I have been in Liverpool quite regularly over the last week which has resulted in five new ships being added to the list although most of these were all seen over a week ago.

Last Thursday I saw the Crude Oil Tanker Sark (IMO 9417787, GT 62789, 2009) berthed at Tranmere. Unusually she was there quite a while before heading NW across the Irish Sea. On the same day I also saw LPG tanker Angela  (IMO 9474541, GT 3493, 2009) heading upriver and General Cargo Ships Flex Emden (IMO  9184823, GT 2999, 1999) and Lisa Lehmann (IMO 9325130, GT 3183, 2004) both berthed on the River wall at Bromborough.
 
This week despite being in Liverpool two or three times the only new ship I have seen is the Panama registered Tanker Star Eagle (IMO 9321938, GT 30068, 2007).

Bearing in mind the amount of time I have spent in the city only seeing five ships was a bit dissapointing, but as I noted earlier this month on the occassions I have been to Liverpool in October it has been relatively quiet and although the regular visitors have been there unfortunately there were not many new ships in port or on the river that coincided with my visits.

I took the above picture last Thursday as I was cutting through the Albert Dock to a meeting in the City Centre. The vessels name is Praise The Lord and although I have had a good look for details of her on Mr Google I cant find anything, my searching is not helped by the fact that their is a 26m super yacht of the same name currently for sale for 495,000 Euro.

Tomorrow I am going for a weeks holiday to the Isle of Wight, I will see some new ships here. We are sailing from Southampton to Cowes on one of the Red Funnel ferries and staying in East Cowes overlooking the Solent. I also intend to take the Fastcat from Ryde to Portsmouth and visit the naval base while I am there. Should be good. Hopefully I will have some good pictures to add to my website when I get back.  

I photographed the above vessel from the Costa Classica whilst we were in Pennang, Malaysia on 25 April 2011. She does not appear to have a name or number.

I like the camouflage scheme - reminds me of the uniform worn by the crew of the Los Angeles Class Submarine USS Newport News (SSN 750) which I saw in Portsmouth Naval Base later the same year.

I took this picture of the Port of Liverpool Building last Thursday as I was sat on the waterfront eating my lunch.

The building was designed by Sir Arnold Thornley (1870 - 1953) and F.B. Hobbs in collaboration with Liverpool Architects Briggs and Wolstenholme. It was constructed between 1904 and 1907. The building has a reinforced concrete frame and is clad in Portland Stone.

The building acted as the headquarters of the Mersey Docks & Harbour Board from 1907 to 1994 when the company relocated to new premises at Seaforth Dock.

At the very beginning of the 20th Century the area now known as Pier Head consisted of the 1771 built George's Dock which was connected to Canning Dock to the South and George's Basin to the North.  

The Mersey Docks & Harbour Board decided to close and infill George's Dock and the land was sold in 1900 to Liverpool Corporation, they did however retain a parcel of land at the South end of the site to build a new headquarters building that brought together all their offices which were scattered around the city.

In 1900 they organised a design competition and prizes of £300, £200 and £100 were offered for the three best designs. In total seven entries were received the winner being the entry submitted by Sir Arnold Thornley and F.B. Hobbs in collaboration with Briggs and Wolstenholme

In 1903 the Contract to construct the new building was tendered and won by William Brown & Son of Manchester. Work began in 1904 and completed in 1907 at a cost of approximately £250,000 although when the cost of furniture, fittings and professional fees was taken into account, the total cost was nearer £350,000. Head office staff officially moved into the building on 15 July 1907 with staff from departments located in other parts of the city moving in throughout the rest of the year.

During the second world war the building was badly damaged during the May Blitz of 1941.

The  Building is designed in the Edwardian Boroque style which takes features from two main sources, French 18th Century Architecture and English 17th Century (Wren) Architecture. Typical details of this style of Architecture include domed corner rooftop pavilions and a central taller tower-like element creating a lively rooftop silhouette.

