MAX1 Studies OWS Chronology Analysis
In almost every technical case, or operational problem we get involved in we find that it first takes the construction of a chronological narrative to get an idea as to where the shoe sticks. When we were asked to look at OWS effectiveness by NFWF, one of the tasks we proposed was the construction of… Read more »
AD 1522 to 2015, A Really Big Step for Mankind
In 1522 a sailing vessel, named the Victoria, arrived in Spain and thereby completed the first circumnavigation of Earth using only sustainable power (wind). This voyage is generally called Magellan’s voyage, but the person who completed the voyage in command was Juan Sebastian Elcano. Since that time, humans have circumnavigated Earth in any number… Read more »
Double Dog Day
Dog days are good days in an office. Today is a double dog day. Jim brought in beagle Buddy and Rik brought in golden/lab Harris. Nothing easy about taking a picture of two dogs at the same time.
National Bulk Carriers, Daniel Ludwig and Universe Ireland (TBT)
Of all the shipping companies that I have had any contact with National Bulk Carriers and its Owner Daniel Ludwig is probably more deeply submerged in lore than any other company. Every time I meet somebody who has worked for NBC I am regaled with yet another story of clever derring do led by Daniel… Read more »
MAX1 Studies, a NFWF Ship Waste Stream Management and OWS Study. Invitation for Participation
In the first half of 2015 Martin & Ottaway will be performing a study for the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, “MAX1 Studies” (MARPOL Annex I Studies), that will address the following questions: How effective are shipboard Oily Water Separators? What can be done to further increase the effectiveness of shipboard oily waste management? The… Read more »
Baby It Is Cold Outside, So Be Careful
Cold weather actually makes us busier. Cold weather makes people seek shelter so they pay less attention and cold weather makes equipment operate and fail in unusual fashion. It has been cold out (we almost had iceboat conditions on the river) so there is no time to ruminate any further. Instead I will post a few… Read more »
Christmas Poetry
Many years ago Arthur Mournian gave me a quirky little book named Nautical Poetry, which was a collection of (what the editor considered to be) the best nautical poetry. It contained some good stuff, but not this Robert Louis Stevenson poem that was sent to me over Christmas by my friend and former colleague John… Read more »
The Big Maritime Things In 2014
So here, at the end of the year, I have spent a few moments pondering the maritime events that affected my life. As usual, this is a personal list, but checking back against prior lists I am surprised that this list making can be very unpredictable. It almost seems that these annual lists carry a… Read more »
SS Sea Witch & SS Esso Brussels (TBT)
Harry Ottaway, past President of Martin & Ottaway, getting his balance on the SS SEA WITCH in drydock (stern section), August 2, 1979. The SS SEA WITCH was a container ship which lost steering control while leaving New York harbor and collided with the fully loaded tanker SS ESSO BRUSSELS on the night of May… Read more »
Big Load Afloat
As a company maybe we love salvage more than anything else, but load outs must come in as a very close second. There is something special about showing up somewhere, where it is too hot, too cold or too dark and to work with true professionals in the form of riggers, equipment operators, barge operators,… Read more »
Invention: Vinyl Plus Memory Stick; You Saw It Here First
Inventions are often difficult to track, but they often start with a loose comment. Hannah came into my office and asked for my portable CD drive. Not too long ago CD drives were built into computers, but USB memory sticks are rapidly rendering CD’s old hat. Out loud Hannah wondered: “How long do you think… Read more »
Ryszard Kaczmarek Can Do!
