Three Tows - UPDATED

 Day to day tug activity in the Port of Halifax rarely attracts much attention. Docking, undocking and escort work appear to be routine and are carried out with quiet skill. 

Today, November 13 there were several ship arrivals and departures that used the tugs of Atlantic Towing Ltd in those typical functions. Large ships, such as the 149,525 gross tons 15,000 TEU container ship Zenith Lumos took two tethered stern escorts both inbound and outbound as required by Port of Halifax regulations.

 Sister tugs Atlantic Ash and Atlantic Maple both RAStar 3200-W types of 6675 bhp, 85 tonnes bollard pull provided the required double escort.

Seeing tugs with tows is rare, but today there were two of note. The first saw the US flag tug Ezra Sol (see previous post) finally getting underway after a long stay in port. It arrived initially on September 21 towing the bulk carrier AP Revelin. That ship lost its prop (or a blade) and was unable to proceed on its own. The ship transloaded its grain cargo to another bulker the Eva Bright then awaited favourable weather. Calm conditions are expected for the next week and the the tow was able to get underway this morning.

The Ezra Sol gets underway from Pier 25 today. 

After reconnecting the tow line, the voyage begins with the Atlantic Maple providing steering assistance from the stern tethered position. ETA New York is November 18.
 

Tugs from McNally Marine  are busy in the harbour with dredging and construction of the new pier face at Halifax Shipyard. Some of that work has been completed and the company will move some equipment back to its base in Point Tupper. Today their very capable tug Mister Joe (Russel Brothers, 1964, 750 bhp), which arrived from Cape Breton November 10,  towed out a derrick barge.

Built as the Churchill River and renamed in 2001, tug was extensively rebuilt in 2019. "Worth its weight in gold", the tug has worked all over eastern Canada including Hudson Bay and Newfoundland and Labrador. The trip to Point Tupper will take about 36 hours at 4.9 knots.

Tugs of the Royal Canadian Navy's auxiliary fleet are not commissioned naval vessels and are crewed by civilians. However they work for the Navy doing a variety of chores, including berthing naval vessels.Today's operation for the CNAV Glenside YTB 644 was a little out of the ordinary. It moved the long retired World War II Corvette Sackville from its summer berth, where it is open to the public, to its winter berth within the HMC Dockyard, the RCN's eastern base.

 

 The Glenside and two more sister tugs, the Glenbrook and the Glenevis were built in 1976 and are rated at 1750 bhp, 19 tons bollard pull. They are VS cycloidal drive boats, very adept at working within the confines of the Dockyard finger piers. 

When the time comes to move the Sackville next year the task may fall to a new tug, as the RCN is in the process of retiring these tugs and replacing them with two ASD tugs. The first of the new tugs, the CNAV Canso is fitting out in Quebec City and may be delivered this fall or more likely by next spring. [The wisdom of building only two tugs to replace three tugA and a fireboat, and ASDs at that for a growing RCN must be questioned. More on that another time.]

It is worth noting that between the time when the Mister Joe was built and the Glenside was built Canada instituted a requirement that all sleeping accommodation on new tugs was to be above the waterline. Older vessels were "grandfathered" as conversion was likely impossible. The regulation came into effect after several lives were lost when tugs sank, trapping crew below. The rule also applied to tugs, no matter their age, purchased abroad and brought under Canadian flag. If they had sleeping quarters below the waterline it had to be removed and new accommodation provided or the boat had to be a day boat, with no sleeping aboard. 

Bonus Round - Dominion Diving

Tugs and work boats from Dominion Diving Ltd are constantly busy in the harbour shifting barges,  providing line handling services and carrying out small tows.

The Dominion Rumbler scurries ahead of the inbound Morning Cornelia on November 11 for a line handling job. The auto carrier's bow line will be lead out to a mooring buoy and Dominion's crew members will make take the line and make it fast to the buoy, sometimes using an even smaller boat. (September 30 photos).

Note the boat has a towing bit mounted high on a "roll bar" aft.

The smallest tows seen recently include:

Dominion's as yet unnamed aluminum hulled workboat was spotted towing a former Coast Guard boat:

 And to outday, their venerable Halmar (built in 1960, rebuilt in 2009) won the prize for smallest tow. Halmar works as a crew boat for pilot delivery, goes well to sea for survey and sampling work, and acts as a diving tender.

