CLS4 Carpentaria

Last updated
Lightship CLS4 "Carpentaria" (7854156048).jpg
Lightship CLS4 "Carpentaria" moored at Wharf 7, Darling Harbour.
History
Civil Ensign of Australia.svgAustralia
Name:Carpentaria
Namesake: Gulf of Carpentaria
Owner: Australian National Maritime Museum
Builder: Cockatoo Island Dockyard, Sydney, Australia
Laid down: 1916
Completed: 1917
Commissioned: 1917 [1]
Decommissioned: 1985
Homeport: Sydney
Fate: Preserved
Status: Museum ship as of late 2016
General characteristics
Type: Lightvessel
Displacement: 164 t (161.4 long tons; 180.8 short tons) [2]
Length: 21.94 m (72.0 ft)
Beam: 7.82 m (25.7 ft)
Draft: 2.74 m (9.0 ft) [3]
Propulsion: none
Complement: none
Notes: Career and characteristics data from “ANMM” website, [4] unless noted otherwise.

Commonwealth Lightship 4 (CLS4) Carpentaria is a lightship that was in service from 1917 to 1985 with the Commonwealth Lighthouse Service, [note 1] built at the Cockatoo Island Dockyard and commissioned in 1917. The vessel is named after the Gulf of Carpentaria, where it spent most of its service life together with its sister ship CLS2 (also named Carpentaria). [4] [5] [3]

Lightvessel ship that acts as a lighthouse in waters that are too deep or otherwise unsuitable for lighthouse construction

A lightvessel, or lightship, is a ship that acts as a lighthouse. They are used in waters that are too deep or otherwise unsuitable for lighthouse construction. Although some records exist of fire beacons being placed on ships in Roman times, the first modern lightvessel was off the Nore sandbank at the mouth of the River Thames in England, placed there by its inventor Robert Hamblin in 1734. The type has become largely obsolete; lighthouses replaced some stations as the construction techniques for lighthouses advanced, while large, automated buoys replaced others.

Cockatoo Island Dockyard Australian dockyard

The Cockatoo Island Dockyard was a major dockyard in Sydney, Australia, based on Cockatoo Island. The dockyard was established in 1857 to maintain Royal Navy warships. It later built and repaired military and civilian ships, and played a key role in sustaining the Royal Australian Navy. The dockyard was closed in 1991, and its remnants are heritage listed as the Cockatoo Island Industrial Conservation Area.

Gulf of Carpentaria A large, shallow sea enclosed on three sides by northern Australia and bounded on the north by the Arafura Sea

The Gulf of Carpentaria is a large, shallow sea enclosed on three sides by northern Australia and bounded on the north by the Arafura Sea. The northern boundary is generally defined as a line from Slade Point, Queensland in the northeast, to Cape Arnhem, Northern Territory in the west.

Contents

Design

CLS4 Carpentaria is one of four identical lightships designed in 1915 by the Scottish firm D & C Stevenson of Edinburgh and built in 1916-17 at the Cockatoo Island Dockyard in Sydney, Australia; they were designated CLS1 to CLS4. The design is optimised for operating unmanned anchored at a stationary position on station offshore for prolonged periods of time, away from port. [4] [3]

Edinburgh Capital city in Scotland

Edinburgh is the capital and second-largest city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian, it is located in Lothian on the Firth of Forth's southern shore.

Sydney Metropolis in Australia

Sydney is the state capital of New South Wales and the most populous city in Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Port Jackson and extends about 70 km (43.5 mi) on its periphery towards the Blue Mountains to the west, Hawkesbury to the north, the Royal National Park to the south and Macarthur to the south-west. Sydney is made up of 658 suburbs, 40 local government areas and 15 contiguous regions. Residents of the city are known as "Sydneysiders". As of June 2017, Sydney's estimated metropolitan population was 5,230,330 and is home to approximately 65% of the state's population.

Australia Country in Oceania

Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country by total area. The neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, and East Timor to the north; the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to the north-east; and New Zealand to the south-east. The population of 25 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Australia's capital is Canberra, and its largest city is Sydney. The country's other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.

