# End of an era



## 5036 (Jan 23, 2006)

http://www.shipspotting.com/gallery/photo.php?lid=1911852

The end of the mighty Weijsmuller "Typhoon." Ended her life as Gudri and apparently broke mooring lines whilst alongside unmanned. She drifted off getting damaged along the way and settling in shallow water turned on her side.

Spookily, "Tempest" her sistership is on her way to the breakers.

These 1976 built sisterships were revolutionary in their day and were on full time charter to Shell Expro as field tugs for the first part of their lives, Tempest continuing until the '90's. Shell released them for several installation tow outs of large concrete platforms for which they were modified with their revolutionary pusher nose. They were also upgraded with fire monitors and were among the first vessels to have hydraulic pins and sharks jaws.

They were famous and popular with great skippers such as Peter Schwartz whose English on the VHF was tinged with a Norfolk accent thanks to his wife. I spent many happy days aboard these astounding little ships laying anchors and buoys and using them on tows. I recall one tow where we had Tempest on the starboard bow anchor and Star Pisces on the port. The tension meter for the Pisces was jumping around as we towed into a full gale whilst the Tempest's was almost flat lined.

The design was so good that in 2002 the design was used as the base for the HARMS tug "Primus."
http://www.tugboats.de/primus_e.html

In 2003 "Port Said" was built for the Suez Canal Authority.
http://www.shipspotting.com/gallery/photo.php?lid=1281243

The Fairplay 32 and 33 built in 2011 are similarly based on the redoubtable Tempest and Typhoon.
http://www.tugboats.de/fairplay32_33_article.html

Some nostalgia and the famous pins here at 2 mins:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqrKZTQOkPQ

RIP Tempest and Typhoon.


----------



## tony Allard (Jan 25, 2009)

it is a sad time to see such iconic vessels end up as scrap. same fate for the london and rotterdam.


----------



## kees de ru (Dec 13, 2009)

The Tempest, as Indus, is today still working Offshore Lagos.

I made my last voyage prior to retirement in 2009 onboard Typhoon.


----------



## DxbBob (Oct 4, 2019)

*TYPHOON life saving services in August 1991*

Whenever I see a reference to Bureau Wijsmuller's AHT *TYPHOON*, I'm reminded of the rescue services she provided when *McDERMOTT DERRICK BARGE No. 29* sank trying to outrun tropical cyclone Fred on Thursday morning 15 August 1991. *TYPHOON* had the combination derrick/pipe lay barge in tow 65 miles off Hong Kong headed towards a cyclone mooring in the mouth of the Pearl River (Zhujiang in Chinese) when the tow line parted. The tug's repeated attempts to recover her tow were unsuccessful. Once the tow line parted, the drifting barge turned broadside to the whipped up waves and her rolling progressively worsened, causing a pair of steel anchor pendant buoys lashed on deck to break loose, roll forth and back across the deck, slamming over and over again into a hatch cover, eventually holing it. The barge began to take on water at a rate and volume which overcame her pumps. In no time she capsized and slowly sank in 210' of water. When the barge turned turtle, *TYPHOON* immediately commenced search and rescue operations in the 25' seas and 75 knot winds. Her operations required unrelenting demonstration of the highest standards of seamanship. _ When *TYPHOON* finally cleared into Hong Kong that Thursday night she had 84 survivors aboard. _  Another 87 crew members were rescued by vessels from China, Taiwan, the Soviet Union and Hong Kong, and by Hong Kong based SAR helicopters. 24 personnel perished.


----------

