Category Archives: High Seas

Key point:It would have been a Cold War dream come true.

In the early1980s, the Reagan Administration was looking to fund high visibility defense programs. Reagan had been elected on a platform of rebuilding the armed services after the hollowing out of the early1970s.

One example was the reactivation of four World War II-eraIowa-class battleships, which started in 1982. Each of the four ships, Iowa, Missouri, New Jersey and Wisconsin was refurbished, their sixteen and five-inch guns brought back online. Each battleship was also equipped with sixteen Harpoon anti-ship missiles,thirtytwoTomahawk land attack cruise missiles and four Phalanx close-in weapon systems (CIWS) for defense.

The four battlewagons were swiftly retired after the end of the Cold War because the manpower-intensive vessels each required a crew of nearly two thousand. That made them early victims of the post-Cold Wardrawdownas the defense budget was sharply reduced. Today, all four serve as memorials or floating museums. Retirement put an end to future upgrades, which might have included the boldest of them all.

In the November, 1980 issue of the United States Naval InstituteProceedings, Captain Charles Myers,USN(retired) proposed reactivating the battleships with significant modifications to the aft section.The proposal envisioned deleting the number three turret near the stern and the three sixteen-inch guns housed in it.

In place of the number three turret would be an extraordinary set of armaments. A V-shaped, ramped flight deck would be installed, with the base of the V on the ships stern. Each leg of the V would extend forward, so that planes taking off would fly past the stacks and ships bridge. Two elevators would bring BoeingAV-8BHarrier II jump-jets up from a new hangar to the flight deck. It was envisioned such a conversion could support up to twelve Harriers.

Thats not all. Existing five-inch gun turrets would be deleted and replaced with 155-millimeter howitzers for naval gunfire support. In the empty space between the V would be a field of tactical missile silos such as the Mk.41.Up to 320 siloscould fit in this space, supporting a mixture of Tomahawk land attack missiles,ASROCanti-submarine rockets and Standard surface-to-air missiles. This massiveloadoutwould dwarf even the 154 Tomahawks found on todaysOhio-class guided missile submarines.

Myers called the vessel the Interdiction Assault Ship. The ship could interdict enemy fleets on the high seas, particularly the Soviet NavysKirov-classnuclear-poweredbattlecruisersthat were then under construction at the Leningrad shipyards. In a wartime scenario, the U.S. Navy worriedKirovbattlecruisersand their formidable missile armament could be used to target American aircraft carriers or devastate convoys of reinforcements headed to Europe.

The Interdiction Assault Ship (IAS) would go after theKirovs, bombarding them with 16-inch guns and Harpoon missiles. Embarked Harrier jump jets could also join in the fight. The ships would be an economy of force measure, allowing aircraft carriers to go about their preassigned wartime duties with minimal distraction.

TheIASalso had a second mission: supporting Marines in an air assault landing. The six remaining 16-inch guns, backed up by the new 155-millimeter guns, could bombard land targets prior to an assault. The Navy and Marines would use the flight deck, in conjunction withIwo Jima-class helicopter landing shipsandTarawa-classamphibious assault ships, to help manage the assault force of anairmobileassault on an enemy-held position.

Under such a concept, theIASwould become part of an air assault staging area. The flight deck could be used as excess space to hold helicopters. The hangar was estimated to be able to accommodate up to 500 Marines. Once ready, the armada of helicopters would take off, escorted by the Interdiction Assault Ships Harrier fighters, which would also provide close air support until Marine artillery could be landed.

Although much discussed, execution of theIASconcept was delayed at least twice. The Department of Defense and the Navy wanted the battleships reactivated as quickly as possible, and as a result they were updated for service with only a minimal baseline of improvements the installation of Harpoon and Tomahawk missiles and the necessary fire control, Phalanx self-defense systems andRQ-2Pioneer drones.

The installation of the flight deck and missile silos would have to wait. They were again suggested in the late1980s, but for one reason or another, mostly coming down to cost and the Cold War winding down, the Navy got cold feet. By 1992 all four ships would be decommissioned.

In hindsight, the Interdiction Assault Ship concept might have had a difficult time fitting in with U.S. military operations in the1980s. Among operations in the Persian Gulf, Grenada, off the coast of Lebanon and Central America, there was no operation in which theIASwas a must-have. An amphibious ship could do the job or a battleship, but a compromise of both with the inherent shortcomings of an compromise would not have brought anything particularly compelling to the table.