Maybe too often do we tout the power of interning and mentoring, but this week we received a heartwarming note from one of our past interns which started as follows: Since you deserve a partial credit for your support, I thought you would want me to share this great news I received last week. The… Read more »
Great Design Is No Joke
True or not, this joke is attributed to Abraham Lincoln: A farmer’s young son comes running into the house. Out of breath he says: “Pa, Pa, the hired hand and Sis are in the hayloft. The hired hand has dropped his pants and Sis has pulled up her skirt! Pa, I think they are fixin’… Read more »
van Hemmens Present At The SMC In Houston
Rik and I will be presenting our co-authored paper titled “Game Theory for the Maritime Professional” at the SNAME Maritime Convention this Wednesday from 1300-1400 hrs in the Technical Track 1 section, Sandalwood A&B room on the 4th Floor. If you’ll be at the SMC, come check it out! The picture is explained in the… Read more »
Salvage Of The SS Normandie (TBT)
Watch a cool video produced in the 1940’s by the US Navy on the salvage of the SS Normandie (USS Lafayette) here. Frank A. Martin of Martin & Ottaway valued this vessel for the US government before the fire/capsize.
48 Hours On The Lettie G. Howard
Maritime education is an incredibly powerful educational tool. While it does not necessarily have to be a path to maritime employment, it is always an effective path to provide Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, Philosophy, History, Language and Arts (STEMPHLA) education. The Lettie G. Howard project has a straightforward focus: Provide students with a tool to… Read more »
Funding The Lettie Project, Two States One Port
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has provided seed funding to the “Two States One Port Campaign”, but to fully operate the Lettie G. Howard requires a budget of $600,000 per year. This is a substantial sum of money, but it is estimated that about 300,000 people in the Port of New… Read more »
M&O Jeep Fleet
In 1994, M&O leased the then new Jeep Grand Cherokee, with miles per gallon in the 17 mile range. Twenty years later M&O has returned to the Jeep brand with the leasing of the new “Eco Diesel” Jeep Grand Cherokee, which can get some 33 miles per gallon on the highway. Stephanie Khadam-Hir of the… Read more »
Damage Artwork (TBT)
USNS “Maumee” Bethlehem Steel, Key Highway Encounter with ice floe Antarctica, March 1976
Meeting In The North Atlantic (TBT)
In 1954, my great-grandfather, Hendrik Fokko van Hemmen, was Chief Engineer on the M/V Prins Frederik Hendrik of the Oranje Lijn, and my grandfather, Henk van Hemmen, was deck engineer on the Dutch flagship, the SS Nieuw Amsterdam. On November 1, my grandfather was asked to make a repair to the steam whistle valve which… Read more »
Dungeon Art (TBT)
Our office has a real dungeon where we keep our unused art, our extra gear, our historical records and our completed files. Inevitably we need to clean out the dungeon when we no longer have space for the completed files and that means we literally get rid of dumpster loads of reports, depositions, shipping documents,… Read more »
N.S. Savannah
M&O took a picture of the N.S. Savannah while at an adjacent pier in Canton Marine Terminal, Baltimore on a recent survey: N.S. Savannah is the first nuclear-powered merchant ship ever built (the Soviet ice-breaker N.S. Lenin was the first nuclear-powered civil ship). She was launched in 1959, and was built at a total cost… Read more »
Ten Real Shipping Books
The general public’s awareness of maritime continues to be elusive. People without exposure to maritime have a vague notion of what ships do, but the knowledge is almost always superficial. Maritime is complex and therefore it takes a large investment to become deeply familiar with the dynamics of maritime in all its facets. This made… Read more »
Hydrogen As The Ultimate Fuel (Maxi Taxi 10)
Our intern Matt Stern is guest blogging on some background research he did at our office on hydrogen fuel before he gets ready to start his junior year at the Bronx High School of Science: In modern times, we have become accustomed to using fossil fuels as our source of energy for road transportation. But,… Read more »
NYMAR Victory!
They said it couldn’t be done but Martin & Ottaway’s representatives had the pleasure of winning the 3rd race of the August 7th NYMAR J/24 racing series. Congrats Captain Peter and crew!
