It’s been pretty foggy in parts of the lower Columbia region the past few days. Or not foggy at all, depending on where you are. It’s part of a a larger pattern this week statewide of dense foggy conditions.
We’ll talk about what might be causing our fog here and what ships do under such conditions.
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We’re seeing unusual ships arriving in the river this week so far. Yesterday it was the USCGC Healy, the Coast Guard’s biggest ship, headed to the Swan Island shipyard.
Today it’s the USNS Grasp, a highly specialized rescue and salvage ship, whose job it is to save people and ships when they get in trouble on the water.
Image: the USNS Grasp, photo courtesy of US Navy photo gallery.
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Today we’ll see the USCGC Healy, a Coast Guard icebreaker and the US military branch’s largest vessel, enters the river early this morning on her way to the Vigor shipyard in Portland for about 8 months of repairs and maintenance. She’s an unusual vessel with some interesting history behind her name.
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Yesterday the Columbia River Bar was on Red status, per the Columbia River Bar Pilots. It’s the most severe restriction on ship traffic they can impose, and it means most, if not all, ships will be restricted from coming in or out of the river till the weather improves.
We have a big potential ship schedule today, meaning lots of ships want to enter and leave the river. Today we’ll talk about the effect a temporary, weather-related closure like this has on vessels, and what they do while they wait.
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We’ve got another round of inclement weather coming in, and it’s a good time to talk about how our marine pilots, who are in charge of assisting ships in and out of the river, decide when the weather is too difficult to allow ships to transit until things calm down. We’ll talk about that today.
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Now that the fleeting festivities of New Years have faded away, let’s turn our attention to the workhorse ships that continue to do their work despite holidays, weather and other distractions.
Also, we’ll look at the weather, which is worsening a bit again – and we’ll talk about my favorite KMUN inclement weather forecast ever.
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