TheIASwas a big stick for big wars chasing down theKirovsand other heavy Soviet surface combatants in World War III, supporting U.S. Marines in Norway, then executing the Maritime Strategy and joining the carrier fleets in attacking Soviet bases above the Arctic Circle. In this scenario, theIASsreal innovation a field of 320 missile silos would be a must-have. The ability to fire off salvoes of 16-inch shells and Tomahawk missiles at land targets, especially Soviet air defenses, would have been a godsend to the aircraft carriers and aircrews who would have had to fly combat missions over the Soviet Union.

Today all fourIowa-class battleships are scattered across the United States serving as floating museum ships. New technologies such as lasers andrailgunswill almost certainly spark a new wave of calls for reintroducing the ships with21stCentury technologies. While unlikely in the current fiscal environment, such a possibility shouldnt be completely ruled out. TheIowaclass keeps coming back, and still may yet again.

This first appeared in September 2015 and is being reposted due to reader interest.

Image: DVIDShub.

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Aircraft Carriers and Battleships Are Legends: Can You Combine Them Into 1 Warship? - The National Interest Online

Tony winner Roger Bart has joined the cast of the forthcoming world premiere of Back to the Future The Musical, which will open at the Manchester Opera House February 20, 2020. The production will play a 12-week run through May 17 prior to transferring to the West End.

Bart, who won the Tony for his portrayal of Snoopy in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown, will play Dr. Emmett Brown, the role created on screen by Christopher Lloyd. Bart has also been seen on Broadway in a Tony-nominated turn in The Producers, plus roles in The Frogs, Young Frankenstein, and Disaster the Musical.

He joins the previously announced Olly Dobson as Marty McFly, Hugh Coles as George McFly, Rosanna Hyland as Lorraine Baines, and Cedric Neal as Goldie.

In a statement Bart said, I am thrilled to be here in the great city of Manchester, England, to introduce to the world this extraordinary incarnation of this hilarious and heart-warming story. Playing the role of Doc Brown, made iconic on film by the brilliant Christopher Lloyd, is going to be the adventure of a lifetime. After all, at this stage of my life, who doesnt want to go back in time?

LISTEN: Hear the New Version of 'Back in Time' From the Upcoming Back to the Future Musical

The show, featuring a book by the movies co-writer, Bob Gale, will feature additional songs from the source material, including The Power of Love and Johnny B. Goode, but will largely be comprised of an original score by Glen Ballard (Jagged Little Pill) and original film composer Alan Silvestri. Dobson previously offered a sample of the duos collaboration with the track Put Your Mind to It.

The musical features direction by Tony winner John Rando (Urinetown, On The Town) with set and costume design by Tim Hatley, lighting design by Hugh Vanstone and Tim Lutkin, sound design by Gareth Owen, video by Finn Ross, choreography by Chris Bailey, musical supervision and arrangements by Nick Finlow, and illusions by Chris Fisher. Orchestrations will be by Ethan Popp, with dance arrangements by David Chase.

Roger Bart has been a special guest performer on Playbill Travels Broadway on the High Seas cruises. Cabins are now on sale for Broadway in the Great Northwest, Playbill Travels first domestic cruise featuring Kate Baldwin, Tedd Firth, Christopher Fitzgerald, Aaron Lazar, and Faith Prince (April 26May 4, 2020), and for Broadway on the Mediterranean (August 31September 7, 2020), featuring Audra McDonald, Will Swenson, Gavin Creel, Caissie Levy and Lindsay Mendez, and for Broadway on the Nile (December 27, 2020January 7, 2021), with performers soon to be announced. To book a suite or stateroom, call Playbill Travel at 866-455-6789 or visit PlaybillTravel.com.

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Tony Winner Roger Bart Joins Cast of Back to the Future Musical - Playbill.com

In August, President Donald Trump made international headlines when he voiced an interest in buying Greenland, the world's largest island, which teeters on the edge of the icy Arctic Ocean. As it turns out, Greenland isn't for sale, and Trump was widely ridiculed for his diplomatic blundering. Yet, many wondered what could be behind this unprecedented move and if it might have something to do with the United State's growing interest in owning a slice of the Arctic.

The U.S. is one of eight nations surrounding the Arctic along with Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia and Sweden that are all currently jostling for ownership of the region's frozen seas. Several of the countries have already submitted formal papers to a United Nations body, claiming portions of the vast Arctic seabed. Climate change is also opening up the Arctic's formerly ice-locked waters, making the region more accessible than ever before. "Based on current trends, the predictions of the Arctic being completely ice-free are [that it will happen] around 2040 or 2050," said Richard Powell, a polar geographer at the Scott Polar Research Institute at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom.

This surge of interest in the region has been dubbed the "scramble for the Arctic," or more sensationally, "the new Cold War," because Russia and the United States are big players. But despite the opportunities the region presents, can the Arctic Ocean really be owned by anybody? And why do so many countries want a stake in this landscape of drifting icebergs and polar bears?

