Ghost Ship aground at Ballycotton
- Thread starter Irish Rover
- Start date
Topcat47
Well-known member
HMS Protector is an ice patrol ship and very lightly armed (4 in no 7.62mm Gatling guns and 5 in no GPMG (also 7.62mm). The only way she is likely to have been able to sink this vessel is to ram it (she is an ice breaker after all) or to send a boarding party to lay charges (assuming such charges were carried). I can't remember if Endurance had anything larger (given her age it may have been a 40mm Bofors or even a 30mm cannon, still to small to inflict any real damage to a steel hull - these were pejoratively referred to as "Sampan guns" when I was an apprentice).
AntarcticPilot
Well-known member
Endurance had a gun - but I understand it was usually struck down into storage, not ready for active service! As you say, something pretty small; the Bofors rings a bell.
Topcat47
Well-known member
You'd not drag a bofors out of store onto a deck. It must've been an Oerlikon 20mm cannon at best. GPMGs were carried by some ships as extra armament but GPMGs are 7.62 calibre heavy machine guns.
AntarcticPilot
Well-known member
Quite likely. The story I heard was that she only had a gun because the navy didn't like the idea of a completely unarmed ship. It probably came off her with the original maker's grease on it!
Alfie168
Well-known member
Looks to me like a textbook docking manoevre by HMS Troutbridge.
Iliade
Well-known member
Maybe they worked out that it would beach on Ireland so didn't feel the need to waste UK tax payers' money?
Stemar
Well-known member
If it had been sunk in international water by the RN, or any other navy, in the absence of any specific legislation permitting it, I can imagine the owners - or someone with the ability to put together the necessary paperwork, claiming it wasn't abandoned at all, and demanding compensation for an act of piracy.
Once it comes ashore, it's a wreck, so no problem legally, apart from the bill and those people with the ability to put together the necessary paperwork will have put together different paperwork that says not my problem.
Once it comes ashore, it's a wreck, so no problem legally, apart from the bill and those people with the ability to put together the necessary paperwork will have put together different paperwork that says not my problem.
Irish Rover
Well-known member
Frogmogman
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Thanks for posting. I was wondering if anything further had happened with the Alta.
Irish Rover
Well-known member
Official report of the Marine Casualty Investigation Board
https://www.mcib.ie/_fileupload/Documents/reports/mcib-299-incident-involving-the-mv-alta/2021-03-03-10-40-MCIB Alta Report.pdf
https://www.mcib.ie/_fileupload/Documents/reports/mcib-299-incident-involving-the-mv-alta/2021-03-03-10-40-MCIB Alta Report.pdf
Frogmogman
Well-known member
Thanks for posting that. Nothing particularly unexpected in the report. It does beggar belief how it has not been possible to identify the ship's owners. One would have thought that the owners at the time the vessel was struck off Tanzania's register on 27 December 2018 (ALTA shipping LLC of Miami Florida) should be considered to be the owners, unless they can prove selling or transferring the vessel to another owner.
Humblebee
Well-known member
Interesting stuff, thanks for the link.
Adios
...
Shipyard Low Tide Pale Ale is a new one worth trying. Particularly nice cold which isn't true for all the low alcohol beers which can lose most of their flavour if too cold. So maybe one for the scorching hot summer ahead!
Frogmogman
Well-known member
Let me guess. Does Low Tide Pale Ale have a muddy flavour, and a slightly stale and sulphurous aroma ?
Adios
...
Thats not the description they went with for the label and thankfully its better than you imagine!
Frogmogman
Well-known member
I mean no disrespect to the brewer, but that’s just what low tide conjures up for me.
Irish Rover
Well-known member
Stemar
Well-known member
Cork County Council firefighters in East Cork battled a fire which broke out on board the shipwreck, the MV Alta.
OK. I'm totally ignorant of such things, but why bother? It's difficult to get to with firefighting kit (=risk of accidents) and there's nothing worth saving
OK. I'm totally ignorant of such things, but why bother? It's difficult to get to with firefighting kit (=risk of accidents) and there's nothing worth saving
scruff
Well-known member
Practice for the fire crew? - they would know it was low consequence for not getting the fire out quickly so could perhaps practice different techniques for their efficacy? (Also going by the ex forces fireman I know - he'd probably find it fun!)