The small inflatable was used for some unknown, possibly diving, work in Bedford Basin. Legend has it that the Halmar was built by Halifax Shipyard apprentices. It operated as a workboat at the old Dartmouth Marine Slip until it moved next door to Dartmouth Cove and was rebuilt by Dominion Diving.

 

Update 2025-11-14 

The Mister Joe returned to Halifax, with its tow, after only few hours at sea. There may have been an equipment failure of some sort. By the end of the day November 14, the tug and tow were still in port.

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The Narrows - the place to be

For a short stretch of time this morning [ 9:47 -10:21 AST], the Narrows was the place to be to see some tug and workboat activity.

Siem Commander arrived to tie up at pier 9C south.

Since joining Secunda Marine from parent Siem in July, the boat has been kept busy replacing Trinity Sea on Secunda's Exxon Mobil contract. That work involves decommissioning the Sable Offshore Energy Project gas installations. The seven platforms will all be removed and the 22 wells capped by the end of next year.

Dominion Diving's general duty workboat Halmar was returning from Bedford Basin after delivering a pilot to the anchored bulk carrier Salarium. The self-unloader was moving to National Gypsum on departure of the Algoma Verity [see Shipfax].

Also returning from the Basin, the Dockyard tug Glenside completed a security patrol to Birch Cove. Although the research barge is not there now, a flat deck barge has been moored in its position, and requires periodic checking.

Glenside is showing some rust on her strongback / stern rail from some recent towing work.

The tug Mister Joe returned from pier 42 with the split hull hopper barge Pitts No.12 after delivering another load of ballast rock.

J.F.Whalen came out to assist the barge alongside as the outbound Algoma Verity was fast approaching the Narrows.

McNally's work on extending pier 42 southward is nearing completion with the cribs almost completely ballasted. The Port has also let the contract for the cope walls, and McNally is beginning to pack up some of its plant.

The tug Whitby has been loaded aboard the crane barge Idus Atwell both of which were brought in from the Great Lakes last spring for this project.

Although it is a research vessel, the CCGS M.Perley is certainly a workboat. Built by Meridien Maritime Reparation Inc in Matane, QC in 2012, the 210 grt vessel is used for nearshore fisheries research and usually lays up for the winter at the BIO in Dartmouth.

The vessel's specs are outlined at: https://inter-j01.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fdat/vessels/vessel-details/120

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The Warrior has landed

After a stormy day yesterday that prevented unloading, Dominion Warrior took to the water today from the heavy lift ship Stellaprima.

The new acquisition was shepherded by Dominion's Roseway to the Dartmouth Cove base, attended by Dominion Bearcat and Halmar. Both of these boats have been rebuilt by Dominion's own forces during their tenure with Dominion and it is likely that Dominion Warrior will receive similar treatment before it enters service.

As per the previous post, Dominion Warrior ex Coastal Warrior will expand Dominion's capabilities to support its diving and marine service business by being a multi-tasking vessel with tug / cargo/ and other capabilities.

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Halmar - on the go

Although I have featured the tug/workboat Halmar before: http://tugfaxblogspotcom.blogspot.ca/2012/05/big-tug-little-tugs-at-pier-9.html, it never hurts to look again at one of the busier boats in Halifax harbour.
Whether it is assisting in the launch of a new ship at Halifax shipyard - see yesterday's Shipfax - or ferrying pilots, agents and stores out to anchored ships, Halmar sees almost daily use.

This afternoon the boat was bustling along in the Narrows taking a pilot out to the tanker Cenito in Bedford Basin.
Built in 1960 by and for Halifax Shipyards, it was completely rebuilt in 2009 by current owners Dominion Diving. At that time it was repowered with an 8V71 main engine of 318 bhp and given a 12 inch bow thruster.

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Big tug, little tugs at pier 9

More tug activity in the northend on Friday involved moving the old supplier Intrepid Sea a.k.a N-29, along pier 9B to pier 9A. The long dead Neftegaz 29 could not move on its own, and so Dominion Diving provided the motive power, and deck crew, using Halmar and Roseway - also two veterans.
Neftegaz 29 was built in Poland in 1983 as a pipe carrier/supplier for the USSR and acquired by Secunda Marine Services in 1998. Secunda rebuilt three sister vessels, with this one providing a lot of spares, but never reaching the conversion stage.

1. Its current name Intrepid Sea appears nowhere on the ship, so it is referred to as N-29. 

2. Neftegaz 29 was registered in the port of Kholmsk, which is on Sakhalin Island, just north of Japan in the eastern part of the Russia. Lloyd's Register never listed a registry port for the ship.

