Merchant Ship Construction Da Taylor pdf. 4/5 Ship, from the descriptive work discussing the United States, Maritime Studies Plymouth Polytechnic. Ship Construction File SOLAS 1974, regulation II-1/3-10; MSC.1/Circ.1343. Merchant Vessels X X X X X X International Oil Pollution Prevention Certificate. Supplemented with a Record of Construction and Equipment for Ships other than Oil Tankers (Form A) or a Record of.
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Historical merchant trading ship: a Dutch fluyt cargo vessel from the late 17th-century
A merchant ship, merchant vessel, trading vessel, or merchantman is a watercraft that transports cargo or carries passengers for hire. This is in contrast to pleasure craft, which are used for personal recreation, and naval ships, which are used for military purposes.
They come in myriad sizes and shapes, from twenty-foot inflatable dive boats in Hawaii, to 5,000 passenger casino vessels on the Mississippi River, to tugboats plying New York Harbor, to 1,000 foot oil tankers and container ships at major ports, to passenger-carrying submarines in the Caribbean.[1]
Most countries of the world operate fleets of merchant ships. However, due to the high costs of operations, today these fleets are in many cases sailing under the flags of nations that specialize in providing manpower and services at favourable terms. Such flags are known as 'flags of convenience'. Currently, Liberia and Panama are particularly favoured. Ownership of the vessels can be by any country, however.
The Greek merchant marine is the largest in the world. Today, the Greek fleet accounts for some 16 per cent of the world's tonnage; this makes it currently the largest single international merchant fleet in the world, albeit not the largest in history.[2]
During wars, merchant ships may be used as auxiliaries to the navies of their respective countries, and are called upon to deliver military personnel and materiel.
- 3Merchant ship categories
- 3.1Dry cargo ships
Definitions[edit]
The term 'commercial vessel' is defined by the United States Coast Guard as any vessel (i.e. boat or ship) engaged in commercial trade or that carries passengers for hire.
In English, 'Merchant Navy' without further clarification is used to refer to the British Merchant Navy; the United States merchant fleet is known as the United States Merchant Marine.
Name prefixes[edit]
Merchant ships names are prefixed by which kind of vessel they are:[3]
- CS = Cable Ship/Cable layer
- MS = Motorship
- MV = Motor/Merchant Vessel
- MFV = Motor Fishing Vessel
- SS = Steam Ship
- MT = Motor Tanker or Motor Tug Boat
- MSV = Motor Stand-by Vessel
- MY = Motor Yacht
- NS = Nuclear Ship[4]
- RMS = Royal Mail Ship
- RRS = Royal Research Ship
- SV = Sailing Vessel (although these can be sub coded as type of sailing vessel)
- LPG = Gas carrier transporting liquefied petroleum gas
- LNG = Gas carrier transporting liquefied natural gas
- RV = Research Vessel
For more detailed information see ship prefix
Merchant ship categories[edit]
The UNCTAD review of maritime transport categorizes ships as: oil tankers, bulk (and combination) carriers, general cargo ships, container ships, and 'other ships', which includes 'liquefied petroleum gas carriers, liquefied natural gas carriers, parcel (chemical) tankers, specialized tankers, reefers, offshore supply, tugs, dredgers, cruise, ferries, other non-cargo'. General cargo ships include 'multi-purpose and project vessels and roll-on/roll-off cargo'.[5]
Dry cargo ships[edit]
Sabrina I carries bulk cargo inside her holds.
A cargo ship or freighter is any sort of ship or vessel that carries cargo, goods, and materials from one port to another. Thousands of cargo carriers ply the world's seas and oceans each year; they handle the bulk of international trade. Cargo ships are usually specially designed for the task, often being equipped with cranes and other mechanisms to load and unload, and come in all sizes.
Dry cargo ships today are mainly bulk carriers and container ships. Bulk carriers or bulkers are used for the transportation of homogeneous cargo such as coal, rubber, copra, tin, and wheat. Container ships are used for the carriage of miscellaneous goods.
Bulk carriers[edit]
A bulk carrier is a ship used to transport bulk cargo items such as iron ore, bauxite, coal, cement, grain and similar cargo. Bulk carriers can be recognized by large box-like hatches on deck, designed to slide outboard or fold fore-and-aft to enable access for loading or discharging cargo. The dimensions of bulk carriers are often determined by the ports and sea routes that they need to serve, and by the maximum width of the Panama Canal. Most lakes are too small to accommodate bulk carriers, but a large fleet of lake freighters has been plying the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Seaway of North America for over a century.