Related: Why Is There So Much Oil in the Arctic?

There's a straightforward answer to the second question: The Arctic possesses massive oil and gas reserves. The seabed beneath the Arctic Ocean houses an estimated 90 billion barrels of oil about 13% of the world's undiscovered oil reserves and an estimated 30% of the planet's untapped natural gas, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

A century ago, this immense mineral wealth would have been unreachable, because we lacked the technology to exploit it. Back then, countries were limited to exploring only a thin sliver of sea along their coasts, while areas of remote ocean, like the deep Arctic, were designated as high seas that belonged to no country. But with huge technological advancements in recent decades, remote stretches of ocean have become increasingly accessible. That's forced international lawmakers to play catch-up and expand the definitions of where countries can legally explore.

Currently, under a treaty called the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), signatory countries can exploit resources from the seabed out to 370 kilometres off their shorelines. But if a country can provide evidence that particular geological features on the seabed located farther out from that 200-mile limit are connected to the nation's continental landmass, then the country's jurisdiction can be expanded deeper into the sea.

"[Countries] compile the data, make the claim, then the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf [a U.N.-appointed body] rule as to whether they accept the reasoning or not," Powell told Live Science.

In the Arctic, this approach puts large swathes of once-untouchable ocean up for grabs by the surrounding nations, known as the "Arctic 8." Many of their claims now focus on the Lomonosov Ridge, a huge, deep-sea geological feature that stretches across the Arctic Ocean. Several nations posit that this ridge is an extension of their continental shelf, a claim that could grant them access to larger areas of Arctic seabed, and thus, vast mineral wealth.

All this points to a future in which different nations will indeed own chunks of the Arctic Ocean, each with varying degrees of power. Russia and Canada, for instance, are staking the two largest claims, which would inevitably give these nations more regional influence.

However, the divvying up of the Arctic isn't likely to happen very soon. For one thing, gathering evidence about the seafloor, crafting detailed reports and wading through the intricate science of nations' claims is an intensive procedure that's only just begun.

"The process of deciding on those claims itself is going to take possibly decades. Some people predict a couple of decades, but certainly years," Powell said. Even if countries get the go-ahead, they'll then have to shoulder the huge expense of getting their ships to the Arctic, building deep-sea infrastructure, and extracting oil and gas from miles beneath the surface.

"It's not just about melting ice. It's still an isolated environment. There are still difficult seas and icebergs, and it's very difficult to get insurance to operate," Powell said. "There's a whole set of other issues that are involved in whether that's practical."

Related: 10 Things You Need to Know about Arctic Sea Ice

At this stage, therefore, countries' claims to the Arctic are mostly anticipatory, said Amy Lauren Lovecraft, a professor of political science at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and director of the Center for Arctic Policy Studies. "A lot of what's being divvied up doesn't have anything to do with immediate need. It's about 'let's get what we can under UNCLOS so that we have access to all of that space in the future,'" she said.

Still, should we be worrying now about what ownership will ultimately do to the Arctic, even if that reality is still decades away? Could nations' jockeying for oil access spark a war? And how will an influx of resource-hungry countries affect the region's fragile ecology?

Powell said the effects on the Arctic will be determined by the general global situation when nations finally move in. "One could imagine a world where there's more conflict and anxiety about different things, and in that scenario, it would be bad news for the Arctic. But then you can also imagine increasing global organization to combat climate change," which might prompt states to work together to forge better environmental regulation, Powell said. "I definitely think it depends on other, wider issues."

Lovecraft said she is more cautiously optimistic. "If I put on my absolute environmentalist's hat, it's true, the Arctic will be used more." However, she added, "I don't think it's a race to the bottom." In other words, the Arctic will be owned and explored but that doesn't necessarily mean it will be destroyed.

The reason is that too much hangs in the balance. For instance, the Arctic's frigid waters,already threatened by climate change, support food chains that benefit the entire planet. Lovecraft said that governments grasp the crucial importance of protecting that resource.

There's proof in the Arctic Council, established in the 1990s by the eight Arctic nations. It promotes cooperation among different countries and indigenous communities of the region, "in particular on issues of sustainable development and environmental protection in the Arctic," the council website says.

Lovecraft said that countries have a desire to safeguard political and environmental stability in the region; theyre not blindly hurtling towards disaster. "People tend to think only about the Arctic in environmental terms, or in these old, Cold War terms. But it's far more nuanced, and there's a lot of goodwill," she said.

