guidelines and the best information… Read more »
The Unpredictability of Innovation in Wheelchair Use
Standard wheelchairs have not changed in decades. It is a chair with wheels and has foot pads to support a person’s feet and to keep them from dragging on the ground. The foot pads are actually quite complicated, because they need to flip away when the person is being seated or stands up and they… Read more »
Death by Ship Value
Martin & Ottaway has been performing ship values since its formation in 1875. Our records go back to the late 1800’s and we have hung onto our historic records through all our office moves. A lot of our actual project work has now been digitized which is a huge space saver, but other paper records… Read more »
Build a Little, Test a Little and Learn a Lot; A Waterpomptang story
Note: The Waterpomptang family is fictitious and occasionally a Waterpomptang story appears on the M&O website. Some say their adventures resemble real events, but that is just a coincidence. It was early morning at Watt & Fulton’s office above the BuyLo Packy in Red Bank. After the VC investors had overcome their initial… Read more »
Hey UN! Here is your Golden Opportunity for Global Relevance
Earlier this week the United Nations issued the “2020 World Economic Situations and Prospects report,” a high-level annual report. It is chock full of economic information collected by just about every United Nations Economic analysis body. The report has a foreword by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. In it, he stresses the importance of… Read more »
The Big Maritime Thing(s) in 2019
I actually enjoy taking stock of a past year in its last few days. The office tends to be quiet and a few moments of introspection can be interesting. This year I did not have any real innovations or significant developments in mind as far as 2019 milestones are concerned. I wondered if 2019 was… Read more »
Marmaduke Redux
Marmaduke Surfaceblow was a much beloved character in a monthly column in the trade magazine Power Magazine. I very much enjoyed reading the stories. Marmaduke was a fictional character who was a ship’s engineer who became an engineering consultant. Marmaduke traveled the world and solved various power problems. The problems probably were actual technical problems… Read more »
Solar Math Update
I installed roof top solar on my house in July 2017 and wrote a blog about it promising to provide an update in a few months. I did not get to it until now, but after more than two years of operation it is even more fun to revisit the project to see how it… Read more »
Liberty Meats
By a weird coincidence my sister, Annemarie, came across this story that my father, Henk van Hemmen, wrote on Veteran’s Day in 2004. “Liberty” Meats Looking into the history of warfare and battle ground victories it is a well-known fact that in general terms, the army that is well-fitted out and well-fed will have a tremendous… Read more »
Barbados: The Goldilocks Approach to Sustainability
Mathematically, worldwide sustainable energy is a real possibility, but it will require a very significant change in thinking, attitudes, efforts, and financial commitments to accomplish. All over the world we are encountering experiments, trials, and even significant changes in human attitudes, but, so far, we cannot point at an integrated success story of societal change…. Read more »
500 Years of Circumnavigation
On September 20, 1519 the Spanish fleet Armada de Molucca, under the command of Fernão de Magalhães (more famously known as Magellan), set sail to find a passage to the Far East by sailing around the tip of South America. By the time the single vessel carrying 18 survivors returned to Spain, they may have… Read more »
Global Partnership for Ocean Wave Energy Technology (GPOWET)
The Global Partnership for Ocean Wave Energy Technology (GPOWET) (pronounced “jeep – o – wet”)is a United Nations – Multi-Stakeholder Partnership formed to bring commercially-viable, utility scale ocean wave energy conversion (WEC) technology solutions to humanity. The founding members are Martin & Ottaway Inc. (M&O), SurfWEC LLC, and the Stakeholder Forum (SF). We believe by… Read more »
“Sustainable Energy – without the hot air” David J.C. MacKay (1967-2016) – Wave Resource Review
Sustainable Energy – without the hot air is an excellent text covering the various renewable power sources and their potential contribution to the energy supply mainly focused on the United Kingdom. One statement that I consider to be a significant error is on page 73, where MacKay states “The fetch required to stoke up big… Read more »
SurfWEC Alternate Configuration #1
The patented SurfWEC variable-depth platform (US Patent 8093736 B2 enabling the Shoaling Feature and Storm Load Avoidance Feature) is applicable to other generic WEC concepts including flapper/surge devices. Economic analysis of traditional bottom-mounted flapper/surge devices drives the existing designs into the boutique power generation realm rather than the sustainable energy triad. This is a… Read more »
Waves to Water Prize SurfWEC video
Environmental Game Theory, A Story About Endangered Birds
The wreck had spilled some heavy fuel oil and wildlife had been affected. The wreck was on the beach, waves were about 12 feet high and it was unlikely we would get a tow wire out to the tug offshore that day. I had asked a DEP employee to lay out an area of about… Read more »
The Mechanics of a Tank Barge Explosion
If there is a marine explosion, chances are Martin & Ottaway gets a call. An explosion investigation is hard work and requires a huge amount of data collection. It can be an exhausting and often confusing task. Today there are great tools to quickly build a model, but even with the best tools (drones, laser… Read more »