Container ships[edit]
Colombo Express, one of the largest container ships in the world, owned and operated by Hapag-Lloyd of Germany
Container ships are cargo ships that carry all of their load in truck-size containers, in a technique called containerization. They form a common means of commercial intermodal freight transport.
Tankers[edit]
Commercial crude oil supertankerAbQaiq
A tanker is a ship designed to transport liquids in bulk.
Oil tankers for the transport of fluids, such as crude oil, petroleum products, liquefied petroleum gas, liquefied natural gas and chemicals, also vegetable oils, wine and other food - the tanker sector comprises one third of the world tonnage.
Tankers can range in size from several hundred tons, designed to serve small harbours and coastal settlements, to several hundred thousand tons, with these being designed for long-range haulage. A wide range of products are carried by tankers, including:
- hydrocarbon products such as oil, LPG, and LNG
- Chemicals, such as ammonia, chlorine, and styrene monomer
Different products require different handling and transport, thus special types of tankers have been built, such as 'chemical tankers' and 'oil tankers'. Gas Carriers such as 'LNG carriers' as they are typically known, are a relatively rare tanker designed to carry liquefied natural gas.
Among oil tankers, supertankers were designed for carrying oil around the Horn of Africa from the Middle East; the FSO Knock Nevis being the largest vessel in the world, a ULCC supertanker formerly known as Jahre Viking (Seawise Giant). It has a deadweight of 565 thousand metric tons and length of about 458 meters. The use of such large ships is in fact very unprofitable, due to the inability to operate them at full cargo capacity; hence, the production of supertankers has currently ceased. Today's largest oil tankers in comparison by gross tonnage are TI Europe, TI Asia, TI Oceania, which are the largest sailing vessels today. But even with their deadweight of 441,585 metric tons, sailing as VLCC most of the time, they do not use more than 70% of their total capacity.
Apart from pipeline transport, tankers are the only method for transporting large quantities of oil, although such tankers have caused large environmental disasters when sinking close to coastal regions, causing oil spills. See Braer, Erika, Exxon Valdez, Prestige and Torrey Canyon for examples of tankers that have been involved in oil spills.
Coasters[edit]
Coasters, smaller ships for any category of cargo which are normally not on ocean-crossing routes, but in coastwise trades. Coasters are shallow-hulled ships used for trade between locations on the same island or continent. Their shallow hulls mean that they can get through reefs where seagoing ships usually cannot (seagoing ships have a very deep hull for supplies and trade etc.).
Passenger ships[edit]
A passenger ship is a ship whose primary function is to carry passengers. The category does not include cargo vessels which have accommodations for limited numbers of passengers, such as the formerly ubiquitous twelve-passenger freighters in which the transport of passengers is secondary to the carriage of freight. The type does however include many classes of ships which are designed to transport substantial numbers of passengers as well as freight. Indeed, until recently virtually all ocean liners were able to transport mail, package freight and express, and other cargo in addition to passenger luggage, and were equipped with cargo holds and derricks, kingposts, or other cargo-handling gear for that purpose. Modern cruiseferries have car decks for lorries as well as the passengers' cars. Only in more recent ocean liners and in virtually all cruise ships has this cargo capacity been removed.
A ferry is a boat or ship carrying passengers and sometimes their vehicles. Ferries are also used to transport freight (in lorries and sometimes unpowered freight containers) and even railroad cars (in the case of a train ferry).
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^'Summary of the Report from the Passenger Vessel Access Advisory Committee'. Archived from the original on 14 April 2012. Retrieved 24 April 2012.
- ^'Review of Maritime Transport 2007, Chapter 2, Structure and ownership of the world fleet, p. 45'(PDF).
- ^Dasgupta, Soumyajit (4 March 2013). 'What are Ship Prefixes for Navy and Merchant Vessels?'. Marine Insight. Retrieved 30 October 2018.
- ^'Rich Atlantic International --- Ship Prefix --- Glossary'. web.archive.org. 5 August 2012. Retrieved 27 November 2019.
