• Thursday-What'sUP July 1 - 06:16 pm

A few weeks back, in early June, we featured a photo of the BBC Mississippi ship carrying windmill parts in the St. Ignace area and heading to Menominee to unload them. Well, lo and behold, Brenda Leigh was on hand when the same ship made another trip and she captured it being towed into Menominee by the tug, Jimmy L. From the information Brenda found and forwarded to me, it looks like the Mississippi and a number of other BBC ships carry these windmill parts from Becancour, which is in Quebec, Canada. Then they drop them off in Menominee, where they're then transported by oversize semi trucks, into Wisconsin. Quite the process to get them where they're going. And...from the number of folks in Brenda's photos, it sure looks like it's a popular event to come to the pier to watch the ships coming in like this. Thanks for the follow-up photos, Brenda!

Must be a very narrow channel for the tug to have to tow the ship in backwards!

Actually the 'road map' makes this a destination in Menominee....no restrictive underpasses, bridges, etc. for their journey overland after docking/unloading.

I saw one of the sections being hauled on a semi when I was on my way North in WI this past Monday. They are gigantic!

Impressive, I must say. Great photos!

Speaking of Canada.... Happy Canada Day to all!!

And yes those parts are huge as I get to see them on an almost daily basis in the Port of Houston before they make their overland journey to W. Texas. Oh, and fyi: the individual fanblades are bigger as they come in one piece!!

We passed three trucks with one wind turbine blade on each and then a truck with the nested tapered base sections in North Dakota on our way home. Never did recognize the generator housing - if it went by first it wasn't as noticeable as the blades were. The following site explains transport:
http://www.wind-watch.org/news/2007/11/12/turbine-blade-shipping-takes-planning/
And the picture of one on a truck:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/caveman_92223/3348491430/

You can get an idea of the size of these beasts from the standard utility pole in the foreground.

My husband is an OSHA Safety man for a wind farm in MN and gets to climb two or three turbines a day. They are an awesome piece of machinery!

Gee, we built submarines in Manitowoc during the WWII. Must have lost the ability to fabricate steel tubes in the US over the years. Too bad.
Wasn't building these supposed to be the "Green Jobs" we have been hearing about from those swell people in Washington DC?
Like the new Jeep ad says, (paraphrased) we were good when we built good things, not so good when we didn't. Seems like the captains of industry with the acquiescence of government have seen fit to move production off shore and turn us into a nation of traders and consumers. Unfortunately, consumers cease to consume when they run out of money and credit because they haven't produced anything.
But I digress, nice photos of a working port.

Great Shots! May I add my Happy Birthday Wishes to Canada, and my family who all live there.
Enjoy your holiday.

To our good neighbour to the North, Happy birthday to the Dominion of Canada.

this may have been linked before, but there is a video of the making of the bridge on the Gazette site
http://extras.mininggazette.com/BridgeVideo/Index.html

Richard "Notroll", thanks for posting the photo showing the comparison in size. Those 'things' are awesome! Paul H., I agree with every word you wrote! I'll add.....this is NOT my father's country, nor mine!