This cooperation might also become increasingly crucial as other, non-Arctic nations, like China, grow interested in the region. "They're never going to be an Arctic country, but they have money. They will use that soft power to create joint ventures [with Arctic nations] and all other kinds of ways to be in the Arctic," Lovecraft said. A major question then becomes whether the Arctic 8 will band together to protect the region from exploitation, Lovecraft said.

She added that a fixation with the national "scramble for the Arctic"' could be distracting people from a larger and more immediate threat to the region: climate change. Ownership will change the face of the Arctic, but climate change is shaping the landscape irrevocably, right now.

"We're not going to have a war anytime soon in the Arctic. What we are going to have is a fundamental disruption in the ecosystem," Lovecraft said. "What can [the eight Arctic countries] do to better steward this resource? Why not put more energy into protecting that future, for the common good of mankind?"

Originally published on Live Science.

(Image credit: Future plc)

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Who Owns the Arctic? - Livescience.com

A host of Broadway favorites raised their voices October 14 to help animals in need, 14 as part of the annual concert fundraiser Best in Shows, which took place at Feinsteins/54 Below. Seth Rudetsky served as host and music director for this year's iteration of the annual concert, which raises funds for the Humane Society of New York.

Among those appearing were Tony Award winners Beth Leavel (The Prom) and Lillias White (The Life), as well as Tony nominee Brenda Braxton (Smokey Joes Caf, Chicago), Nick Adams (Priscilla, Queen of the Desert), singer-songwriter Javier Colon, Adam Kantor (The Bands Visit), Cassandra Kubinski (You Get Me ), Tony nominee Beth Malone (Fun Home), Bonnie Milligan (Head Over Heels), Christine Pedi (Forbidden Broadway), and Paige Price (Saturday Night Fever).

Tony nominee Andy Karl and Orfeh were honored this year with the Humane Society of New Yorks Sandy Fund Award for their work in support of rescued animals.

Best in Shows is produced by Broadway animal trainer Bill Berloni and his wife Dorothy.

Flip through photos from the evening below:

Braxton, Rudetsky, and White have been special guest performers on Playbill Travels Broadway on the High Seas cruises. Cabins are now on sale for Broadway in the Great Northwest, Playbill Travels first domestic cruise featuring Kate Baldwin, Tedd Firth, Christopher Fitzgerald, Aaron Lazar, and Faith Prince (April 26May 4, 2020), and for Broadway on the Mediterranean (August 31September 7, 2020), featuring Audra McDonald, Will Swenson, Gavin Creel, Caissie Levy and Lindsay Mendez, and for Broadway on the Nile (December 27, 2020January 7, 2021), with performers soon to be announced. To book a suite or stateroom, call Playbill Travel at 866-455-6789 or visit PlaybillTravel.com.

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See Photos From the Star-Studded 2019 Best in Shows Concert at Feinstein's/54 Below - Playbill.com

Original Rent star Adam Pascal, as previously reported, will star in 5-Star Theatricals upcoming production of The Music Man, which runs October 1827 at the Kavli Theatre in Thousand Oaks, California. Get a first look at the Tony nominee as Harold Hill in the photo above.

Larry Raben will direct Meredith Willsons Tonywinning musical, with choreography by Peggy Hickey (Anastasia, A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder) and music direction by Brad Ellis.

Pascal will be joined by Katharine McDonough as Marian, Trent Mills as Marcellus Washburn, Joshua Blond as Winthrop, Lisa Dyson as Mrs. Paroo, Savannah Fischer as Amaryllis, Dani Gonzalez as Ethel Toffelmier, Rich Grosso as Charlie Cowell, Joe Hart as Mayor Shinn, Christie Lynn Lawrence as Eulalie Shinn, Antonia Vivino as Zaneeta Shinn, Chris Hunter as Oliver Hix, Jonathan Matthews as Ewart Dunlop, James Thomas Miller as Olin Britt, Richard Storrs as Constable Locke, L. Michael Wells as Jacey Squires, and Adam Winer as Tommy Djilas.

The ensemble will feature Brittany Anderson, Laura Aronoff, Nichole Beeks, Lucas Blankenhorn, Lucy Bollier, Calvin Brady, Samara Gottlieb, Tina Hidai, Scotty Jacobson, Rachel Josefina, Cleo Magill, Anne Montavon, Chet Norment, Luke Pryor, Camal Pugh, Aria Surrec, Bayley Tanenbaum, Joshua Tanenbaum, Abigail Thompson, Zachary Thompson, Dekontee Tucrkile, Spencer Ty, Weston Walker-Pardee, and Samantha Wynn Greenstone.

The production will also have lighting design by Jared A. Sayeg, sound design by Jonathan Burke, costume design by Tanya Apuya, props design by Alex Choate, and hair and wig design by Jessica Mills. The production stage manager is Talia Krispel.

