The US ocean carrier Matson has decided to no longer ship electric vehicles, because of the increasing frequency of what analysts believe are lithium ion battery caused fires on car ships. Despite newer industry recommendations designed to make ships safer, these fires remain a deadly, and usually in practice, uncontrollable hazard on board.
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We’ve been talking about other things this week so far. Let’s take a look today at our ship schedule.
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Today, as part of the answer to a listener question, I thought it would be good to take a look at why tides happen. This influence is huge in our lives here on the coast and on the river, and it’s interesting and helpful to understand what’s driving it.
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I was thinking more about tides and thought we could talk more about this complex subject. Yesterday we talked about how high tide happens about 5 hours later in Vancouver than Astoria on the Columbia.
Today we’ll look at tidal range, the height difference between high and low tides and how that is also different between different places on the river. And a look at how fast the tide rises – is it uniform, and is there a way to tell how fast it will rise?
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Today’s show is a bit of a mix: I wanted to thank the folks who came down to the Ten Fifteen Theater to hear my Ship Report talk and to hear Jerry and me perform on stage (eek!), and then a bit about tides, and how there is a vast difference in tidal schedules between what we Astoria and Vancouver/Portland.
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We see a lot of ships go by on the lower river near Astoria, but the river upstream past Longview is often busier, with a variety of vessel traffic all doing local work: tugs and barges hauling cargo, ship handling tugs, and ships being moved from anchorages to nearby berths.
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