Amazon has had to pay employees for the time it takes for them to go through the security process at their warehouses, as do gemstone processing facilities. This is no different. It's disappointing that these people have to waste time and money in court, once the precedent has been established enforcement should be automatic.

Heh. Just needs the proper accessory holder so you can slam the handset in a telemarketers ear.

Actually the Russian Coast Guard also has extensive experience managing nuclear powered ice breakers (they run all of the largest ice breakers in the world.) Russian sailors are probably a lot cheaper than American ones. :-)

The Fitzgerald had to change course because of the waves, they wouldn't have wanted the waves, coming out of the north, on their port side. Taconite pellets (partly processed iron ore) can shift in the holds, and if part of the cargo moves and the other doesn't on a 1000 foot ore boat it could twist the hull (that may have actually contributed to the breakup, it's unknown). They knew they were near Whitefish Bay, but needed to head into the storm for stability.

Depends on crewing and the availability of customers who aren't in a hurry for delivery. One savings over a Panamax right off the top is the 40,000 or more gallons of fuel that it won't be burning every day. Another is that these ships apparently are exceedingly automated (in part because that's the only way to deal with sails that size), if they can reduce the crew size so that they're only paying 10% as many crew per ship as the Panamax it's break-even.

Ah. I grew up on the Great Lakes, where they're 'pilots'.

Yes, or a rowboat, or drifting debris, or . . .

The only thing that I can agree with in your entire post is the last line. It's pretty much a given that if they win employees will get pennies on the dollar, and the leeches will get millions.

Probably caught power lines on its way down. Planes don't generally dive straight down into the ground, in fact most can't.

Humans have been sailing since at least 60,000 BCE, since that was the only way for them to get to Australia (paddling rafts is remarkably slow, and there are some nasty currents in that straight.) Genetic studies came to the conclusion that rather than a single event consisting of a couple of possibly storm-tossed families (the old speculation) colonization was a deliberate efffort by hundreds of people over the course of centuries.

They'll know when a storm is coming before it gets there. Weather forecasting has come a long way since the 19th century. They may preferentially skirt the edge of storms for a speed boost.

Now they know when a storm is coming and what its probably path is. The pilot will have to take into account calm areas and avoid those as well, but satellite weather forecasting makes that possible now.

One really big technology change between the 1950s and today is the ability to know when, where, and in which direction the wind is/will be blowing throughout your entire trip. That's huge, no more Edmund Fitzgerald getting caught by an early storm or avoiding doldrums. Also according to sailing rules wind powered vessels always have the right of way, which might be important in straights like the English Channel or around southern Asia.

I didn't RTFA, but 11 knots is about half the speed of a regular container ship, and 2/3 of a bulk carrier, which I find surprisingly good.

Color me not-surprised.

The longer this goes on the happier I am that I never opened a Farcebook (spelling deliberate) account. We use WhatsApp to communicate with family in Peru, but we had those accounts long before the company was bought out.

MD-11 pilots shouldn't take more than a couple of weeks to train and recertify on a different aircraft in the same class (multi-engine large jet transport), it's not uncommon for pilots to be trained in most if not all of the various types of aircraft a carrier uses. An MD-11 is **OLD**, most newer aircraft have a lot more automation and much better ergonomic design (the 737 MAX being a glaring exception to that generalization) so it should be comparatively easier to recertify on a newer plane than on one of those museum pieces.