Friday's move was carried out by two classic boats, that have spent many years in Halifax. The more travelled of the two is Roseway, the former Department of Public Works tug, built in 1960 and acquired by Dominion Diving in 1989. It has performed numerous coastal tows but is most commonly seen these days as the line handling boat for Autoport.

3. Roseway reports for duty.

4. After moving a containment boom, Roseway takes a bow line and gets the ship moving using her 300 bhp on two screws. 

 Also built in 1960 is Halmar, one of the former Shipyards workboats. Its name is an amalgamation of HALifax Shipyards and Dartmouth MARine Slips,and it worked in both yards and all around the harbour until 1992. It was completely rebuilt and repowered in 2008-2009, with new superstructure and even a bow thruster. It can often be seen ferrying pilots to ships at anchor in the harbour when the pilot boat is out, but also does numerous other chores.

5. Halmar takes a stern line to keep the ship in line.

 

6. Her bow thruster was put to use several times during the move.

7. Roseway is often seen handling the head lines of ships at Autoport, where they are tethered to large buoys. 

8. On December 23, 1991 Roseway sank in 60 feet of water (and muck) while approaching the IEL dock. She was lifted off the bottom by slings and barge and moved to the pier where she was raised on December 28. Her electronics were replaced and and after cleanup was back in service within two months. [The tug in the background is Canmar Tugger, which became Atlantic Oak(i) and is now working on the west coast as Island Tugger. Coincidentally, it sank at its dock in Sydney in March 1993 and was raised by Dominion Diving.]

9. Halmar as she looked shortly after Dominion Diving acquired her from the Shipyards. [That is a lifeboat from CSS Hudson, and the retired icebreaker John A. Macdonald in the background]

10. In her Shipyard days Halmar worked around the harbour to assist in repairs, often with divers aboard. 



Mystery Solved-Oak returns

Thanks to an intrepid squad of observers, I have been able to piece together the whereabouts of Atlantic Oak for the last several days.

After leaving Halifax, Atlantic Oak remained with the Triumph as it continued "around the corner" to St.Margaret's Bay - just west of Halifax. There is shelter and room in the Bay, which is also free from conflicting ship traffic. (Triumph's position at anchor in Halifax was creating issues for other shipping.) Bad weather closed in soon after the rig left Halifax, with high winds being the predominant factor, and it was a better place to anchor than in Halifax.

Although St.Margaret's Bay is some distance from Halifax by sea, it is not far by land, and so it was that workers could shuttle from Halifax to the Hubbards by road for additional securement work on the rig. Dominion Diving's Halmar provided boatmen service for the workers out to the ship.

Atlantic Towing's Atlantic Elm was also called in to assist. It has been scheduled to bring the tidal turbine from Saint John for the last several weeks, but weather has also interfered with that move.

Atlantic Oak and Halmar returned to Halifax today when weather permitted Triumph (with is deck cargo of Rowan Gorilla III) to sail for Corpus Christi TX.

[photo: October 4, 2010]

Tugs of All Sizes

All tugs are important to Tugfax!

One operator of small tugs (some would call them workboats- more on that later) in Halifax is Dominion Diving Ltd. As their name implies, they do diving work - much of it offshore, but also in the harbour too. They also have contracts with the Atlantic Pilotage Authority and others for launch services in the harbour and approaches.

For this purpose they operate a fleet of launches and other vessels, including a growing fleet of scows used for a variety marine work, including stores and water barges and lineboat work at Autoport.

They also operate three tugs (you can tell because they have towing bitts- this makes them tugs!)

Their home base is in Dartmouth Cove, and the photo taken this morning shows their fleet in repose.

In the foreground - with no name visible- is Roseway built in 1960 for the Department of Public Works. She is a twin screw tug and packs 300 horsepower. Orginally used to tend a small dredge and mud scows, she is now a jack of all work, often working as a line boat at Autoport and handles stores and water barges.

In the middle is Big Steel, built in 1955 for the navy as YFU/ YMU 116, with 250 bhp. She also works as a line boat, but also handles scows. She was rebuilt by Dominion Diving with a new wheelhouse.

On the right is Halmar, also built in 1960. She is also single screw. Built by Halifax Shipyard for their own use, she was rebuilt by Dominion Diving in 2009 with a new house and possibly a new engine. Her old engine rated 110 bhp. She is used for in harbour towing too.

Their distinctive colour makes the highly visible, as they bustle about the harbour.