Have been at the anchorage for the last few days and with things a bit hectic haven't shown up here. Since the fish series has had a break due to cartoons and cartoons got interrupted by Ship work, it seems only fair to put up some posts about Ships.
This is a stamp form Finland on the older ships. The stamp itself is a beautiful one and the sketch in Sepia tones does give it a very nice look. I will need to do a bit of googling to find out any history about the featured ship, but I can try to give
you a few basics.
The ship is Named SS Express. The Prefix SS in front of the name indicates "Steam Ship". Other prefixes might be "SV - Sailing Vessel", "MV- Motor Vessel", etc. I am myself sailing in a "MT - Motor Tanker".
The SS Express is thus a steam powered vessel most likely sailing around the 1915's by the look of it and is the type of vessel that used to carry everything from coal to livestock to Passengers.
Another thing noteworthy about this picture is that the Express is breaking ice in front of her. This is typically the sort of ice that only a Ice breaker usually breaks. The Artist seems to have taken some liberties and shown Express ploughing through
the thick ice in what looks like speeds in excess of 10 knots.
But these were obviously times when we were pushing the envelopes in everything so it might very well have been the case. These days for a vessel to be anywhere near Ice of this thickness, the vessel should have an "Ice Notation" from a classification
society. Among other things, this means that your forward shell plating is made much thicker then it would otherwise be. And with that think plating and stronger engines, you are still required to slowly follow the broken ice behind the speed breaker
at a speed fast enough that the Ice doesn't freeze back, and slow enough that you don't walk into the Ice Breakers Stern!
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