- ^Hoffmann, Jan; Asariotis, Regina; Benamara, Hassiba; Premti, Anila; Valentine, Vincent; Yousse, Frida (2016), Review of Maritime Transport 2016(PDF), United Nations, p. 104, ISBN978-92-1-112904-5, ISSN0566-7682
External links[edit]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Merchant ships. |
Look up merchant ship or merchantman in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Merchant_ship&oldid=930037274'
History | |
---|---|
Name: | Ocean Telegraph / Light Brigade |
Owner: |
|
Builder: | James O. Curtis, Medford, Massachusetts |
Launched: | March 29, 1854 |
Acquired: |
|
Out of service: | 1883 |
Fate: | Coal hulk at Gibraltar |
General characteristics | |
Tonnage: |
|
Length: | 227 ft (69 m) |
Beam: | 40 ft (12 m) |
Draft: | 23 ft 6 in (7.16 m) |
Propulsion: | Sails |
Ocean Telegraph was an American clipper ship. Built in 1854 for the run between New York and San Francisco, she was later sold and renamed Light Brigade in 1863. For the next 12 years she was used predominantly to transport cargo and immigrants between London and Australia and New Zealand.
1854: Construction - Ocean Telegraph[edit]
Ocean Telegraph was designed by Boston-based naval architectSamuel Hartt Pook who designed several very fast clipper ships. She was built by James O. Curtis in Medford, up the Mystic River from Boston, in 1854. She was built for Reed, Wade & Co. of Boston, Massachusetts, for New York to San Francisco run.
The ship was 1,495 tons register Old Measurement, 1,244 tons Moorsom Measurement. She measured 227 feet (69 m) long, 40 feet (12 m) wide, and 23 feet (7.0 m) deep.[1][2]
She was described as 'a very sharp clipper and said to be one of the most perfect ships ever built'.[1] 'No expense was spared to make her one of the most perfect and beautiful ships ever built. The bow raked boldly forward, flaring gracefully, and was ornamented with a beautiful carved female figure with forks of lightning playing around She was very sharp, with a long, clean run tapering like that of a pilot boat. Her light and graceful stern was ornamented with carved work surrounding a figure of Neptune. She had a fine sheer, and every line and molding harmonized her whole length.'[1][3]
In common with other clipper ships of the day she was constructed from wood and with three masts. Also in common with other clipper ships of the day her hull was painted black, and the bottom of the hull lined with copper. Her black hull can be clearly seen, and the copper can just be seen above the waves in an 1858 painting by James E. Buttersworth.
1854 - 1862: New York to San Francisco run - Ocean Telegraph[edit]
Clipper ship sailing card
From 1854 to her sale in 1863 she was involved in moving cargo and passengers between New York and San Francisco. In common with many other clippers at the time, she was sometimes unable to procure a return cargo and when this happened had to return to New York in ballast.[1]
Under the command of Captain Little she was involved in a race from New York to San Francisco in 1859/1860 against Great Republic which at 109 days Ocean Telegraph won by 1 day, and which also placed her for the second time on the list of clipper ships to make the journey in 110 days or less. On her voyages she also became one of the 36 ships to make the run from 50° S in the Pacific to the Equator in 20 days or less (19 days), and one of the 48 ships to make the run from the Equator to San Francisco in 20 days or less (20 days).[1][4]
The fastest outward passage to San Francisco from New York of Ocean Telegraph was 105 days, 20 hours. In total she made eight passages with cargo to San Francisco from New York. The average of seven of these is under 117 days, and of the eight is 121 days. She made five passages with cargo from San Francisco to New York, of which four were under 100 days. The average of the five is 96.8 days. Portions of a number of these runs were very close to record. Fastest return passage 90 days. In 1855 she made the run from Callao to New York in 58 days, believed to be the fastest on record.[3]
The clipper ship trade card used to advertise the Ocean Telegraph had an illustration of two telegraphers facing each other over an expanse of water.[5]
She sailed from San Francisco to Queenstown, with a cargo of guano from Peru in 1862.[6] In 1863, when it was no longer possible to make a profit on the trade from New York to San Francisco, she was sold.
