Boats And Ships (3rd Ed, 1980)

[Music] when most of us think of boats we think of fun it's a thrill to ride a rubber rft down a fast moving River to speed across an open Lake in a motorboat to challenge the winds and waves of the ocean on a catamaran [Music] but boots aren't just for play they're also for work more than a hundred years ago ships like this did the important job of moving goods from one country to another they were driven by the wind and were called China clippers because they were the fastest ships on the Seas and hauled tea from China they also carried wool from Australia cloth from England and lumber from America we don't use China Clippers anymore though they were once the pride of the Seas today we know them mainly from pictures and [Music] models but bats and ships still do the important work of moving Goods these barges are loaded with grain the white boat pushing them is called a towboat it can push groups of barges many times larger than itself my father is a towboat captain on the Mississippi River he's moved goods between Minneapolis and St Louis for many years sometimes at night when there aren't too many boats on the river he lets me steer while he watches steering the boat is called piloting and it's not an easy job you have to navigate the boat through changing currents and shifting sandbanks you must always be on the lookout for Bridges and other boats the trip down the river takes several days and nights when the sun comes up my father takes over the controls our towboat has two engines and two sets of [Music] Rudders steering down the twisting turning river is a lot more complicated than it would be on the Open Sea while the captain Pilots the boat the chief engineer is down in the engine room making sure the the motors are working [Music] properly as we travel down the river we meet the Delta Queen boats like this were once used to haul cotton grain and other Goods Up and Down the River today the Delta Queen is a cruise ship like ocean liners she carries passengers from port to port everything on the Delta Queen is steam driven from its music kopy to its [Music] engines steam helps to power the giant Paddle Wheel at the stern or back of the boat the invention of the steam engine was an important development in the history of water transportation it meant that boats and ships could travel faster than they did with wind power they did not have to depend on the wind to blow at some places along the river locks are needed to lower boats to a new water level most boats enter the locks under their own power but some are pulled in by large wire cables it takes a lot of teamwork to move a boat through the locks and the crew members communicate by walkie-talkie each crew member wears a life preserver just in case he takes a spill over the side the Mississippi is an important part of American America's vast network of inland waterways it makes transportation to many parts of the country cheap and easy on the Mississippi boats carry Goods all the way from Minnesota to New Orleans there are no locks on the Mississippi south of St Louis our part of the journey is over and we head back up the river on this part of the Mississippi barges can be put together in larger groups our grain barges are now joined to others to make a group of 35 for the trip to New Orleans have you ever noticed how easy it is to move something when it's floating in the water this towboat is now pushing 35 barges filled with grain it would take a train almost 6 mil long to carry as much grain as these barges are hauling on a barge 1 gallon diesel fuel will move a ton of cargo more than 400 miles that is why River Transport is much more economical than trucks railroads or trains when we see the international trademark we know we've arrived at the busy Port of New Orleans here we see barges filled with coal being pushed by a towboat like ours goods from many parts of the world enter and leave New Orleans every day there are boats and ships of many different shapes and sizes and each one has a different job to do tugboats are ready to help push the large ships safely to the dock here three toeb boats are joined together to push a heavy load of charges the Coast Guard uses small motorboats and helicopters to patrol the harbor and keep all the traffic moving smoothly the Coast Guard boat soon passes an incoming freighter from Finland it is called the Patricia and has just unloaded its cargo one way you can tell that the ship is empty is by seeing how high it rides in the water if most of the waterm marking Show the ship is carrying a light load or nothing at all on its top deck the Patricia has four cranes these cranes are used to load and unload [Music] Freight the barber prium is another phrase it's from England and is being loaded with piggyback containers that are stacked one on top of another the loading goes fast about 35 men can do the whole job in one [Music] day The Barber Blue Sea company owns many ships [Music] the alaria likes is a container ship it carries most of its Cargo in barges that are stacked up inside the hold toeb boats are used to pull the barges out of the hold while ships are being unloaded in New New Orleans other ships in Far Away places are taking on Cargo in the port of Valdez Alaska this tanker is picking up oil for shipment to San Francisco California it is a super tanker it is the biggest type of ship in the world it is more than 10 stories from its highest point the bridge to the bottom of the hole on the ship's top side there are living quarters for the crew members they live on the ship for 2 months at a time time line one of the ship's officers uses her free time to study more about navigation at work line helps direct the loading of oil onto the ship the oil is pumped through pipes large lights allow the work to continue day and night when the work is done the North Slope is ready to head out toward the Open Sea tugboats push it along until it is safely out of the harbor up on the bridge Lorraine Pilots the giant super tanker as the third mate one of her duties is to keep an eye on the weather because she knows that stormy seeds can destroy a ship even one as big as this when she sees that the waves are getting bigger she knows there must be a storm nearby the radio transmits a picture of the latest weather map Lorraine uses the map to chart the course of the approaching storm meanwhile the captain is writing reports and planning the work for the whole [Music] ship as the storm comes closer it blows white spray off the top of the water the rain calls crew members in other parts of the ship including the engine room the engines give the ship the power to drive through the Seas the electricity to light the ship and make its computers work also comes from the engine room it is here too that salt water is made into drinking water on the bridge line checks the ship's position against the map she must know where the ship is and how fast it is moving satellites and computers also help navigate the ship the storm is still getting worse [Music] the giant super tanker Bobs up and down like a [Music] COR one of the officers directs the Lifeboat drill each member of the crew from the captain to the Cook must be prepared for an emergency lifeboats carry food food water radios and other things the crew might need in life Boots the crew can survive several weeks on the ocean a bad storm could knock out the modern computers so the ship carries the tools sailors have used for hundreds of years clocks like this were used long before the age of computers and they are still needed today so are the magnetic compass and the sextint an instrument which US uses the sun to help pinpoint the ship's location radar helps to warn the crew of any obstacles in the north slope's path such as icebergs or oncoming ships although the old-fashioned ships wheel survived from bygone days it's much smaller than it used to be this is because the giant super tanker has power steering ships have changed a lot since the days of of the China clippers but the work of boats and ships is still important and sailing the oceans is still dangerous because the sea is as unpredictable as Ever After Hours of howling winds and crashing waves the captain can see that the storm is ending and that all is clear ahead almost 5 days after leaving Alaska the Ship Sails under the San Francisco Bay Bridge [Music]