A successful winter

I knew it would be a good winter when the northwest passage froze over in September, three months before it had the past couple of years.  The high temperature in the past three days is 19 F.  It is expected to touch 37 for a couple hours on Monday. Then it heads back down to the temperatures that fill the North (Hudson) River with ice - as in this view from the window of our apartment just above the George Washington Bridge. - gwc

Freighter Palisades Evening Light

A big bulk carrier passes southbound on the North River passing  Castle Village. = Ben Berry photo

Starling murmuration

Starling murmuration over the River Shannon, Ireland.  The issues are discussed in this Wired article

Aurora Australis Icebreaker Reaches Australia with 52 Rescued Passengers | gCaptain Maritime & Offshore News

Aurora Australis Icebreaker Reaches Australia with 52 Rescued Passengers | gCaptain Maritime & Offshore News: "The 52 passengers rescued from a Russian expedition vessel that became stuck in an Antarctic ice floe over the holidays have reached Australia safe and sound.

The passengers began disembarking the Aurora Australis icebreaker Wednesday morning in Hobart, Tasmania three weeks after their dramatic Southern Ocean rescue.

The 52 people, mostly scientists and tourists from Australia, were passengers onboard the Russian ship M/V Akademik Shokalskiy, which left New Zealand on November 28 on a private expedition and became trapped by ice on December 24 just off the coast of Antarctica.

The Aurora Australis, along with the Chinese icebreaker Zue Long, were diverted to assist and spent almost two weeks trying to reach the vessel. The passengers were eventually airlifted from the ice floe January 3 by the Zue Long’s helicopter and transferred to the Aurora Australis for transport back to Australia."



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Climate change - if you see something, say something

Observing melt water on a Greenland glacier

If You See Something, Say Something - NYTimes.com:

by Prof. Michael E. Mann // Penn State University 

 "If scientists choose not to engage in the public debate, we leave a vacuum that will be filled by those whose agenda is one of short-term self-interest. There is a great cost to society if scientists fail to participate in the larger conversation — if we do not do all we can to ensure that the policy debate is informed by an honest assessment of the risks. In fact, it would be an abrogation of our responsibility to society if we remained quiet in the face of such a grave threat.

This is hardly a radical position. Our Department of Homeland Security has urged citizens to report anything dangerous they witness: “If you see something, say something.” We scientists are citizens, too, and, in climate change, we see a clear and present danger. The public is beginning to see the danger, too — Midwestern farmers struggling with drought, more damaging wildfires out West, and withering record summer heat across the country — while wondering about possible linkages between rapid Arctic warming and strange weather patterns, like the recent outbreak of Arctic air across much of the United States."

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For Seamus

For Seamus Heaney - a short film - NY Times
It must have been a spot like this where Seamus watched his father digging.  
By God the old man could handle a spade.

5 Years Later, Still Feeling Impact of Plane Down in the Hudson - NYTimes.com

5 Years Later, Still Feeling Impact of Plane Down in the Hudson - NYTimes.com:
by Jim Dwyer

 "Plane down in the Hudson. No sign of it at 42nd and 12th Avenue. Where was it? Moving downstream, or downtown, fast.
I chased.
A colleague says she took notes by phone from me as I ran. My only memory is of the rod of ice that seemed to have grown inside my body, from both the wind whipping off the river on a frigid day, and the dread over what was sure to be an awful loss of life. Maybe a few people had been able to get out alive.
It was a cold day, about to get awful.
Somewhere, past the towed-car pound, maybe around the Javits Center, I spotted it. Well, not quite. What you could see from the street was a flotilla of ferries, nestled around the downed plane, keeping perfect pace with it as the Hudson currents pulled it toward the ocean.".....

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Fog on the North River

Circumnavigation Abandoned – Heading to Cape Town | Dr. Stanley Paris – Kiwi Spirit, a custom designed 63-foot yacht

When you are 1,700 miles from Capetown in the South Atlantic, bound for the southern ocean and your jib furler is held in place with a C-clamp, it's time to quit.  75 Year old Stanley Paris - on strong advice from Farr - the designer of Kiwi Spirit - will do just that.  He'll (hopefully) make it to the Cape of  Good Hope, ship the boat back to Lyman Morse in Thomaston, Maine, and enjoy the rest of his days in Kiwi Spirit doing sensible things. 