The building's central dome is the main focal point of the building, although it was not part of the original design. LAst minute changes resulted in the dome being added, the main entrance was also moved to its current location following a chnage in the buildings layout caused by a land ownership issue.

The building has five floors is 67m high and is approximately rectangular in shape (80m x 66m). The main entrance is located in the centre of the river-facing side of the building and is flanked by two three-metre high, stone statues of women representing "Commerce" and "Industry".

Today I have generated a new page and moved all my blogs relating to docks, buildings and structures into it.

This frees us space in my misc folder which is now mainly just vessels.

Type 332 Frankenthal Class Mine Hunter FGS Gromitz (M1064) of the German Navy photographed 24 & 25 May 2013 in Liverpool.

She was visiting the city as part of the Battle of the Atlantic celebrations and belongs to the 5th Minesweeper Squadron.

Commissioned in 1994 she was originally one of twelve ships in the class although a number have since been sold to the United Arab Emirates

She has a displacement of 650t with a length of 54.4m, 9.2m beam and 2.6m draft.

Propulsion is via two MTU 16V 538 TB91 diesel engines rated at 2040kW, in addition to two electric motors for slow and silent manouvering. Speed is noted as being 18 knots and the ships complement 41.

Her main armanent consists of a Rheinmetall MLG 27 27mm cannon. This weapon is a single-barrel, high performance, breech-cylinder gun operated by a fully automatic electrically fired gas-operated system at a selective rate of
1000 or 1700 rounds per minute. Muzzle velocite is 1025 m/s.

I was in Liverpool all day yesterday and although I was only briefly able to get to the riverside this did luckily coincide with high tide and I did see a number of ships on the river. I have in the past seen these ships at one time or another but it was good to see a fair amount of traffic on the Mersey.

Inbound to Ellesmere Port was the product tanker Ternland (IMO 9121699, GT 6534, 1996) whilst General Cargo Ship and regular visitor to Liverpool Ben Varrey (IMO 8507365, T 997, 1986) was heading out to sea on route to Drogheda. Transiting the river from Ellesmere Port to Liverpool Docks was the tanker Whitchampion (IMO 9252280, GT 2965, 2003) whilst waiting to gain entry to Cammel Lairds basin was the offshore constructon vessel Friedrich Ernestine (IMO 9578256, GT 11730, 2011) under assistance from the tugs Smit Sandon and Smit Barbados.

The new ships I saw were both spotted whilst driving into the city centre. Bulk Carrier Graig Rotterdam (IMO 9602186, GT 24187, 2012) was moored in the Seaforth basin along the river wall whilst Dutch registered dredger Johanis de Rijke (IMO 9098986, 2007) was in the main docks.

I took the above photograph on my way home from my phone just as the light was fading. These are all vessels which have been working widening and deepening the channel over the last month or so.

Closest to the camera is the cargo ship Goliath (IMO 8714669, GT 6037, 1988) which seems to be slotted into a platform? followed by the dredgers Johan Van Veen (IMO 9098971, GT 869, 2007) and Johanis de Rijke (IMO 9098986, GT 869,  2007).

Today I am in Salford, on my way into work I saw the sun rise which for a change was quite spectacular the whole horizon being a wash of red, orange and purple. The radio did warn that we were going to get heavy rain from 11am and they were not wrong, at 11.52 it started raining and it does not look like stopping until well into the night.

I am back in Liverpool Friday afternoon, hopefully some new ships will be in port in good positions to allow me to take photographs.

Following the Dock Act of 1844 Dock Engineer Jesse Hartley as part of a single construction project built five new central docks one of which was Collingwood, the others were named Salisbury, Stanley, Nelson and Bramley Moore all of which opened in 1848. 

The dock boundary wall enclosing this set of docks is about 5m high and differs from those constructed previously as instead of brick he used his ‘Cyclopean’ granite technique comprising finely jointed irregular shaped stones and flush rounded copings of random lengths. In total this type of wall extends over 1000m. 