P.V. “Molly Pitcher” Rolls Out Of Yank Marine
Congratulations to Yank Marine and NY Waterway on the rolling out of the hull of the passenger vessel P.V. Molly Pitcher on August 25, 2014. M&O provides construction supervision and attended on behalf of Owners. We caught the roll out on video too:
Wood Technology Never Gets Old
Wood is a truly wonderful material, not just for its beauty, but also for its excellent engineering characteristics. While wood technology has been around for thousands of years for boat construction purposes, wood technology is still developing today. In August of 1999, Woodenboat magazine published an article on a novel type of wooden mast construction…. Read more »
SS Florida / SS Republic Collision (TBT)
A photo of the damaged SS Florida as a result of its collision with the SS Republic in 1909 hangs in our office. On the back is an article from an unknown source (I’m betting that one of our consultants decided to look up the story one day). The story reads as follows: “Due to… Read more »
The SS Morro Castle (TBT)
Today’s Throwback Thursday is one of the most famous shipboard fires, and is especially well-known in our area because the vessel was beached for several months in Asbury Park, New Jersey, not far from our current headquarters. While the SS Morro Castle disaster of 1934 tragically killed 137 passengers, it directly resulted in numerous shipboard fire… Read more »
Martin Ottaway RSA Grounded Bulk Carrier Refloating, Lake St. Clair, MI July 2014
In the early hours of July 27, 2014, a Donjon-SMIT NTVRP (Non-Tank Vessel Response Plan) vessel, a handysize bulk carrier, grounded in Lake St. Clair, near Detroit MI. In accordance with the vessel’s plan activation, the SMFF resource provider Donjon-SMIT were contacted who immediately mobilized USCG Sector D09 (Lake Michigan) Martin Ottaway RSA Mr. Mike… Read more »
When Lloyd’s Registers Were Secret (TBT)
Since 1764, Lloyd’s Register has published annually what is basically the definitive list of ocean-going vessels in the world. Our office – and many other maritime offices worldwide – use these “registers” regularly, since they contain valuable, authoritative information on ship size, carrying capacity, age, builder, and equipment, to name a few. We keep our old… Read more »
Sprawl, the Infrastructure Trap, and A Real World Solution (Maxi Taxi 9)
A Time magazine article by Leigh Gallagher highlights a problem that we deal with on a daily basis but that pretty much stays just below our awareness horizon. In the article Mr. Gallagher describes a professional epiphany of a town engineer with regard to town planning codes that exhibits itself as suburban sprawl. The issue… Read more »
Deep Culture
At Martin & Ottaway occasionaly we see all aspects of our culture come together in a single project. This photo pays witness to such an event. Consider: The Engineering Attitude: We can do this, we have the tools, and we sure don’t need to use the written instructions. Frugality: Why pay for chair assembly if… Read more »
Container Archeology
Last week I found myself in Skagway on a cruise ship stop and hopped a ride on the White Pass & Yukon railroad. This railroad was a vital connection between the Pacific and the Yukon River gold fields. It starts in Skagway, the most northeast corner of the Alaskan Inside Passage, goes through the White… Read more »
Rik van Hemmen, SNAME Member Of The Month
The Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers (SNAME) is the main engineering society for naval architects and marine engineers and most of Martin & Ottaway’s consultants are members. SNAME provides the technical resources and updates that are necessary for engineers to stay engaged with the latest developments in the industry. Professional engineering membership is… Read more »
Let’s Not Confuse Innovation and Disruption With Progress
I just read Jill Lepore’s excellent article about disruption and innovation. She very carefully tears apart some recent trendy thinking about innovation and pretty much concludes that one cannot predict where innovation or disruptive technologies will come from and that, inevitably, any innovation or disruptive technology will pretty much find itself in the buggy whip… Read more »
New Jersey Makes, The World Takes
The actual slogan is “Trenton Makes, the World Takes”, and even in that form it is still a pretty weird slogan. The slogan originated very early in the 20th century when Trenton, NJ just about made anything, and it is supposed to mean: “Trenton makes the stuff that the rest of the world buys”. I… Read more »
Lettie G. Howard, An Exercise In Educational Excellence.
