Tramp Steamers

Tiki Tom · Aug 28, 2019

This is REAL, up-to-the-minute, high seas adventure. Watch the video and say OMG.

https://gcaptain.com/watch-u-s-coast-guard-crew-chases-down-and-boards-drug-smuggling-submersible/

Re: The boarding party. That is really earning your pay, having a fulfilling day, “making a difference”, whatever you want to call it.
That guy will be telling that story in a bar someday (“So, yeah, and then I, like, jumped onto the sub and ran over and pried-open its hatch and arrested a gang of pirates.”) and everyone around him will yell “bullsh$t!”
He will just smile, show the video, and say “stay thirsty, my friends.”

Tiki Tom · Mar 17, 2020

You can’t make this stuff up. A modern day ghost ship washes up in Ireland after drifting abandoned for 17 months... backstory includes pirate attacks off Africa. A good (and true) yarn of merchant marine adventure.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-ne...ross-the-atlantic-for-17-months-38963422.html

Tiki Tom · Aug 10, 2020

This is probably a truer than not picture of what the life of a tramp freighter is like. Owned by a guy in one country, flagged in another, carrying questionable cargo from yet another country to a third-world destination... in an interim port it’s discovered that the ship’s paperwork is not in order and she is not completely seaworthy. The owner more-or-less abandons the vessel and the crew; no money to either pay them or repatriate them (I’ve read elsewhere that the abandonment of cargo ships is not uncommon at all) and ...to give a hint of the Final ending of this tragic tale: the impoverished crew become “hostages on a floating bomb.”

https://www.france24.com/en/20200807-the-strange-history-of-the-cargo-that-caused-the-beirut-blast

To quote Paul Harvey: “And now you know the rest of the story.” There is a novel or movie script Somewhere in this sad tale.

Feraud · Aug 10, 2020

This is probably my favorite thread ever!

GHT · Aug 10, 2020

Tiki Tom said:
Many of my dad’s stories, taken out of context, might seem a little amazing. But in context they are readily believable. Getting thrown into jail in Switzerland and Italy for traveling without correct papers, finally obtaining false (but real) Swedish seaman’s papers in France by not exactly honest means, traveling up the Amazon to Manaus, encounter with a biting bat, living in South Africa for a few months between ships, some adventures in Namibia and Tropical Africa. The list goes on and on, spanning almost 20 years. Anyway, I really should try to write them down, or what I can recall of them.
I miss that guy.

It was how it was for their generation. My father never told anything about his time in WW2, after his death in 2009, I learned that he refused officer status, liked being just a foot soldier, was captured on the Island of Crete. He learned to speak German within six months, it saved his life. Working on a low loader rail car he went to stand up. A warning, cried out in German, stopped him from straightening up, had he done so his head would have touched the live overhead wire.

My Father was already fluent in French when hostilities broke out, he then added German to his repertoire. He was housed in a POW camp full of Russians simply because there was no room anywhere else. It took another six months for him to master Russian.

Those Nazis should have known better, my Father's language skills were used as an interpreter at the war crime trials. All of this came as a jaw drop to me. In 1956, I was at nine years old, the oldest of four siblings. Mother died and somehow, by whatever means it took, Dad kept his family together. even my 18 month old brother. He did all that without complaint or without telling us of his wartime experience. He is a Dad like no other, how blessed I am to call him my Father.

Tiki Tom · Aug 26, 2020

Okay, this is awfully cool.

Track global maritime traffic, live! Drag the map around to see your part of the world. Zoom in. Zoom out.

https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:-175.6/centery:28.2/zoom:4

Orange = fishing vessels;
Dark blue = Passenger vessels;
Green = cargo vessels,
Etc.

Lat and Long in upper right corner.

Left Margin: Weather tool and refresh button and other stuff.

Go to top menu bar. Hit “explore”. Click on “vessels”. Now, for example, you can see where the Queen Mary 2 is right now. Lots of vessels to choose from.

Go to “vessel photos”. Pick a vessel and click on it.

Can do the same with ports.

Can also build your own fleets to follow.

