bbbbRASS said:
In reply to alfadriver :
In Charleston the State Ports Authority did contribute significantly to building the Ravenel bridge which opened up larger shipping to their ports. Now they are proposing replacing a different bridge for more port space, and will likely contribute to that as well. The shippers pay fees to the SPA, so I guess in a way they do? It all comes back to the consumers and tax payers ultimately.
Their decision to contribute to funding highway bridges was not "mandatory". That is/was a choice that SPA made in order to keep their facility competitive and profitable.
Does Baltimore have any Ferries for vehicles?
secretariata (Forum Supporter) said:
In reply to alfadriver :
I don't disagree, but that isn't the system that is currently in place.
Also, as cars & trucks get better fuel mileage the current US system of taxing the fuel is generating less funding per mile driven and it is very difficult to get increases in that tax rate or to index it to actual fuel price or inflation. Part of why we pay significantly less per gallon of gas and diesel than other parts of the world and have infrastructure that gets a D or D- grade from the American Society of Civil Engineers.
The South Carolina Port Authority is owned by the state. It paid $45 million toward the construction of the Ravenel Bridge in Charleston. The port also brings in something like $90 billion into the state every year and 260,000 jobs. That makes a $600 million bridge a drop in the bucket.
From there, the largest ships go to the Mt Pleasant Terminal and the Hugh Leatherman Terminal as the Don Holt Bridge is not tall enough for them to get to the North Charleston Terminal. The Don Holt and the Wando bridges are slated for replacement in 2030.
Wondering out loud here, if the vessel's main engine stalled, could it have been bad fuel? I know these things are set up to burn bunker fuel, which is kind of the definition of "bad fuel", but at some point even that engine won't burn it. Excessive water in the fuel? Clogged filter?
volvoclearinghouse said:
Wondering out loud here, if the vessel's main engine stalled, could it have been bad fuel? I know these things are set up to burn bunker fuel, which is kind of the definition of "bad fuel", but at some point even that engine won't burn it. Excessive water in the fuel? Clogged filter?
Hard to say, but I would think that an electrical problem might be the easiest way to stop one of these. I dont know enough about mega-size diesels though.
In reply to volvoclearinghouse :
I would bet they tripped a breaker on the electrical side of things. Generators are separate from the main engine. The light went out which suggests a loss of electrical power. That is probably also the electrical power they use to control the main engine and steering. The lights went out, they reset the breaker and power came back on and then the breaker tripped a second time.
It will be interesting to see what the investigations find.
Yeah, I don't know much about how these ships are built. The largest diesels I work on are tiny, only 16 cylinders and under 100 liters of displacement.
Do the electrical generators run on the same fuel as the main engine?
In reply to volvoclearinghouse :
That's probably the size of the generator engine.
The Dali was powered by a 9-cylinder MAN-B&W 9S90ME-C9.2 that puts out 55,630 hp.
Interestingly enough, this is the Dali's second crash.
On 11 July 2016, Dali collided with the berth at the container terminal in the Port of Antwerp, Belgium, causing significant damage to her stern and transom. The berth was also damaged and closed for cargo handling operations. No reported injuries or water pollution occurred. At the time of the incident, the ship was owned by Oceanbulk Maritime (a Greek company) and chartered by Maersk.
She apparently had 4 generators. At a guess, they burn regular diesel. The main engines also burn regular diesel in some ports.
Electricity is generated by two 3,840 kW (5,150 hp) and two 4,400 kW (5,900 hp) auxiliary diesel generators.
I might be off base about dolphins, but there is credit to the fact that the growth of the size of cargo ships have been outstripping infrastructure for quite some time.
I will say though that engineering a dolphin to stop a *checks google* 220,000 TON cargo ship in motion is not a trivial task, even looking at videos from when empty ones are run aground at breakdown yards in 3rd world countries, you think that they are unloaded and at a fraction of the loaded mass... even a crash wont stop that on a dime.
02Pilot said:
I read one report that indicated SOP for loss of propulsion is to drop both anchors, and that, if this was in fact done, it's possible the starboard anchor touched first, swinging the bow to starboard. No idea if this will prove out, but simply an additional factor that will be considered.
" SOP for loss of propulsion is to drop both anchors" Not disputing that but it seems like a flawed knee jerk reaction. What about gas pipe lines and electrical cables on the bottom, etc? There's no way that ship was going to stop dropping anchors and backing. If he did back, and it looks like he did, that threw the stern to port and the bow to stbd. :to the bridge pier. It's easy to judge from the arm chair but I think things would have turned out differently if the pilot had come ahead on it and steered. We'll see.
secretariata (Forum Supporter) said:
TLDR: It is perfectly reasonable that MDSHA hasn't spent a significant amount of their very limited bridge maintenance dollars on upgrading the pier protection system for the FSK Bridge which has served 94% of it's design life without a major ship impact prior to today. Especially considering there are probably hundreds of structurally deficient bridges in MD which need those dollars to prevent them from collapsing due to deteriorated components.
Thanks for the knowledge! When I look at pictures, I see something that looks like the bare minimum to prevent a collision.
With ships of this size, is a 100% fool-proof system going to effectively close the channel? Is the likelihood of that collision so small that it is realistically cost-prohibitive? As callous as it sounds, perhaps that is the calculation and unfortunately, the stars aligned to this result. No solace for the families of the deceased, but the fact that only 6 people have died from this is a miracle.