Pascal recently appeared as Edward Lewis in the Broadway musical adaptation of Pretty Woman. His Broadway appearances also include Something Rotten!, Disaster!, and Memphis.

Patrick Cassidy is the artistic director of 5-Star Theatrical, formerly operated as Cabrillo Music Theatre.

See What Your Favorite Stars Are Up to Away From Broadway With Playbill Universe

To celebrate Adam Pascal on his birthday look back through some of his past shows and performances.

Pascal has been a special guest performer on Playbill Travels Broadway on the High Seas cruises. Cabins are now on sale for Broadway in the Great Northwest, Playbill Travels first domestic cruise featuring Kate Baldwin, Tedd Firth, Christopher Fitzgerald, Aaron Lazar, and Faith Prince (April 26May 4, 2020), and for Broadway on the Mediterranean (August 31September 7, 2020), featuring Audra McDonald, Will Swenson, Gavin Creel, Caissie Levy and Lindsay Mendez, and for Broadway on the Nile (December 27, 2020January 7, 2021), with performers soon to be announced. To book a suite or stateroom, call Playbill Travel at 866-455-6789 or visit PlaybillTravel.com.

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First Look at Rent Tony Nominee Adam Pascal as Harold Hill in The Music Man - Playbill.com

Fisherman Michael Cavanagh has no doubts about the potential for violence on the high seas in the event of a no-deal Brexit at the end of the month.

The Greencastle-based skipper , says that just after the initial March 29th deadline passed, an Irish crew fishing for crab off Scotland got a nasty shock, even though there had been an extension.

They went to haul their pots, but 400 of them had already been hauled and the eye (which crabs crawl through) had been cut out of all the pots. And it wasnt Boris Johnson who did it.

Was it UK fishermen?

Who else was it? asks Cavanagh, the chairman of the Killybegs Fishermens Organisation (KFO) .

The organisations chief executive Sean ODonoghue says he has been warning for some time about the potential for conflict between fishermen of different nationalities if there is not agreement allowing for the status quo to be retained for a period once Brexit happens.

He reckons a lot of Irish people do not realise just how close UK waters are to the coast of Co Donegal and so may not appreciate the fears of the industry.

Can you imagine telling fishermen from Greencastle that they can no longer fish outside their back door?he asks.

ODonoghue says the Irish fishing industry will fall off a cliff if there is a no deal Brexit. He notes that over 14,000 people around the Irish coast work in fishing related industries.

Irish fishermen, just like the French, will not be happy if they are barred from areas they have fished for generations, he stressed.

Neither Michael or I will be be able to control this, he warns.

Just look at the farmers, agrees Cavanagh.

Both of them believe French fishermen will be particularly militant if they find themselves barred from much of the English Channel post-Brexit, and they believe blockades at French ports will happen within 24 hours of such a scenario.

Throw into the mix strong policing by Royal Navy boats protecting UK waters and there will be mayhem, warns ODonoghue.

He cites the tension between French and UK fishermen in the English Channel during the so-called scallop wars, when boats were rammed and stones thrown, as an indicator of the potential strife to come.

Somebody will lose a life, agrees Cavanagh.

ODonoghue says in a worst case scenario, those blocking French ports will not take time to check if vehicles have an Irish registration or if they are carrying fish or pharmaceuticals. Everybody will be affected, he says. And it will escalate quickly to Northern ports like Rotterdam.

Cavanagh says if things go badly, Irish fishermen will not hesitate to block Irish ports. And there will be no point having a blockade in Killybegs. It will be in Dublin because this is about bread and butter.

At Killybegs pier on Monday, just one vessel - the Northern Ireland-registered Voyager - could be seen unloading fish, while several local boats were tied up. According to ODonoghue, uncertainty over Brexit meant many local skippers had used up their quotas in the first three months of the year. How could you blame them when they expected they might be barred from UK waters from April?

Businessman Eugene McBrearty said local people were very glad to have the Voyager there because it meant a few days work for one of the the local fish processing factories , which would otherwise have been idle.

Out of his office window he pointed to one pier, where four local vessels were tied up. Thats 150m worth of boats lying idle.

McBrearty, owner of the KER Group (Killybegs Electrical Refrigeration Services) which provides engineering and refrigeration services to trawlers , has had to seek out new markets in places like Namibia, Chile and Saudi Arabia in the long lead in to Brexit.

The threat posed by pirates off Saudi Arabia and the need for security when operating in other Gulf states, means spreading his wings beyond Killybegs was not the exotic lifestyle choice some might imagine. But while a few years ago 80 per cent of his business was Killybegs-based, this has dropped to 40 per cent .