Fun, fun, fun. A great toy for all of us armchair freighter captains.

Enjoy!

Haversack · Aug 26, 2020

There is also a similar site for air traffic worldwide.

Tiki Tom · Sep 10, 2020

Thought I'd check in on my long-time fantasy. Investigated where the Aranui 5 is. She is currently at anchor in Pape'ete, Tahiti. I'd expect no less. One day, my friend, one day!

Tiki Tom · Jan 8, 2021

Happy birthday, Dad!
Today would have been my father's 100th Birthday. He was born 8 January 1921.
Ran away to sea when he was 16 and started his Ocean Going career as a cabin boy on ocean liner, Cap Arcona, out of Hamburg.
In early 1940 he was working in the Engine Room on the freighter "Heidelberg" in the Caribbean. When the Royal Navy caught them, the crew scuttled the ship. Dad spent the entire war in a British Prisoner of War camp in Jamaica. After the war he again joined the Merchant Marines and sailed the world until he met my mom in NYC in the late 1950s and ---more or less--- settled down in the USA. I was his first child.
I miss sitting in my mom's backyard with him and listening to his tales of life upon the sea.
Love you, Dad!

North American Sojouner · Feb 22, 2021

Tiki Tom said:
Happy birthday, Dad!
Today would have been my father's 100th Birthday. He was born 8 January 1921.
Ran away to sea when he was 16 and started his Ocean Going career as a cabin boy on ocean liner, Cap Arcona, out of Hamburg.
In early 1940 he was working in the Engine Room on the freighter "Heidelberg" in the Caribbean. When the Royal Navy caught them, the crew scuttled the ship. Dad spent the entire war in a British Prisoner of War camp in Jamaica. After the war he again joined the Merchant Marines and sailed the world until he met my mom in NYC in the late 1950s and ---more or less--- settled down in the USA. I was his first child.
I miss sitting in my mom's backyard with him and listening to his tales of life upon the sea.
Love you, Dad!
View attachment 299002

Thank you for sharing this. I too have some sail time but not on tramp steamers. A decade at sea, on two ships of the US Navy. Going to sea is a tough business and I thank him for his service to our Merchant Marine.
Zim

Tiki Tom · Jun 29, 2021

Warning, the following article is only for hard core romantics, dreamers-of-far-away-places, and people who yearn to escape. I don’t expect any Lounger to take the advice given. But you never know.

First paragraph (to hook you): “I'm here to tell you that — contrary to popular belief — you can still work your way to almost anywhere in the world on a freighter. You don't need money, short hair, experience or references. You won't even have to fill out an application! All you'll need is a passport and a vaccination certificate.”

https://www.motherearthnews.com/nature-and-environment/work-at-sea-zmaz71mjzgoe

Ah, to be young and rootless again (and a little bit reckless.)

Tiki Tom · Oct 8, 2021

Well, this is terrible. Crews are being marooned in record numbers by ship owners who are abandoning the ships in godforsaken ports, with the crews having no pay, no resources, and no way to get home.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/crews-...rs-without-pay-food-or-a-way-home-11633699978

I imagine it’s a legal no-man’s-land, with neither the ships home country or current location willing to take action/responsibility.

fireman · Oct 9, 2021

With the whole global shipping crunch and some large retailers hiring there own container ships, you would think that those ships would be able to be profitable these days. Crazy times.

Tiki Tom · Nov 20, 2021

fireman said:
With the whole global shipping crunch and some large retailers hiring there own container ships, you would think that those ships would be able to be profitable these days. Crazy times.

Yes, crazy times. I’ve read about the high fuel costs, shortages of staff (I hear that in these COVID times, once on board you can’t get off again; thanks to quarantine restrictions, etc), huge backlogs of ships waiting in ports, and lack of longshoremen & truckers. But, somewhere in the chaos, there might be a niche for an imaginative tramp freighter captain with connections and the ability to get things done. It’s pretty to think so, anyway.