Education in maritime is in a class by itself for too many reasons to count. Bottom line; maritime education works, and people are starting to take notice. The strength of maritime education lies in integration. Basically it allows students to engage in multiple learning experiences simultaneously. Instead of one hour of language, one hour of… Read more »
Methane Slip and The Marine Industry
The most fascinating aspect of the marine industry is the fact that it is nothing but a more technologically aggressive version of what takes place ashore. The world ashore changes and the world at sea changes just as fast. However, shore based technological concepts are all divided along the various technological stove pipes, while, at… Read more »
OPA 90 Salvage Requirement Lessons
The OPA 90 Salvage Response regulations have now been in effect for a number of years and while there has not yet been a major US incident that tests the system to the limit, there have been a few smaller incidents where some lessons are being learned. The most central issue in the US Salvage… Read more »
How To Get The Job Done 350 Years Later
It may have become evident that I am of the opinion that the maritime community is a tower of strength for the spirit of cooperation, jointness and just getting the job done. I will provide yet another example of this, but first let me set the stage. This year is the 350th anniversary of the… Read more »
NAME Computer Programs In The “I Am Not Dead Yet” Category
As a naval architect and marine engineer I have slowly drifted into a bizarre conundrum that actually may be an industry wide problem that is ripe for an industry wide solution. What I am talking about is a loss of all those really great NAME engineering computer programs that were developed in the 70’s, 80’s… Read more »
Goodbye Goltens New York
This week is a sad week for New York Maritime. Engine repairer extraordinaire, Goltens, has announced that they will be closing their shop in Brooklyn. Goltens New York was the last classic marine engine repair shop in the port of New York. Maritime is an incredibly dynamic business and we all know that nothing stays… Read more »
Sheer Efficient Madness
There is absolutely nothing so absolutely awesome as ice boating. It was the greatest thrill in the world 200 years ago and it still is today, and I have no problem betting that it will be still be an astonishing thrill 200 years from now. Ice boating is insane fun, but it is not just… Read more »
Rudderless Behavior
Technology failures are inevitable. The trick is to keep failures to a minimum and to keep failures in the “mostly harmless” category. Certain types of equipment can fail and the failure does not result in consequences that are too serious, while other types of equipment failures can make a mess of things almost right away…. Read more »
Historic Vessel Redux
Occasionally we draw attention to ships that are historically significant. Sometimes it seems like we are simply whistling into a storm. Ship preservation costs money and undoubtedly it is a difficult discussion to decide which vessels are worthy of preservation and which should be, at best, turned, into artificial reefs, but, overall, our country is… Read more »
USS Somerset, The Real Lesson of 9/11
On March 1, 2014 the USS Somerset (LPD-25) will be commissioned in Philadelphia. The Somerset is the third and final San Antonio Class vessel named after 9/11 locations. The other two vessels of the same class that preceded the USS Somerset are the USS New York and the USS Arlington. The names of the earlier… Read more »
Ocean Township Elementary School Science Fair
Anthony Torchia and Niall Tantrum man the Martin & Ottaway model display at the school science fair on January 28, 2014. The models were all constructed by the Martin & Ottaway model making subsidiary.
A Fatigue Engineering Joke
There is a Cold War (remember, that was before 1989) engineering joke that goes as follows: The Russians had built a brand new huge airplane, and it was the pride of Russia, but they had a continuous problem with fatigue fracturing at the wing to fuselage connection. They tried everything and it just kept fracturing…. Read more »
Always Good and Clean Engineering
I remember standing at the Newport News Shipyard gate in the 90’s next to Dorothy the tugboat and reading the shipyard’s motto: “We will build good ships here — at a profit if we can, at a loss if we must, but always good ships” This motto was apparently coined by Collis Huntington, founder of… Read more »