Liam Young , chief executive of Donegal and Wexford-based Errigal Bay shellfish processors, says that Brexit put the brakes on development at his company a long time ago.

The uncertainty has meant his company having to stall key decisions about investing in new equipment, launching new products or hiring new staff, while the slump in the value of sterling has really hurt, he says.

We are competing with companies in the UK whose costs have fallen by 20 per cent, putting the squeeze on us, he explains.

Young says that Errigal, which has a workforce of 150 and exports all its products , was impacted almost immediately after the Brexit referendum, but the impact became really acute when sterling started to slide.

The last thing we want is for the uncertainty to continue. We just want it done, he said.

Like a lot of Irish exporters, Errigal Bay uses Britain as a land bridge en route to markets in continental Europe and that is another worry as any delays when transporting fresh produce could be devastating.

Many in Donegal are also wondering what delays they will face closer to home given that those doing business in Dublin cross the border with Northern Ireland twice on the way.

I remember well the days when I had to sit and wait at a check point in Aughnacloy for two and a half hours and youd have to take everything out of the boot of the car, says Cavanagh. Nobody wants go back to that.

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Fishermen warn of mayhem on seas in event of no-deal Brexit - The Irish Times

The Navy has both a tradition and a futureand we look with pride and confidence in both directions.Adm. George Anderson, 1961

Sunday, Oct. 13, marks the 244th birthday of the United States Navy.

The Navy has evolved significantly from its colonialseafaring roots, but its spirit of service to the nation remains.

The colonial militia is most often mentioned in American history textbooks, but the Navy also had a rule in the struggle for our independence. The Founders debated the practicality of having a naval force at first because of the British Royal Navys domination of the seas. Fortunately for Americans and much of the future world, the Continental Navy proved its mettle and won the respect of General Washington as a partner to the Army.

The Navy then all but disappeared after the Revolutionary War. It took pirates off the North African coast, tensions with France, and war with Great Britain in the 18th and 19th centuries to highlight the necessity of the Navy.

On April 30, 1798, President John Adams signed a congressional act establishing the Department of the Navy after both the Department of Treasury and the Department of War advised Congress to do so.

Today, the seas are arguably more relevant to global commerce than ever. In fact, approximately 90% of all the worlds goods are shipped by seas. These economic lifelines are threatened every time a ship is hijacked by pirates in the Gulf of Aden, or when Iranian vessels interfere with shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

A rising China and a resurgent Russia also are trying to tip the scales, shifting their resources to the Pacific Ocean and Arctic Circle. For example, China built airfields in the Spratly and Paracel islands, many in areas still disputed by neighboring countries.

Although the Navy abandoned a global force for good asa slogan, it continues to be one. It not only keeps the peace on the high seas,it airlifts in supplies and offers assistance from its hospital ships at timesof flooding and natural disasters.

This undertaking involves the commitment of approximately 337,000 active-duty personnel, 102,000 ready reserve, and an additional 279,000 Navy civilian employees.

The United States enjoys a blanket of security thatspans the entire globe, in part thanks to the efforts of American sailors whotirelessly patrol both the blue waters and the littorals.

From the Barbary Coast, to the Battle of Midway andbeyond, the Navy will go to victory or to the rescue. Happy Birthday, U.S.Navy!

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Forged by the Sea, and Centuries of Devotion to the American People - Daily Signal

On the third day of a noreaster, the storm is set to continue to bring wind, rain and potential coastal flooding, particularly for Cape Cod and the Islands, and Nantucket.

The National Weather Service predicted Friday morning that the long duration offshore ocean storm will continue to produce sustained winds at a maximum of 25 to 35 miles per hour along the coastlines of the Cape and Islands with maximum gusts between 35 and 50 miles per hour. The strongest winds are predicted for Friday morning and afternoon; theyre supposed to die down Friday evening.

For Boston, maximum wind gusts could reach between 35 and 40 miles per hour through Friday afternoon, the service said.

Our noreaster is still spinning well to our southgusty winds and rough season continue today, Terry Eliasen, a meteorologist with WBZ, said.

The storm could also bring some minor coastal flooding to Nantucket with 1.5-to-2-foot storm surge during high tides with waves reaching 5 to 10 feet, the service said. Nantucket was under a coastal flood advisory as of 6:15 a.m. Friday.

Expected inundation of less than one-foot above ground level in low-lying areas near shorelines, the service said.

The service also predicts dangerous sea conditions for all vessels with strong winds and high seas off shore.

Since Wednesday, Boston has received just .1 inches of rain, but areas of Cape Cod have gotten well over an inch. Nantucket has received nearly 3 1/2 inches of rain, the service said.