1863–1873: London to Australia and New Zealand run - Light Brigade[edit]
Light Brigade at Gravesend, London
In 1863 sold for £7060 to the Black Ball Line of James Baines & Co., Liverpool principally for the London to Australia and New Zealand run, and renamed Light Brigade. As part of the Black Ball Line, and under Captain Henry Evans, she carried immigrants from London to Brisbane, Australia in 1863; British troops and their families to Auckland, New Zealand, in 1864 from both Calcutta and Rangoon in India, and from London, for the New Zealand Wars (two separate voyages); immigrants from London to Sydney, Australia in 1867 and returned to London via Calcutta with cavalry horses for the troops in Calcutta; immigrants from London to Lyttelton, New Zealand, in 1867; and immigrants from London to Brisbane, Australia in 1869 and 1870/71.[2] On this last trip Captain Evans died in Brisbane 10 days before the ship sailed again for London in April 1871 with a cargo of primary production goods being 2630 bales wool, 48 bales sheepskins, 500 casks tallow, 788 cases preserved mutton, 223 cases preserved meat, 11 calfskins, 1500 hides, 6031 horns, 89½ cwts bones and hoofs, 3 cases honey, 3 packages tobacco, 2 cases natural history specimens, 2 boxes silver plate, 69 sundry boxes and packages.[7]
In 1871 sold to Taylor, Bethell & Roberts, London principally for the London to Queensland, Australia run.[2] She made 2 trips from London to Keppel Bay (Rockhampton) in 1871/72 (Captain Holden) and 1872/73 (Captain L. Davies). Light Brigade was described on the first trip as 'a smart looking full-rigged ship, admirably adapted for the conveyance of passengers and immigrants, the various compartments for their accommodation being, both roomy and well ventilated. It may be added that the ship 'tween decks presents a clean and orderly appearance.'[8] Also on the first trip it was decided that she not travel down to Brisbane but that she return with cargo from Keppel Bay to London. This cargo did not arrive in a satisfactory condition and settlers near Keppel Bay decided not to again ship goods as part of her cargo. As a result, on the second trip she then travelled down in ballast to Sydney looking for a return cargo. The newspapers of the day do not then make it clear whether she returned to London via Batavia (Jakarta, Indonesia), or San Francisco, or both.
Each time Light Brigade had sailed to Australia and New Zealand during this period she carried around 400 passengers, mail and a cargo of general merchandise. The passengers for Auckland were soldiers and their families. The passengers for Lyttleton, Sydney, Brisbane, and Keppel Bay (Rockhampton) were predominantly assisted immigrants - labourers, domestic servants, and tradespeople for the settlements there. She returned with mail and a small number of passengers, but return cargo to fill the space of the assisted immigrants and soldiers was harder to procure.
A typical cargo of primary production goods for transport to London is described above. A typical cargo of general merchandise coming out from London consisted of apparel and ready made clothing £272, flannels and blanket, £380, cotton goods £606, general drapery £290, saddlery and leather goods £187, cordage and twine £144, sacks, 150 woolpacks 150, paints and varnish £150, stationery £130, brushware £11, hardware and ironmongery £356, machinery £854, railway material, £1200, upholstery and furniture £51, toys and fancy goods £12, oilman's stores and provisions £303, salt fish £165, oils 2350 gallons, salt 60 tons, fruits and spices 4 cwt, drugs £91, cigars 1721 lbs, beer in glass 50 barrels, bar and rod iron 2 tons, lead: sheet, pipe, and pig 1 ton, steel 5 tons, tin plates 582 boxes, and wire 3 tons.[9]
1875 - 1883: Later years - Light Brigade[edit]
In 1875 sold to the Cork Warehouse Co., Cork, Ireland, and changed into a bark.[2][3]
In February 1883 arrived at Queenstown VA 19 days south of New York, leaking badly.[2]
In 1883 condemned and sold to Gibraltar where she was converted into a coal-hulk.[2] Last report 1891.[3]
See also[edit]
Notes[edit]
- One reference states that the Ocean Telegraph was built by Hayden & Cudworth. This is not substantiated by any other references. This clipper ship was built by James O. Curtis.
References[edit]
- ^ abcdeEra of the Clipper Ships
- ^ abcdefOcean Telegraph
- ^ abcdMedford Historical Register Vol. XXXIII, 1930, Published by the Medford Historical Society
- ^Medford Historical Society
- ^Bulletin of the Business Historical Society
- ^Howe, Octavius T.; Matthews, Frederic C. (1927). American Clipper Ships, 1833-1858. 2, Malay - Young Mechanic. Salem, MA. pp. 457–459.
- ^The Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864-1933), Wednesday 5 April 1871, Pg 2
- ^The Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864-1933), Wednesday 16 March 1872, Pg 11
- ^The Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864-1933), Wednesday 21 February 1872, Pg 2
External links[edit]
- Media related to Ocean Telegraph (ship, 1854) at Wikimedia Commons
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