Drunk Russian Sailor Rips Gaping Hole in South Korean Bridge

He looks like he's still in the throttles?

Yeah, but in a back bell.

He wasn't even CLOSE to a span that he would fit under..... WTH?

It looks like the wash is coming out behind, or is that a dynamic I'm ignorant of? Maybe I don't know what "back bell" means, except the signal to reverse gear?

The minute I saw the headline on another site about a Russian ship hitting a bridge, my first thought was... VODKA!

Maybe I misunderstood what you meant when you asked, "He looks like he's still in the throttles?" I thought you were indicating that he was still powering ahead, and I was pointing out that he was in fact powering back or reversing. You can tell by the wash on the port side creeping toward the bow while the ship is still moving forward. (You are correct about what "back bell" means.)

Looks to my untrained I eye that he is still in forward, and since he's at a stand still the wash is coming out the side but I defer to others. And that's not really important. How the heck did the captain/pilot or the watch, even if "bombed", think they'd get under that bridge? More a statement than a question.

Nah he's in reverse. Which is another bonehead move, and can only result in MORE damage. Once you hit you shut it down and wait for the guys with the acetylene torches.

Wonder what the tidal situation was there..... If there's a lot and it's incoming this could get interesting.

Wouldn't there be a local pilot onboard in a harbor like that?

Good point..... Wonder if Ivan thought he could do this without.....

A couple of video's about this. Y'know, this bridge is "personal" to me. 'cuz whenever I had to fly into/out of Busan to get to my ship [USNS Wheeler], this was the way. . .
Retirement suits me better!!

- this from Busan Harbor

- this from the wheelhouse of the ship.

Oh man..... what a cluster&(@%

Several times a year vessels loose their engines in the Seaway, they then have to drop their anchor to stop ship .
Last year a vessel approaching the canal piers coming off Lake Erie drag anchor for one mile before he stopped, sometimes they restart engines but takes awhile to get under control.
Attached is a video off a thousand foot Great Lake Freighter doing a planned emergency stop.

Here is another thousand foot freighter that was in bad weather with strong current

So should he have reversed direction way be for this point and tried driving out? You can see he has tremendous leeway ( is that the proper term) going on there.

That's looks like it would tear all sorts of stuff up on the ship doing that!!!!!!!!

Different maneuver, but square riggers used to drop a bow anchor to make a "hard" tack. I have forgotten what the maneuver is called. That had to have an interesting effect on the rigging.

I'm talking about that video. Where they put the ship at full speed reverse while at cruise speed (15 knots). You can see welded items on the ship all shaking from the cavitation that is going through the entire ship.

Interesting to note though that full loaded they can come to a complete stop in 7/8 of a mile.

I've always heard that it takes about a mile to stop one of those things sometimes more. And no doubt at full reverse there are a lot of negative forces going on - thankfully its an emergency maneuver, rather than a regular one?

In NY Harbor you just give those bad boys a wide berth and move on.