Bands of showers, mostly light, will expand farther north and west of Boston today then weaken and ease out of the picture tomorrow morning, WBZ meteorologist Barry Burbank said.

He predicts Boston could get another .3 inches of rain before midnight Friday.

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'Still spinning': Here's the latest on what to expect from the ongoing nor'easter - Boston.com

FORTY YEARS ago, in the autumn of 1979, a group of British explorers set out from London on a seemingly impossible mission: a circumpolar navigation of the Earth. Over the three years of what was known as the Transglobe Expedition, they would struggle against high seas in the Roaring Forties, evade hungry polar bears, negotiate mountainous sand dunes and forbidding jungles. There was another danger, more insidious and less photogenic than any of these, but which nonetheless posed a threat to their endeavourboredom. This was to be particularly acute in Antarctica, where, after traversing Africa, the group was obliged to spend months huddled in icy darkness.

Sir Ranulph Fiennes and the team he had assembled undertook their journey in a much less technological age. There was no satellite navigation; messages to and from their base camp were sent in Morse code by Sir Ranulphs wife, Ginny, who was in charge of communications. Nor were there any Kindles. A big part of the cargo aboard the Benjamin Bowring, the expeditions ice-breaker, was books.

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Fortified by this reserve, the team undertook two adventures at onceone of the body and one on the page, both involving extreme conditions, endless vistas and unsettling claustrophobia. Both laid bare the personalities of the participants, and both left their marks.

The plan for Antarctica was to spend the first brief summer getting the main groupSir Ranulph, Ginny and two former members of the SAS, Charlie Burton and Oliver Shepardup onto the lofty Antarctic Plateau, where they would wait out the eight-month polar winter before embarking on their crossing of the continent in the spring. They succeeded in establishing themselves on the 3,000-metre-high ice shelf. I dug an awful lot of snow, dug tunnels, dug slop pits and latrines, Sir Ranulph, now 75, recalls. The Antarctic leg required an enormous amount of time crouched over maps. But there was time for reading, and we read a lot.

At Eton he had been taught French by David Cornwell, the alter ego of John le Carr: He developed in me a lasting love of literature, of the sound of great language. Penguin, the publisher, had offered to sponsor them, Sir Ranulph explains. He took 50 volumes by classic British authorsDickens, Scott, Thackeray and Trollope (Dickens was always a bit like coming home). For his part, Burton requested a boxful of Westerns. Mr Shepard, meanwhile, had hardly read at all when I went out there. Before the expedition he had worked in the wine trade; he now lives in France. But we were in a hut the size of a garden shed, he recalls, and reading was the only form of escape I had.

His preference was for an epic tale of adventure, played out against a hostile and perilous landscape. I read The Lord of the Rings trilogy seven times, Mr Shepard says. It seemed to appertain so closely to what we had decided to undertake. He believes that this prolonged engagement with literature left a lasting impression. More than simply being a diversion, it put me on the path of an avid reader. He remembers War and Peace and Kafka as hard work but worth it. (Ginny Fiennes died in 2004, Burton in 2002.)

At least the main expedition crew was partly occupied by anticipation of the polar crossing. The team had also established another camp, just inland from the ice-packed Southern Ocean. There two young men, Anto Birkbeck and Simon Grimes, were to guard the fuel and food supplies that would be airlifted to Sir Ranulph and his colleagues when winter was over.

At the time Mr Birkbeck, who is now a fund manager, was just 22 and straight out of university; he leapt at the chance of spending an exotic winter in the polar darkness. He and Mr Grimes, who had never met before they set out, were crammed into an even smaller hut than their counterparts on the plateau. There were two desks, two bunks and over 200 books.

Our hut was a bubble on the ice shelf, miles of flat whiteness with a hundred foot of ice beneath us, and the sky above and the sea beyond, Mr Birkbeck recollects. These were abnormaland, it turned out, riskycircumstances. The more I think about it, the more really odd it was to be parked in a box with some very good books and great ideasYou do end up looking too deeply into the Eye of Sauron, the malign antagonist of The Lord of the Rings.

Mr Birkbeck started off with a clear plan for his days: an hour of physical exercise in the morning, followed by an hour of physics, an hour of Spanish study and then an hour reading poetry. The rest of the day would be spent with a novel. As winter wore on, he says, the novels took over. I started getting up at midday and just reading a novel until bedtime.

He had asked friends to recommend their desert-island books, and duly worked through all of Tolstoy, Hardy and George Eliot, plus Don Quixote, One Hundred Years of Solitude and Joyces Ulysses (as well as Homers Odyssey). As well as the poetry (Chaucer, Milton, T.S. Eliot and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight), there was philosophy (Nietzsche, Hegel, Bertrand Russell and Aristotle). And, almost fatefully, he read Dostoyevsky.