When we see tragedies, I think we all have the same "someone should do something" response. We have to be responsible and reasonable with the subsequent actions. Maybe we shoot from the hip and we don't know everything (I'm not a bridge engineer, surprisingly) but we have an opinion. I do appreciate the variety of expertise and knowledge that we have on this board.
No Time said:
In reply to aircooled :
The local news station was interviewing Ernie Boch tonight about the impact this will have on Subaru of New England and new vehicle supplies for the near future.
He said there will definitely be some impact, but too early to know how big or how long.
A close friend of mine is the 1st Mate on a big ship that carries a lot of vehicles across the pond. Right now their COA for unloading autos is NJ. Their capacity to accomodate is going to be a major limfac but at least those loggies are figuring that stuff out now to minimize the impact.
11GTCS
SuperDork
3/27/24 9:46 a.m.
In reply to volvoclearinghouse :
It's been a hot minute since I've been in an engine room, with that said:
Fuel quality is probably better than old school bunker fuel at this point due to sulfur content restrictions for emissions. My experience was with steam powered vessels but bunker or "residual fuel oil" would be the same. It's basically what's left over from the refining process to remove the more volatile compounds (gasoline, lighter diesel and jet fuels, etc.).
The smell is unforgettable for one, it needs to be heated quite a bit to even pump it as at room temperature it's more like thick tar than what we would consider to be fuel oil. For firing the ships boilers we heated it to 300 F / 150 psi (if I'm remembering correctly) and used additional steam at the burner manifold to assist with atomizing the fuel at the burner nozzle.
There was a process to move fuel from storage tanks located throughout the double bottom of the ship, through pre heaters, strainers and centrifugal separators and then into two large fuel oil settling tanks located just aft of the main engine room for use in the boilers. Think of them as very large "day tanks" for the "finished" product.
The process on a heavy fueled diesel propulsion engine would be very similar with quite a number of strainers of increasingly fine screen sizes to remove debris and centrifugal separators to remove water. The fuel injection components on a main propulsion engine are as massive as you would expect on something in the 57,000 HP range and would be more tolerant to minor contamination. As Toyman mentions it's very likely that the fuel source for the ship's service generators is separate and of a higher grade for lower emissions in port. These would be similar to engines in a tractor trailer or stationary emergency generator and far less tolerant of contamination. It's absolutely a possibility, I'm sure more will be learned as things develop.
In reply to Apexcarver :
True... it's possible the bow of the ship would have just crushed against the dolphin as the upper section of the hull kept moving. I'm sure there will be multiple "what if..." computer simulations over the coming years.
Dammit, where's Sullenberger when he was needed?!
In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :
Which seems to be the right thing to do- can the impact be lessened to keep the shipping lane open?
In reply to Apexcarver :
Apparently they should have planned for that size ship "just in case" anyway.... /sarcasm
Kreb (Forum Supporter) said:
Dammit, where's Sullenberger when he was needed?!
Sully would have landed that ship at BWI.
In reply to jmabarone :
As No Time posted on page 4, the current vessel impact design scenarios are probability based. The wider the channel, the lower the allowed vessel speed is, the lower the water velocity, etc. the less likely it is that an errant vessel will hit a pier supporting the bridge. As a result a lesser protection system and/or collision design force is required.
Considering the current state of our infrastructure, can we afford to eliminate all (or more realistically nearly all) risk? If a bridge sees 1 million large ships pass under it during it's lifetime do we want/need to eliminate a 1 in 10 million risk factor?
In reply to alfadriver :
Who knows... with a ship that size and weight, the upper section of the hull still might have hit the bridge supports even if there were much larger dolphins protecting it. There are so many variables we don't know that any speculations about what might have prevented this is nothing more than a WAG. The structure of the hull and how it crushes under impact. How different dolphin designs might affect the hull. And so on...
Steve_Jones said:
In reply to Apexcarver :
Apparently they should have planned for that size ship "just in case" anyway.... /sarcasm
Sarcasm appreciated, The following is borrowed from another forum.
Ya think they had any idea 47 years ago that ships would get THAT big? Plus, doubling in the last 10 years? Good luck keeping infrastructure up with that! Ideally, yeah, but there is a lot of "if it aint broke dont fix it" mentality and so much clamboring for the infrastructure funding that does exist. The outcome of this may drive some port and waterway improvements, we will see. I still think the ship loss of power and control aspect and inspections/requirements surrounding that are the more fruitful area.
An aside on bunker oil: 2 years ago I had a project that included demo'ing an underground bunker oil line and tank (almost a half a mile's worth). It was a jacketed pipe, with steam in the jacket, and then asbestos insulation around that, with metal cladding around that. We had to abate the AB insulation, then thin the remaining oil in the line with diesel and pressure and catch it at one end where we cut into it, then demo the pipe in sections, with that slop still dripping out of the ends.
The cleaning/abatement of the tank required setting up a temporary boiler on site to support guys down in the tank steaming the stuff to a point that it could be vac'd into tanker trucks for disposal.
It's some thick/nasty stuff.
Back to bridge discussion!
Apexcarver said:
Ya think they had any idea 47 years ago that ships would get THAT big? Plus, doubling in the last 10 years? Good luck keeping infrastructure up with that!
You and I are on the same page, but look back a few pages, lol. Like I posted a few pages back, photos do not show just how massive these boats can be, if anyone ever gets the chance to get close to one, take the time to do so, you won't forget seeing it up close.
