WOOLOOWARE BAY off Taren
Point - in BOTANY BAY
New South Wales.
AUSTRALIA
A TransPac 52 Yacht that had been shipped
over from England and had been in Lewis Shipyard being prepared - was launched
yesterday in a most unusual way.
No doubt because of it's design - with a very
deep keel and bulb - it could not be put in with the TravelLift crane at the
dock - and so we witnessed the following amazing scene out here in the bay -
yesterday afternoon.
All of the photos were taken sitting on the back
steps of my yacht - and a lot were 'zoomed up' - where you can often be ruined
by the slightest movement - and luckily most came out OK.
As per usual they have all been reduced in size
and quality from the huge original resolution - particularly those big panoramas
- for this email and compressed to the smaallest Kb size - and still be good for
screen viewing.
Quite incredible - and as you can see despite some
obvious concern with lift balance - not to mention the overall problem of doing
it from 2 moving, floating barges anyway - it eventually was a complete
success. The conditions were ideal - which was one of the
reasons they pressed on - rather than try it again - (and as it's turned out -
today has been quite windy and vigorous on the bay).
It took right up until dark to get the yacht up and
down safely into the water - and then they carried on in the dark and lifted and
installed the mast too.
When I came out this morning at 7am - the yacht was
gone - and so was the crane. When I went ashore I found out that it
had left first thing this morning to go up to Sydney Harbour - where it will be
based. I don't know anything about it - and when I asked one
of the people associated with it a while ago - he did not name the yacht -
and simply said it was a TransPac 52. But clearly it's going to be
seen around - and probably in the next Sydney to Hobart, I suppose.
When I got to shore at about 9am to go for some
more tests - and do some running around - the big crane from Botany Cranes was
no where to be seen - and had already been off-loaded and gone. So
you'd have to say it all appeared to go pretty well.
The fascinating little end to today's tale - is
that when I got up to the Medical Centre for the blood tests again - and was on
the table for the nurse to take some blood - (she knows me from a couple of
visits now) - she said - 'Did you see the yacht being launched from where
you were?' And she then told me that her husband Greg was the
mastermind - Head Crane Driver from Botany Cranes - who had given the advice and
final go ahead by phone from the dock - for the lift to proceed
successfully.
So isn't that another amazing coincidence - and
sometime tonight I will send her (via her son) a copy of this email and the
photos.
Until next time.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, May 21, 2008 6:59 PM
Subject: Amazing Yacht Launch from floating Barges
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