Catching the Wolverine in a Jiffy

 I was going to see if I could catch some snowy owls today.  I ended up taking a convoluted route to get there.  As I was passing on Huron River Drive, it occurred to me that the Wolverine would be passing soon and I would have a chance to catch her.

I was able to get  to Chelsea to catch it.  It has been a while since I've seen a train here, so it was pretty cool.

It was an eastbound train and that was nice because the lighting at this time of day for the eastbound train is pretty good.

It was a pretty nice day but a little on the cold side because of the wind.  Since it snowed fairly recently, there was some snow being kicked up by the train.

I think I see the engineer pointing at me and that's kind of cool.

One more shot of the train's front.

And then it passed.

The Flight of the Cub

 I was having one of those days today when I didn't really feel like doing much.  There wasn't much stirring on the rivers (or lakes).  I didn't really feel like going out for trains as it was a little on the cold side and windy so there was no guarantee the roads would cooperate.  As I was accepting that I might not get out to take pictures, I took a look at FlightRadar and I saw something that caught my interest.

The first plane that I caught was a CRJ-200 coming in from Toronto.

It has been a while since I've seen this particular flight, so it was pretty cool to catch it.

Next up was a 757.

Anyone who follows this blog knows that I like the 757.

As a result, I will take many pictures of it.

This particular one is a 757-200.  Actually, it is a 757-251.  I remember correctly, different airlines have different designations for their planes.  This particular plane is powered by two Pratt and Whitney PW2037 engines.  It carries 199 passengers.  It was the 714 757 to come off the line from the Boeing Renton plant.

This plane had its first flight on May 30, 1996 and was delivered to Northwest Airlines on August 23, 1996.  

In 2009, ownership was switched to Delta Air Lines.

Today, this plane was coming to Detroit from Tampa.

This is the plane that got me out though as it was one I've never seen before.

It was an An-12 built by the Antonov Aircraft Bureau in Ukraine.  This was one of the Soviet aircraft design bureaus and they mostly produced cargo aircraft.  

The An-12 was developed from the An-8 and was a military version of the An-10.  The design first flew on December 16, 1957 and was introduced to service in 1959.  A total of 1,248 aircraft were built.  

It has a crew of 5 and can carry a little over 44,000 pounds of cargo.  The plane is 108 feet long and has a wingspan of 124 feet.  It has a cruise speed of 350 miles per hour and a range of 3,500 miles.  The Soviet military aircraft had two 23 mm cannons in the tail.

The NATO designation of this aircraft was Cub.  All of the NATO names for cargo planes started with a C, fighters with an F and bombers with a B.  

It is roughly equivalent to the C-130.

This particular aircraft was built in 1966 and currently flies with the Ukraine Air Alliance.

The flight originated in Miami.  Today's flight was 1,214 miles and went up to an altitude of 24,000 feet.  The filed flight speed was 316 miles per hour.  The flight took roughly 4 and a half hours to get from Miami.

It was pretty cool to catch this plane.  It's been here a couple of times but it was never at a time that I could catch it.

The Iver Bright Makes Another Appearance

 It wasn't long before the ship appeared.  She wasn't too far behind the Risley.

It was starting to snow a little more.  That made picture taking a little difficult.

It wasn't too long before she came out of the squall.

The ship in question was the Iver Bright.

She was coming down from Sarnia.

As she was heading to Monroe, I assume she had a load of asphalt.

Anyway, this was the third time I saw this ship in the off season.

She's kind of a nice looking ship though, so I'm not going to complain.

The reflections were pretty cool too.

The beam shot.

And she started to pass.

I wanted to get a shot of her in the window.

I would like this shot better if she weren't over exposed.

One more shot before heading home.

The Samuel Risley Makes an Appearance

 As we were getting ready to leave, I decided to show my dad the AIS they had there.  As I was looking at it, I saw that there was a ship at the tip of Belle Isle.  I was surprised as I checked AIS before heading out and I didn't see any ships stirring.  The ship must have started to stir as I was at other places.

The ship was being led by the Samuel Risley.  The Risley was sort of breaking ice but there wasn't much ice at this part of the river.

I haven't seen the Risley yet as she has been breaking ice on Lake St. Clair and this part of the Detroit River.  She hasn't ventured down to the part of the river by Belanger Park.

It was pretty cool to see her as I think she is a pretty neat looking ship.

It wasn't too long before she passed the pilot house.

All I can say is that I was glad I was inside because it was a little on the cold side.

I decided to take a picture that gave a sense of place.

And she started to pass.

The beam shot.

I'm not sure how far up she went but this was the last picture I took.

A Stop at the Dossin Museum

 Then I decided to take my dad to the Dossin Museum.  I didn't remember if I took him there before but even if I did, it's a pretty neat place.

They changed up the exhibits a bit.  Throughout the museum, they had a bunch of models.  This was a ship in a bottle.

A model of the Sykes before she had her self unloading boom.

This was a tour boat of some sort.  I think it was a steam powered one.

A cutaway model of the John G. Munson.  It was showing the self unloading system.  She was in the Bradley colors.

I'm not sure what ship this was but it was carrying a bunch of cars.  I would have loved to see this.

The S.T. Crapo.

An engine telegraph in the pilothouse of the William Clay Ford.

I think this was a radar scope.

Both of them together.

The controls of the ship.

I think this is a radio direction finder.

At one time, the Great Lakes were ringed with radio towers that would send out signal of their location.  You could use this device to get a fairly accurate fix of your position.  With the advent of GPS, this system is no longer needed (but I think it may still be around).

A ship called the Pewabic.