Category: Marines from all over the world

Brazil - Dramatic images: Sailing training ship in distress

As a seafarer, you don't want to have to look at these pictures, but as a chronicler of maritime events, you can't close your eyes to them. The Rio Guayas through the centre of Ecuador's port city of Guayaquil, home to 3 million people, can be a killer! At its narrowest point, a smart pedestrian bridge was built from the city to the green island of Santay in 2014, but in 2017 and 2018, two military units failed in their attempt to defy the fierce tidal current to catch the open passage. After the delicate-looking bridge had only recently been repaired, the Ecuadorian Navy asked the President of Ecuador via the Ministry of Defence to dismantle it again in mid-September.

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Sailing training ship chases drug speedboat - and wins

The opponents could not have been more dissimilar: a smart sail training ship similar to the GORCH FOCK and a highly motorised, semi-submersible drug smuggler! And yet the Ecuadorian three-masted barque GUAYAS managed the feat of intercepting and apprehending the drug-laden speedboat on its journey north. Sheer luck and bad luck helped the commander - on the one hand favourable winds and constant information about the change of situation from the American air surveillance of the anti-drug task force, on the other hand the failure of two of the three outboard engines and perhaps also the impressive silhouette of a three-master from a frog's-eye view. Even if the sailor could only run at 10 knots at best, the boat would have a clear advantage at 40 knots...

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USS Connecticut Investigation result: Grounding

So there are still blank spots on the maps of the earth after all! At least on the charts of the Naval Oceanographic Office (NAVOCEANO) in the Pentagon, there must be previously unknown shallows. This is the conclusion one can come to when reading the results of the US Navy's accident investigation into the accident involving the USS Connecticut (Seawolf-class nuclear submarine) in the South-East Asian Pacific at the beginning of October. The submerged submarine is said to have run aground on a previously unmeasured shoal. The damage to the outer hull of the boat was described as minor. There were also only minor injuries to the crew. This is the official version. As is well known...

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