The dock has a double entrance with three tapering towers comprising a flanking pair of round towers and a larger central tower incorporating a shelter for watchmen or the dock police. 

The towers have implied castellations above the cap and the central tower has arrow-slit like windows looking out onto the road and a small chimney. Deep slits are provided at the sides for sliding gates which would have slid out on rollers operated by counterweights closing into a slotted recess in the central tower.

Granite blocks bearing the name and date of each dock are set into the walls. It looks like the letters within the name were once inlaid with metal (possibly lead?) as I have noticed the remains of metal in some of the name plates. This may however been done in more recent times. 

Granite block identifying the dock with the date 1848

View of the gate towers showing remains of a timber sliding gate which may or may not be original.

Closer view of the Cyclopean walling. 

You cannot do anything else but admire the workmanship of the men who built this wall 165 years ago.  

Although worn and weathered after 165 years the gate towers and walls are still an imposing sight.

Back in 2011 we did two cruises back to back from Singapore on the Costa Classica.

Notes from my trip are below.

CLICK HERE.

I photographed Veerseborg on the 15 August 2013 as she was being loaded with scrap metal at the Norton facility on Liverpool Docks. The ship owes its name to the small River Veerse, which flows into the River Wuemme near Rotenburg in Northern Germany.

She is owned by Reederei Frank Dahl which was established in 1973 and was built in 1998 by Bodewes Volharding at their Foxhol yard in the Netherlands as Yard Number 345. She has an overall length of 132.2m, beam of 15.87m and a maximum draft of 7.05m. Gross Tonnage is 6130.

Typical crew is noted as being 9 personnel.

She has two holds (total hold capacily 454,000 cubic feet) with a double skin strength hull for heavy cargo such as the metals she was loading when I saw her, she is also equipped for transporting containers (264TEU in the hold with an additional 264TEU on deck).

Main Engine consists of a Wärtsila 6L38 ( 1x 3960 kw) diesel engine driving a 4.2m diameter four bladed single pitch propeller. This gives her a service speed of 14 knots and a maximum speed of 15 knots. Fuel consumption is noted as being 14.2 m3 / day at 14 Knots rising to 16.0 m3 / day at 15 Knots

MMSI - 304606000
REG -  AG, St.Johns
IMO - 9184653
Call Sign - V2ON5
General Cargo Ship
Built - Bodewes Volharding, Foxhol, NL
Yard No. - 345
L 132m W16m
GT 6130
Year - 1998
Liverpool, 15 August 2013

This granite monument is located in St. Nicholas Place, Pierhead, Liverpool.  

Designed by Sir William Goscombe John (1860-1952) and erected in 1916 it takes the form of a 14.6m high obelisk with an Egyptian scene at the top and statues of engineers above the plinth. There are depictions of Water, Earth, Sea and Fire on each corner and it is surmounted by a gilded flame.   

The memorial was originally intended to be for the engineers serving on the RMS Titanic who stayed at their posts on the tragic night of 15th April 1912 ensuring that the stricken liner had electricity and other amenities for as long as possible. 

However, World War I broke out before its completion and its dedication was broadened to include all maritime engine room fatalities incurred during the performance of duty. 

The memorial is an early example of a monument raised for working men.  

Some damaged stonework received from shrapnel damage during Second World War bombing raids can be seen.

On the North face is inscribed -

"IN HONOUR OF / ALL HEROES OF THE / MARINE ENGINE ROOM / THIS MEMORIAL / WAS ERECTED BY / INTERNATIONAL SUBSCRIPTION" 

Inscription on the South face reads-

"THE BRAVE DO NOT DIE / THEIR DEEDS LIVE FOR EVER / AND CALL UPON US / TO EMULATE THEIR COURAGE / AND DEVOTION TO DUTY"