Nantucket (LV-112)
 The ship in 2011
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The fire ship Nantucket (LV-112) was under the designation Lightship No. 112, Nantucket is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a National Historic Landmark . The ship, built in 1936, was used to warn of shallows near Nantucket until it was decommissioned in 1983 and is currently a museum ship in the port of Boston in the state of Massachusetts in the United States . To date, it is the largest lightship built in the USA.
Lightships in the United States
The United States used lightships to mark the most dangerous locations on the coasts of the seas and the Great Lakes . The work on these ships was regularly life-threatening for their crew, who were usually provided by the United States Coast Guard . In particular, the position on the shallows near Nantucket was classified as the world's most dangerous place to work on a lightship. In winter, Nor'easters could stop for days, but otherwise strong winds and high waves made even experienced sailors seasick. The continuously inhaled diesel exhaust fumes caused health problems, as did the piercing fog horn of the ship, which could cause earaches and even deafness. Fog was particularly common at the Nantucket position and increased the risk of collision. A total of 179 lightships were built in the United States between 1820 and 1952, of which only 17 remain today. At times 51 lightships were in use at the same time. Eight of the ships still in existence are now operated as museum ships.
Lightship LV-112
history
LV-112 was stationed on one of the busiest shipping routes in the world, sometimes referred to as "Times Square of the Atlantic". There were very frequent accidents and near-collisions with the lightship lying there. During the Second World War , LV-112 was withdrawn for military service, painted gray and used as a patrol boat near Portland, Maine from 1942 to 1945 . During this time, she rescued sailors from the Eagle Boat 56 , which was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U 853 on April 23, 1945 .
The lightship was built in 1936 by Pusey & Jones in Wilmington (Delaware) for US $ 300,956 (approx. US $ 5,540,000 today) and was powered by two oil-fired steam boilers from Babcock & Wilcox , which with an output of 600 hp have a maximum speed of 12 knots allowed. The construction costs of the ship were financed from a total of $ 500,000 (today about $ 9,210,000) in compensation from the White Star Line , whose RMS Olympic had rammed and sunk the lightship LV-117 near Nantucket in 1934, with seven of the eleven crew members died.
The ship suffered the only serious damage in 1954, when Hurricane Edna produced waves with a wind force of 200 km / h that hit the lightship with a height of up to 21 m. The wheelhouse and the rudder were badly damaged and the dinghies destroyed. In 1960, the LV-112 was extensively modernized and equipped, among other things, with two 450 HP engines from Cooper Bessemer , which replaced the steam boilers that were still in use until then. LV-112 is painted in US Coast Guard colors today; H. the hull is bright red, the superstructures and masts are yellow-brown and the name of the ship - throughout "Nantucket" with the exception of the war effort (no name) and the period between 1958 and 1960 when it was called "Relief" - is on the outer hull painted white. In 2009 the lightship, which until then had not found a permanent port and, among other things, had been in a never-opened naval museum in Oyster Bay (New York) for eight years , was bought by Robert Mannino, Jr. in a desolate condition for the symbolic price of one dollar towed to Boston on May 11, 2010 after a makeshift repair for $ 125,000. An additional $ 850,000 was set for a full repair.
The LV-112 is the largest lightship ever built in the United States to date and was built to specifications for United States Navy warships ; H. it has a double hull and a high degree of isolation and was explicitly designed for unsinkability . With 39 years of service, she was stationed at Nantucket longer than any other lightship; the site was only given up in 1985 as the last lightship position in the United States. Due to the 100 mi (160.9 km ) distance to the mainland, the location was the furthest from the coast of all lightships and the only one in international waters . In December 1989, LV-112 was inscribed on the National Register of Historic Places as a National Historic Landmark . In 2012, it was classified as a United States National Treasure by the National Trust for Historic Preservation .
Technology and equipment
The two steel masts of the ship rise 16.1 m (foremast) and 16.2 m (main mast) above the deck, so that the two 400,000 candlestick beacons of the ship are positioned 20.1 m above the waterline and have a range of 14 nm (25.9 km ); the Boston Globe deviates from this and speaks of 500,000 candle strengths and a range of 50 mi (80.5 km). However, only one of the beacons was ever used, so that the other served as a fall-back option and maintenance work could be carried out.
As identification of the beacon of the Nantucket three white flashes of light were used with a duration of one second, followed by two seconds darkness. An air-powered diaphone was used as the fog horn, emitting a three-second tone every 30 seconds. The pressure required to operate the horn was around 2.8 bar and was provided by compressors. The ship also had facilities for generating underwater sounds ( submarine oscillator ), a radio signal that sent a radio beacon over a wire stretched between the masts at a frequency of 302 kHz , and a classic fog bell. The two anchors, each weighing 3.5 tons, have 150 thread (approx. 275 m) long chains with 4 cm thick chain links made of nickel-plated steel.
See also
- List of entries on the National Register of Historic Places in northern Boston
- List of National Historic Landmarks in Boston
literature
- James P. Delgado: National Register of Historic Places Registration Form. ( PDF ) National Park Service , June 30, 1989, accessed April 6, 2016 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ National Register Information System . In: National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service . Retrieved November 2, 2013.
- ↑ a b c d e Nantucket Lightship / LV-112. United States Lightship Museum, Inc., 2016, accessed April 7, 2016 .
- ↑ cf. Delgado, p. 3.
- ↑ cf. Delgado, p. 7.
- ↑ a b cf. Delgado, p. 5.
- ^ A b Peter Schworm: Oldest US lightship comes home to Boston. In: The Boston Globe . May 12, 2010, accessed April 7, 2016 .
- ↑ Listing of National Historic Landmarks by State: Massachusetts. National Park Service , accessed August 11, 2019.
- ↑ cf. Delgado, p. 6.
Coordinates: 42 ° 21 ′ 40 ″ N , 71 ° 2 ′ 7 ″ W.