Update: But there are some disturbing things: Farr "recognizes that the rigging attachments" are inadequate to the task - ocean sailing!  Why didn't LM recognize that?  Paris refers to returning the boat to its original purpose "a fast family cruiser".  So it looks like this guy succumbed to his biggest bucket list item "round the world record breaker" and tried to convert a boat designed for less challenging purposes.  As to Cabot Lyman - who has sailed around the world - why did they not realize the design was not up to the re-purposed  task? - GWC
Circumnavigation Abandoned – Heading to Cape Town | Dr. Stanley Paris – Kiwi Spirit, a custom designed 63-foot yacht:

The President of the boat designers at Farr Yacht Design, after seeing the photos of the failures and repairs, as well as his recognizing that the design of the rigging attachments to the yacht were inadequate for ocean sailing, emailed me to say:“I have to say looking through them that I’ve become really concerned. My recommendation is to stop and regroup. I know that isn’t what you want to hear, but I don’t believe that you should continue into the Southern Ocean in this state. I think it would be irresponsible to do it. I think you have too many substantial problems to head into harm’s way. The boom end failure is a substantial one. The jury rigged mainsheet arrangement looks very prone to chafe. That, combined with the jury rigged reefing arrangement, leads me to believe that a substantial failure is possible. If that occurs, you will quickly end up in a loss of mainsail situation. That by itself could quickly lead to a dismasting… I think the widespread failures across so many systems, would have kept a crewed grand prix boat on shore. To have this combination of problems in your injured state is inviting disaster… Please make the prudent decision and stop.” From Commanders Weather who have been routing me, stated after a comprehensive outline of various strategies:“I am very sorry, but the safest decision will be to head for Cape Town.  And, getting into Cape Town is sometimes not very easy!” From Cabot Lyman, the owner of Lyman Morse, the builders:“I am in complete amazement and awe of your accomplishment so far -you have  the complete respect of everyone who has any knowledge of this project and  the many thousands of miles you have already sailed puts you in the category of the very few. Is it prudent for you to stop in Cape Town. Yes, are we all disappointed – yes – extremely so.

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Cuthbert and the Otters - Paul Muldoon in memory of Seamus Heaney

The monastery and lobster boats at Lindisfarne

The Sea obeyed the word of the monk Cuthbert, allowing sailors to return home safe, the Bede reports in his hagiography The Life and Miracles of St. Cuthbert, Bishop of Lindisfarne, who died on Farne Island in 687.  That is the Cuthbert of the title of Paul Muldoon's long poem which appeared in the Times Literary Supplement in December.  Muldoon like Heaney is from North Ireland.  He teaches at Princeton and is ensconced in Manhattan where he is poetry editor of The New Yorker.  His "three car garage" rock band Racket performs occasionally.

The poem, which is not the easiest read (e.g. a hauberk is a chain mail tunic; to "thole" is to tolerate), is a read-aloud to grasp the sometimes gruff onomatopoeia which evokes Heaney's language.  The first three stanzas are below.  Click on the title to go to the full poem on the TLS website.

Cuthbert and the Otters

Paul Muldoon: In memory of Seamus Heaney

Published: 20 December 2013

Notwithstanding the fact that one of them has gnawed a strip of flesh 
from the shoulder of the salmon, 
relieving it of a little darne, 
the fish these six otters would fain 
carry over the sandstone limen 
and into Cuthbert’s cell, a fish garlanded with bay leaves 
and laid out on a linden-flitch 

like a hauberked warrior laid out on his shield, 
may yet be thought of as whole. 
An entire fish for an abbot’s supper. 
It’s true they’ve yet to develop the turnip-clamp 
and the sword with a weighted pommel 
but the Danes are already dyeing everything beige. 
In anticipation, perhaps, of the carpet and mustard factories 

built on ground first broken by the Brigantes. 
The Benedictines still love a bit of banter 
along with the Beatitudes. Blessed is the trundle bed, 
it readies us for the tunnel 
from Spital Tongues to the staithes. I’m at once full of dread 
and in complete denial. 
I cannot thole the thought of Seamus Heaney dead.