What a beautiful, sad video, clear photography plus an almost poetic commentary. Fascinating Arthur Kill! Besides those bigger wrecks there are lots of lifeboats, discarded equally long ago, each with their own story. What ships may they have come from, and where did they all end? Thank you for this wonderful video!
Three major reasons: First there was a huge influx of steam tugboats, wooden barges and carfloats, and ferry boats after the last of the bridges linking Staten Island was completed in the 1950s and 1960s. Witte thought the vessels may have some use if they were kept intact, and was slow to scrap them. Second was a fire that swept through the yard in 1977. The fire was supposedly started on July 4th, when people in pleasure boats, celebrating the 4th of July shot fireworks into some of the wooden boats, one of them landing on the steam ferry American Legion. The fire burned pretty well across the yard and took three days to put out. There were wooden barges filled with steam gauges, steam pumps ("hundreds of them"), fire extinguishers, and other machinery. When they were burned in the fire, their contents fell into the brackish water of the Hudson River and sank into the mud, most of it never to be recovered. The paths between the hulks were gone as well; making their salvage all the more difficult. Third was in the 1990s and beyond. By that point, the remains of the yard had been there for over two decades, and the yard had become a marine sanctuary, in spite of the oil and other contaminants. So the remains were left undisturbed so the wildlife could continue to live there.
Awesome video! Thank you 👍
So awesome. Thank you for sharing this history!
Wow. Been looking at these boats for decades but never really knew the history .great job
What a beautiful, sad video, clear photography plus an almost poetic commentary. Fascinating Arthur Kill! Besides those bigger wrecks there are lots of lifeboats, discarded equally long ago, each with their own story. What ships may they have come from, and where did they all end? Thank you for this wonderful video!
Awesome james !
Saw it on google maps and had me intrigued by the story
Very Educational..Thy..
I don't understand Why this mess,never cleaned up..
Three major reasons:
First there was a huge influx of steam tugboats, wooden barges and carfloats, and ferry boats after the last of the bridges linking Staten Island was completed in the 1950s and 1960s. Witte thought the vessels may have some use if they were kept intact, and was slow to scrap them.
Second was a fire that swept through the yard in 1977. The fire was supposedly started on July 4th, when people in pleasure boats, celebrating the 4th of July shot fireworks into some of the wooden boats, one of them landing on the steam ferry American Legion. The fire burned pretty well across the yard and took three days to put out. There were wooden barges filled with steam gauges, steam pumps ("hundreds of them"), fire extinguishers, and other machinery. When they were burned in the fire, their contents fell into the brackish water of the Hudson River and sank into the mud, most of it never to be recovered. The paths between the hulks were gone as well; making their salvage all the more difficult.
Third was in the 1990s and beyond. By that point, the remains of the yard had been there for over two decades, and the yard had become a marine sanctuary, in spite of the oil and other contaminants. So the remains were left undisturbed so the wildlife could continue to live there.
Cap a tan birdseye 9000
Wow..So Sad..What a Mess..looks like 3rd world