I knew it looked familiar and that was confirmed as soon as I saw the name: The Haida Chieftain is one of the biggest and oldest still-working tugs on this coast.
The 145-foot steel tugboat was built as a U.S. Navy tug by Foundation Marine Co. in 1944, and named Foundation Lillian. (Farley Mowat wrote a couple of good books about the Foundation tugs and their salvage work and tows in the Atlantic.)
After service with Foundation Marine on the east coast, she was renamed 'Escort' and then 'N.R. Lang', and was owned for a time by Kingcome Navigation (1971, running log barges and other materials through Seymour Narrows on a regular basis).
She's 30-ft wide, and 'draws' almost 13 feet (meaning that's how much of her is under the water that you can't see).
In January, 1965, the Haida Chieftain caught fire off Cape Beale on the west coast of Vancouver Island. The crew of 10 abandoned and were picked up by the tug LaPointe of the Vancouver Tug Boat Co. The brand-new tug La Beine, on her maiden trip, intercepted the Haida Chieftain, put out the fire, and towed the vessel to port. The Haida Chief was then rebuilt and returned to service.
Currently owned by WAYDEN TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS INC. of Richmond (a suburb of Vancouver), she required further repairs in 2004 when she rammed into the dock on Main Street in Richmond on New Year's Day.
And here she is about to go under the Johnson Street bridge en route to Point Hope Shipyard, yesterday.
There is an old video of her online, taken by a deckhand, slogging through some stormy waters off the Queen Charlottes. She's a grand old boat, that's for sure!
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And yes, I've been knitting, too ... I finished the purple beaded scarflette while I was watching the Haida Chieftain go by!
13 comments:
That is a big tug!!
Lovely scarfy, as well :)
-kate
very pretty scarf feel better soon
A warm welcome to your site in the haidachieftain web results. Your site's placing in the Google haida chieftain search list is top.
From haidachieftain, banker
Nice to see she is still working. I can add a little to her history. She started life in a Texas shipyard as an Armed salvage tug. Never saw service in WW2. Foundation was an early Canadian owner. As the Haida Chieftain Kingcome Navigation paired her up with the brand new Haida Carrier in 1954. The Carrier was one of the first self dumping log barges. Sheids then Blueband had her towing that barge after Kingcome replaced her.
SaltAir
quite interesting; mainly because yesterday evening i had a conversation with an old classmate of mine who mentioned that he was in charge of a 7 million dollar remodelling and overhaul of this ship ; so he mentioned to me to look it up; since i had never heard of this boat before. Really facinating to start checking this out...
Was indeed built in Orange , Texas at the Levingston Shipyard. Launched as the LT533 for the U.S. Navy. She is now called the Audry Gail and owned by Amix Group of Vancouver, Canada. I contacted Clarke Longmuir, President of Amix Group on Sept. 24, 2013 and was informed that she is to be broke up for scrap.
I also had the pleasure of working on the refitting of this old girl in the mid to late 90's
I also had the pleasure of working on this project
Robert kindred@hotmail.com
This was my Grandads tug .He worked on that tug for many years .He was 1st mate I believe .Lovely to see her .As a young girl my grandad would take us for a visit. Sadly never got to sail in her as I was a girl .Men only in those days .My father and brother had the joy .
Thanks for the lovely post. I wonder if you know what happened to the video of the Haida Chieftain? The link doesn't work anymore.
No sorry to say I dont know what happened to it
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