There was one moment, towards the end of the winter, when Mr Birkbeck had just finished reading Crime and Punishment and found himself walking behind Mr Grimes on the ice. In his memory, the events of that day are now murky. I find it very difficult to know whether it is a figment of my imagination or not, he says. Theres no question that if you put two people in a hut the size of a caravan and shut them up for nine months, you will generate intense frustration, for which the other person is the obvious focus.

On this particular day, I dont remember ever having a row, but I do remember being intensely irritated by him. Mr Birkbeck also recalls having an ice-axe in his hand as he trailed his hut-mate through the whiteness. I remember getting deeply into the mind of Raskolnikov and thinking hard about this cold-blooded murder, which Dostoyevskys anti-hero commits with an axe. At the same time he was pondering the question of whether good and evil truly exist. I dont really know whether [Mr Grimes] was in danger or not.

Now, thinking back after four decades on what he calls a Boys Own adventure, Mr Birkbeck says the experience was more powerful and meaningful than he had realised. Over the years the two feats involved, one mental and one physical, each formative in its own way, have come to chime and blur. It was not just about the South Pole, he concludes. It was also about Dostoyevsky and James Joyce, and about the lasting power of great books.

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An expedition reveals the perils of reading Dostoyevsky in Antarctica - The Economist

Italian authorities have found the bodies of at least 12 people who drowned last week after a boat capsized in rough seas off the island of Lampedusa.

Photos released by the Italian coastguard showed some of the clothed bodies floating at a depth of about 60 metres (200ft). Among them was a woman who drowned while embracing her child of about eight months.

On Tuesday last week, Italian authorities rescued 22 survivors from the boat, which was carrying about 50 people. The bodies of 13 women were found at the time, including that of a 12-year-old girl. But after testimony from those who survived, it was clear dozens of people, including eight children, were missing.

According to an initial reconstruction of events, all the people onboard moved to one end of the vessel as the rescue boat arrived, causing it to overturn. Survivors said the boat had initially left Libya carrying mostly people from sub-Saharan Africa, before sailing along the coast to reach the city of Sfax in Tunisia, where another 15 people boarded for the journey to Sicily.

The site of the wreck was finally located on Tuesday and the bodies will be recovered in the next few days.

The Agrigento prosecutor, Salvatore Vella, who is leading the investigation into the incident and the search operation, said: We believed in it until the end.

The divers did not give up for a single day. They put all their heart into returning the bodies of loved ones to their relatives.

The news has shaken Italy, particularly because of the high number of children onboard. Prosecutors have released some of the harrowing accounts of survivors.

Among those was that of a young Tunisian called Wissen. When the boat sank, the man recovered the body of a child who had been onboard. But suddenly, he recounted, another person desperately clung to his legs to try to save himself, risking dragging Wissen down with him. Wissen had to let go of the child to unfasten his trousers, and the other person drowned. Wissen was saved but could no longer find the child.

Although the number of arrivals has practically halved, thousands of people continue to attempt the crossing from Libya to Europe.

On Tuesday, the Italian coastguard assisted a boat with 180 people onboard, while Maltese authorities aided another boat carrying 75 people.

On Wednesday, the Norwegian-flagged Ocean Viking docked in Taranto with 176 people onboard. The vessel, operated by the charities SOS Mditerrane and Mdecins Sans Frontires, had rescued them at sea about 30 miles (48km) off the Libyan coast.

While EU member states are working on a temporary plan to quickly take people off boats in the Mediterranean and distribute them among countries willing to accommodate them, there has been significant criticism in Italy of a human trafficker participating in a meeting with authorities.

Abd al-Rahman Milad, known as Bija described by the UN as one of the worlds most notorious human traffickers met Italian officials and a delegation from the Libyan coastguard at Cara di Mineo, one of the biggest migrant reception centres in Europe, in May 2017.

In February of that year, the then Italian interior minister, Marco Minniti, signed a memorandum with the leader of Libyas UN-recognised government, Fayez al-Sarraj, introducing a new level of cooperation between the Libyan coastguard and Italy, including the provision of four patrol vessels.

Despite Italian authorities denying their involvement in the meeting, the UN migration agency has confirmed it was requested by the interior ministry.

Bija was reached by the Italian newspaper Avvenire, which first reported the case. In the interview, the trafficker said he was offended by how the media have described him and that he was coming to that meeting only to discuss how to block the flow of migrants.

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Italian coastguard finds bodies of migrants who drowned at sea - The Guardian