Gazela (ship, 1901)
_-_OpSail76.jpg) The Gazela in 1976
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The schooner bark Gazela , built in 1901, is a former fishing vessel that is now used in Philadelphia as a museum ship and training ship . She is one of the few remaining ships of the former Portugal White Fleet .
Construction and technical data
The exact beginnings of the ship are not clear: both the year 1883 and 1901 are given as the year of construction. Wood from the schooner Gazella , built in 1883, was probably used in the construction of the ship at JM Mendes' shipyard in Setúbal in 1901 . In doing so, the client, the Bensaude family , avoided a regulation of the Portuguese state, according to which no new buildings, only existing vessels, were permitted for fishing on the Newfoundland Bank. Perhaps the new building from 1901 only took over the registration of the older Gazella .
The Gazela Primeiro is a wooden schooner bark (also known as barkentine) with up to 16 sails rigged with a sail area of 828 m² and measured with 323.89 GRT or 220.96 NRT. She is 54.00 m long, 8.20 m wide and has a draft of 5.20 m . 1938 was Mannheim - diesel engine fitted with a 180 hp, be extended to the transom to four meters had, and a screw worked. As a fishing vessel, the crew consisted of 42 men, for whom 35 dories could be stacked on deck.
history
Portuguese fishing vessel
From 1901 the Gazela Primeiro was part of the "White Fleet" of Portugal, the Frota Branca, and was mainly used on the Newfoundland Bank , which is rich in fish . In April / May of one year, she sailed with - sometimes with up to 40 - other fishing vessels to Labrador. She was loaded with 300 tons of salt, which served as ballast for later salting the caught fish. Until the autumn she mainly fished cod, which was caught by the dories with longlines and salted on board the ship. The fishing trip usually lasted until around October, after the return the ships were in port, were serviced and re-equipped over the winter.
In the second half of the 1930s, the stocks have been overfished on the Grand Banks, so that the "White Fleet" in the Davis Strait hiss of Baffin Island and Greenland had to dodge. In order to face the prevailing winds better, which received Gazela Primeiro 1938 in Setúbal a 180- hp - diesel engine of the motor Werke Mannheim (MWM) . After almost 70 years of service at sea, the Gazela Primeiro started her last fishing trip on May 25, 1969, from which she returned to Lisbon on October 25. Then the ship was laid up there.
American museum ship and training ship
That same year, the Philadelphia Maritime Museum was looking for a sailing ship and bought the Gazela Primeiro the following year. The barquentine reached Philadelphia after a six-week journey on July 8, 1971 and was given the abbreviated name Gazela , although it was also referred to more often as the Gazela of Philadelphia to distinguish it. Volunteers gradually renewed the ship and since 1976 the ship has been taking part in windjammer meetings. Operation Sail '76 will begin , followed by participation in the Jacques Cartier Regatta in Quebec in 1984, Operation Sail 2000 and participation in schooner regattas on the US east coast since 2008. In 1985 the museum handed over the ship to the Philadelphia Ship Preservation Guild , which was founded in the meantime and has been operating the Gazela as a museum ship and training ship ever since.
Trivia
The Gazela was used several times as a backdrop for movies - for example in 1994 for an interview with a vampire or in 1999 for The Widow of Saint-Pierre .
Other vehicles of the "White Fleet" preserved
- Creoula : training ship of the Portuguese Navy
- Santa Maria Manuela : civil training and charter ship
- Argus : Polynesia since 1985, trailer in Aveiro since 1984
- Gil Eannes : Museum ship in Viana do Castelo
literature
- Otmar Schäuffelen, Herbert Böhm: The last great sailing ships , Delius Klasing Verlag, Bielefeld 2010, ISBN 978-3-7688-3191-8 .
- Jean-Piere Andrieux: The White Fleet. A history of Portuguese handliners , Flanker Press, St. John's 2013, ISBN 978-1-77117-236-3 .
- Philadelphia Ship Preservation Guild: Gazela of Philadelphia Crew Manual , 2010 ( online version as PDF )
Web links
- Website of the Philadelphia Ship Preservation Guild , accessed October 28, 2019
- The Gazela at Tall Ships America , accessed October 28, 2019