Research Vessels

[Roger Long]

[FONT=&quot]These slides are from our recent presentation to design a new research vessel. During the last two decades of my career, I designed the core of the U.S. Atlantic coastal oceanographic fleet. Including a conversion and a vessel designed as V.P. of a previous company (not shown here), the overlapping ranges of my designs cover the East Coast from Canada to Mexico.[/FONT]

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[FONT=&quot]There is also this sailing school ship which teaches and conducts a fair amount of oceanography.[/FONT]

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[FONT=&quot]I'm optimistic about our selection for the new research vessel design and looking forward to going back to work for a while.
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[jibes138]

Roger,
Did you design the R/V Susan Hudson shown here on the Duke Marine Lab webcam on Pivers Island?

http://www.nicholas.duke.edu/marinelab/facilities/webcam

 

[Roger Long]

Did you design the R/V Susan Hudson? http://www.nicholas.duke.edu/marinelab/facilities/webcam

Nope, I only designed most of the coastal boats built since 1990, not all of them.

 

[kloudie1]

Ahh.. Congrats, Roger.. Gives ya time and dollars to think.. Those are good things! Beautiful boats all !

 

[Tom J]

Research vessel

Great designs, Roger. Obviously capable and seaworthy vessels. I worked on this old girl, the AquaQuest, for several years. Her homeport is Tarpon Springs, Florida, and she took us to ports in the Bahamas, Cuba and the Dominic Republic.

 

[Captandrew]

Quite a treat Roger. Especially having worked on the "Conversion" I am still on call for her as relief but have not driven her for a while. I would be happy to skipper any of your designs.

Good luck with the proposal.

Andrew.

 

[Roger Long]

having worked on the "Conversion"

How is the old girl? She looks great in these.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUEFNIHt_6w

http://news.usf.edu/article/templates/?a=1217

http://channel2.typepad.com/changing_seas/2011/08/tour-the-rv-weatherbird-ii.html

Is that CTD slide that I designed still working?

Of course, I didn't get to design an even cooler ship because this one came on the market when the Bermuda Biological Station sold her.


While we're going down memory lane, here is the boat that started it all:

http://www.sml.cornell.edu/sml_welcomekingsbury.html

I actually designed a larger research vessel before the "Kingsbury but it didn't get built when Bermuda bought the Weatherbird.

It was the legendary comfort and seakeeping of the John M. Kingsbury that lead to my designing the UNH, ODU, and WHOI boats without even having to compete for the jobs.

 

[Captandrew]

Is that CTD slide that I designed still working?

Of course, I didn't get to design an even cooler ship because this one came on the market when the Bermuda Biological Station sold her.

I never saw the CTD slide so I cannot tell you about that. As for the design of the new boat. I saw drawings that you did and was blown away with it so I assume you mean that you never got to do the final design. I still wish they could build it, but they are suffering financially as much as everyone. But having said that they do look after Weatherbird well. And I have to say that she serves extremely well and the conversion is a good one. For most people it would be hard to tell she was not built as a research boat.
Actually FIO bought her from a private company that bought her from Bermuda. I enjoyed the video, the tour of the ship one. Some of the crew has changed but everything else is still the same, but then you probably don't know the crew in any case.

I should have been sailing last month for a week but the cruise was cancelled, so no work yet. I should get a few days in before too long. I need a bigger boat fix. I cross oceans with smaller boats , which pays a little but still like bigger ones now and again.

 

[Roger Long]

I never saw the CTD slide

Oh, of course, the Planktos people took all that stuff off. I can see now in the pictures that it is gone.

Too bad, it was an elegant piece of gear. The whole deck area between the house and side around the side A-frame was a fiberglass grating raised about 6" above the deck which made for very dry working conditions. Set flush with this were two tracks. The CTD came down on a platform to which it was secured and this was quickly run into the wet lab being moved by chain drives on each side. This kept the CTD sample bottles from being contaminated by sunlight and spray and made for excellent working conditions while processing.

 

[Captandrew]

Right! The track is still there as is the grating. I never knew the purpose.

 

[Roger Long]

While I was out on the second day of mooring deployments and retrieval aboard the Rachel Carson, the Fay Slover, which was working nearby, came over during one of our stations for photo session.

More photos here:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4054365257938.1073741828.1846284215&type=1&l=506a48746e

I have lots of photos and video of the work aboard the Rachel Carson but it's going to take a while to process and edit it.

We picked up a bottom lander yesterday afternoon that had been collecting data since Valentines Day and discovered today that the data card had filled up or the batteries had run down just than morning. What timing!