The museum ship Falls of Clyde

1 May 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Tall ships, Yacht of the Month Reading Time:  15 minutes

© Alexandre/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Alexandre/cc-by-sa-3.0

Falls of Clyde is the last surviving iron-hulled, four-masted full-rigged ship, and the only remaining sail-driven oil tanker. Designated a U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1973, and National Historic Landmark in 1989, she is now a museum ship in Honolulu, but her condition has deteriorated. She is currently not open to the public. In September 2008, ownership was transferred to a new nonprofit organization, the Friends of Falls of Clyde, which intends to restore her. Efforts to raise $1.5 million to get the ship into drydock have not succeeded as of 2015. An additional $30 million may be needed to fully restore the ship. Falls of Clyde was built in 1878 by Russell and Company in Port Glasgow in Scotland, launched as the first of nine iron-hulled four-masted ships for Wright and Breakenridge’s Falls Line. She was named after the Falls of Clyde, a group of waterfalls on the River Clyde, and built to the highest standard for general worldwide trade, Lloyd’s Register A-1. Her maiden voyage took her to Karachi, now in Pakistan, and her first six years were spent engaged in the India trade. She then became a tramp pursuing general cargo such as lumber, jute, cement, and wheat from ports in Australia, California, India, New Zealand, and the British Isles.   read more…

The sail training ship Unión

1 February 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Tall ships, Yacht of the Month Reading Time:  8 minutes

© flickr.com - Galeria del Ministerio de Defensa del Perú/cc-by-2.0

© flickr.com – Galeria del Ministerio de Defensa del Perú/cc-by-2.0

The BAP Unión is a training ship of the Peruvian Navy. It is a four-masted steel hulled full rigged barque built in 2014 by Shipyard Marine Industrial Services of Peru, known as SIMA. In June 2015, the ship received its masts and propeller; and the interior fitout began in charge of contractors Acopafi and MO Contract. Also, according to an agreement between SIMA and Navantia, the ship was provided with an “Integrated Control System Platform, Navigation and Communications”. The ship’s name honors a Peruvian corvette that took part in the first stage of the 1879-1883 War of the Pacific as part of a naval squadron under the command of Miguel Grau, the most important hero of the Peruvian Navy. Like other similar ships, the Unión has been conceived not only for training purposes, but also to be a sailing ambassador for her home country. Due to its features and dimensions, it has been considered (as of the date it was commissioned) as the largest sail vessel in Latin America.   read more…

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