Green Sea Shipbuilding Establishment

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

The Return of the ECSTASY!









The Green Sea cruise ship ECSTASY returned to the water this afternoon and returned to "Lake America" for the first time since September 2005. Lake America was once the main lake for Green Sea Ships in the early days of 2004-2005. Now it is rarely used in favor of nearby Mercado Lake.

I managed to get some really cool evening pictures including some interesting pics of the Ecstasy passing under the foot bridge on the golf course. Enjoy!

Barrett Hochhaus
diamondback78@hotmail.com

Saturday, June 16, 2007

Green Sea at a Crossroads


(Please forgive the faux news article)

Green Sea Shipbuilding Establishment may be finding itself at a monumental crossroads today. The great debate centers on the immediate future of the construcion side. Creatively, GSS is backlogged with proposals for new ships, many of which are badly wanted. However, storage space is still at a premium, despite the disposal of several unfinished hulls and the late cruise ship SOVEREIGN OF THE SEAS (which sailed to the scrapyard last week).

Adding to the panic, at least 2 new hull constructions are set to begin this summer. One, a mysterious "Super" ship, expected to be longer than the QUEEN MARY and by far the LARGEST ship ever for GSS.

Further complicating matters, there is a widescale effort in GSS to scale back the number of ships. GSS chairman Barrett Hochhaus ultimately wants to have fewer, higher-quality ships than the 10-15 ships once flourishing in the fleet. "I want to have a core of about 4 or 5 ships that I really like and regularly sail", Hochhause said. "These ships would each sail about once a month at least. Then we would have 2-4 more that are 'irregulars', that is they sail 1-3 times per year. The bottom line is, some of my classics like the ECSTASY are suffering lack of use. The ECSTASY for example was always supposed to make at least 100 voyages. That's the benchmark for a really successful career. We reached 25 voyages so easily, but now it is taking forever to reach 35."

Hochhaus has indicated that some ships, most notably the TITANIC may be offered for sale under the new plan. "One ship, which we are hoping to start building this month, is actually expected to be sold, but not before at least 1 year in the Green Sea Fleet. I have noticed that after 1 year, it is sometimes easier to part with these things."

The surface submarines ORCA and OBIHIRO as well as the carrier KAGA are also prime targets either for sail, sinking or scrapping. The battleship GRAF SPEE is expected to be sunk deliberately in a nearby lake later this summer and the NELSON may find herself on the scrapheap.

Even with the sale of the TITANIC, that would still leave 9 ships that would be hard to part with, PLUS the 2 more on the way.

For Green Sea Shipbuilding, it may prove too difficult to achieve such an aggressive streamlining.

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

QUEENS MEET AGAIN!







Last Sunday, June 10, was a big day for Green Sea Ships as the scale luxury liners QUEEN ELIZABETH and the flagship QUEEN MARY met for only the 2nd time on the water.

Unlike the February joint sailing, this time there were no technical problems interferring with the voyage and things went smoothly for over half an hour! The voyage couldn't reasonably go much longer due to the heat. It got pretty warm around noon.

My wife Maico commanded the Queen Mary for most of the voyage while I drove the Lizzie. Unfortunately, the Lizzie has sprung a leak which is described as "serious" in the area of her propellor shaft. A considerable amount of water made it into the hull.

Astonishingly, even with all this water in the hull, the hull NEVER became soggy or lost any structural integrity. That special 3-layer bottom of foamcore board is more resiliant than originally anticipated!

The Lizzie is in drydock now for repairs but for the Mary, it was another smooth sailing with no signs of any technical trouble. She is suddenly becoming one of the most reliable boats in the Green Sea Fleet!

Barrett Hochhaus
diamondback78@hotmail.com

Saturday, June 02, 2007

MAURETANIA SAILS












The R.C.S. MAURETANIA became the 11th currently active R/C boat in my fleet this afternoon after technical problems scrubbed this morning's attempt.

The Mauretania set sail on Mercado Lake in Scottsdale where she sailed for more than 30 minutes. This morning's attempt was scrubbed when the electronics-which had worked just fine yesterday- suddenly wouldn't work. I tried swapping the motor and speed controller, but nothing worked. After I got home, I put another speed controller in and she worked just fine, so we went to Mercado.

I got some great pictures as you can see as well as a video which I plan to put on Youtube.

Incidently, the QUEEN MARY also sailed this morning at a new lake in Litchfield. Again, she ran smoothly with no more engineering problems! The next step is to get all 4 of my Cunard ships (Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth, Queen Victoria and Mauretania) together on the water at the same time!

Barrett Hochhaus
diamondback78@hotmail.com