I was reminded that I have been neglecting this thread. Therefore: Here is a recently published article about a young man’s tramp steamer experience. It reads as authentic. The description of African ports during that period strikes me as true; mainly because my father visited African ports in the early/mid 1950s, and the stories he told jibe with this account. Details of life on board ship and the characters that the writer worked with are also entertaining. It is not a long article.

https://isthmus.com/news/community/at-sea/

LizzieMaine · Nov 20, 2021

I don't know if I've ever told this story here, but I had a great-uncle who had some interesting merchant-marine adventures, including thirty-nine days adrift on a raft. His wife, who was too tough to use a wheelchair even though she'd been crippled by polio, was one of my grandfather's sisters. I grew up on the other side of the block from their house, and though he'd passed on when I was a baby, his presence still loomed over the family Thanksgiving table when the stories got told.

https://bangordailynews.com/2012/05...-hero-not-forgotten-thanks-to-town-historian/

Tiki Tom · Nov 20, 2021

Lizzie, that is a GREAT story. Your relative is pretty much everything this thread is about. The linked article from the Bangor Daily News is terrific. They don’t make men (or women) like that anymore. Thank you!

fireman · Nov 23, 2021

Tiki Tom said:
Yes, crazy times. I’ve read about the high fuel costs, shortages of staff (I hear that in these COVID times, once on board you can’t get off again; thanks to quarantine restrictions, etc), huge backlogs of ships waiting in ports, and lack of longshoremen & truckers. But, somewhere in the chaos, there might be a niche for an imaginative tramp freighter captain with connections and the ability to get things done. It’s pretty to think so, anyway.

I was reminded that I have been neglecting this thread. Therefore: Here is a recently published article about a young man’s tramp steamer experience. It reads as authentic. The description of African ports during that period strikes me as true; mainly because my father visited African ports in the early/mid 1950s, and the stories he told jibe with this account. Details of life on board ship and the characters that the writer worked with are also entertaining. It is not a long article.

https://isthmus.com/news/community/at-sea/

Thanks for posting that article.

I gotta believe that somewhere there is such a captain.

"It's the romantic in me".

Zombie_61 · Nov 23, 2021

Tiki Tom said:
...I’ve read about the high fuel costs, shortages of staff (I hear that in these COVID times, once on board you can’t get off again; thanks to quarantine restrictions, etc), huge backlogs of ships waiting in ports, and lack of longshoremen & truckers...

It has been reported in the news that U.S. President Joe Biden has submitted a plan to clear the backlog of ships and cargo from U.S. ports, and that Congress has approved both the plan and how to steal...er, appropriate...uhh, I mean obtain the necessary funding. However, people "in the know" have all pretty much agreed that the personnel required for this plan to work just aren't available--there is a shortage of both qualified truck drivers and longshoremen currently, and the truck drivers and longshoremen currently in-place are notorious for a lack of cooperation, so it's believed President Biden's plan has failed before they could even attempt to use it.

Tiki Tom · Nov 29, 2021

This is hypnotic. From the Red Sea to Sri Lanka to Singapore to Hong Kong. Some of those night skies are amazing. It’s also fascinating to watch the container ship unload and load. All in time lapse. Run time: 10 min.

Zombie_61 · Nov 29, 2021

Tiki Tom said:
This is hypnotic. From the Red Sea to Sri Lanka to Singapore to Hong Kong. Some of those night skies are amazing. It’s also fascinating to watch the container ship unload and load. All in time lapse. Run time: 10 min.

At about the 0:16 second mark the text at the bottom of the screen reads, "Sailing in the open sea is a truly unique way to grasp how significantly small we are in this beautiful world." For anyone who hasn't been similarly isolated, whether on the ocean or in a wilderness area far enough away from any cities that you can see nothing but nature all around you, I can say this is absolutely true if you have any awareness of the world around you. Even though I was on an ocean liner filled with other guests, mentally focusing on the sheer immensity of the ocean around us when we were at sea with land no longer in sight made me feel absolutely insignificant. Oh, and try it in the middle of night when almost all of the ship's lights have been turned off or dimmed. The ocean is so black that you can't really see it, but if the sky isn't obscured by clouds the number of stars you can see is incredible.

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