Carpentaria has a riveted steel hull and no superstructure, with a single mast amidships mounting the beacon lantern atop. Being a stationary vessel, she has no installed propulsion engines her and has to be towed to change position or return to port. [4] [3] In 1950, CLS4 was equipped with a diesel engine to power an anchor windlass; it was protected by a steel deckhouse added at that moment. [2]

Windlass apparatus for moving heavy weights, consisting of a horizontal cylinder (barrel) rotated by the turn of a crank or belt; a winch is affixed to one end, and a cable is wound around the winch, pulling a weight attached to the opposite end

The windlass is an apparatus for moving heavy weights. Typically, a windlass consists of a horizontal cylinder (barrel), which is rotated by the turn of a crank or belt. A winch is affixed to one or both ends, and a cable or rope is wound around the winch, pulling a weight attached to the opposite end. The oldest depiction of a windlass for raising water can be found in the Book of Agriculture published in 1313 by the Chinese official Wang Zhen of the Yuan Dynasty . The Greek scientist Archimedes was the inventor of the windlass.

Carpentaria's lantern was powered by acetylene gas, of which she carried a 6-month supply in 4 tanks; the gas flow was controlled by a valve which would regulate the flashes of the light according to the code assigned to the station. The gas would shut down during daylight; the beacon light could be seen from 10 nautical miles away. She also carried a bell activated by the rolling motion, so it could be heard on low visibility conditions. [4] [3] [2] [5]

Acetylene chemical compound

Acetylene (systematic name: ethyne) is the chemical compound with the formula C2H2. It is a hydrocarbon and the simplest alkyne. This colorless gas is widely used as a fuel and a chemical building block. It is unstable in its pure form and thus is usually handled as a solution. Pure acetylene is odorless, but commercial grades usually have a marked odor due to impurities.

Bell Percussion instrument

A bell is a directly struck idiophone percussion instrument. Most bells have the shape of a hollow cup that when struck vibrates in a single strong strike tone, with its sides forming an efficient resonator. The strike may be made by an internal "clapper" or "uvula", an external hammer, or—in small bells—by a small loose sphere enclosed within the body of the bell.

History

CLS4 Carpentaria was built at the Cockatoo Island Dockyard; launched in 1917, she was put in service that year, together with her sister ship CLS2, in the Gulf of Carpentaria. They would alternate between being on station and in port for maintenance. [4] [3] [2] [5]

Later in their career, Carpentaria was assigned as traffic separator in the Bass Strait, where they narrowly avoided being hit by container ships. [4]

Bass Strait Sea strait between the Australian mainland and Tasmania

Bass Strait is a sea strait separating Tasmania from the Australian mainland, specifically the state of Victoria.

In 1985, both Carpentaria ships were decommissioned; later they were destined for preservation: CLS2 was given to the Queensland Maritime Museum in Brisbane, QLD, while CLS4 went to the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney, NSW. [4] [3]

As of late 2016, CLS4 Carpentaria is still part of the collection of the ANMM and is on display at the museum’s wharves in Darling Harbour. [4]

Footnotes

  1. ↑ The function of the Commonwealth Lighthouse Service was later performed by the Federal Department of Transport.

See also

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References

Notes

  1. ↑ Harbour lights and Markers - Lightship CLS-4 Carpentaria (accessed 2017-01-10)
  2. 1 2 3 4 "Google Arts & Culture – Commonwealth lightship CARPENTARIA (CLS4) 1917". Google Arts & Culture. Google Cultural Institute. Retrieved 2017-01-10.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Carpentaria Light Ship". Queensland Maritime Museum – Collections – Vessels. Brisbane, Australia: Queensland Maritime Museum. 2014. Retrieved 2017-01-10.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "Carpentaria An unmanned lightship". Australian National Maritime Museum – What’s on – Vessels. Sydney, Australia: Australian National Maritime Museum. 2013. Retrieved 2017-01-10.
  5. 1 2 3 Malcolm Wells (30 December 2013). "Light Ship Carpentaria". ABC OPEN – Explore – Object Stories. Brisbane, Australia: Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 2017-01-10.

Bibliography

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Further reading

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