USS Freedom : The coolest thing you'll see today

[Etienne]

USS Freedom just passed us going down the St-Lawrence river. Doing 39 kts to our 13... I still managed to get some pictures. I'll post them in a minute; they're downloading right now.

That thing is awesome. Seriously, just watching it go by, everybody got excited... She was doing 48 kts on Lake Erie the other day; the pilots say they saw her at 50+ on Lac St-Pierre earlier.

The wake on that thing is enough to rock the boat I'm on. We're displacing 35 thousand tons or so right now. Container ships don't usually rock us.

[FIREWALL]

Hi That must have been a site.

[Etienne]

Here she is, five miles or so away. We had her at 38.9 kts on the AIS:



Approaching



This makes me wanna sing the theme to Team America. Or soil my pants. Notice the exhaust plume.





Here we go with the PURE AWESOME

[Task Force]

Thats a nice looking ship. Fast too, must have been a big wake.

[Etienne]

Some close ups:





I think these are some sort of exhaust ports. There are two on the starboard side, I didn't see the port side very well.





Superstructure:







Is that some sort of drop bay on the stern? Or float-free whatchamacallit, like Landing Ships have? What's the big plate on the stern?

[Etienne]

Originally Posted by Task Force

Thats a nice looking ship. Fast too, must have been a big wake.

Ah, yeah... Check this out.



It's hard to see in that picture, but she actually rocked us.

And then another, smaller boat started calling for them to slow down (They would have been SWAMPED) so she went down to 12 kts in like... 200 meters. Seriously, she just died.





And here she goes again. Like somebody threw a switch.

[jpm1]

Wow , nice shots

[Etienne]

And a last one :



Seriously, that thing looks awesome.

[FIREWALL]

Now THAT would be fun to drive, or better yet water ski behind. :p :rotfl: :rotfl:

[SteamWake]

Nice shots, is it just me or does she seem a bit down by the bow?

If she is doing 39+ knots in the bay, wonder what she is really capable of :hmm:

[Etienne]

Originally Posted by SteamWake

Nice shots, is it just me or does she seem a bit down by the bow?

If she is doing 39+ knots in the bay, wonder what she is really capable of :hmm:

Co-worker said she was showing 48 on the AIS the other night; the pilots says she went up to 50+ on Lac St-Pierre - Numbers like 60 and 70 are being bandied about, but we're just talking out of the wrong hole, really.

I'm betting 65.

[Task Force]

One fast ship, amasing how fast they can go. It would be one H*** of a speed boat.

[MothBalls]

Thanks for posting those great pics.

Q. How loud was it and what did it sound like?

[RickC Sniper]

GREAT pictures!

[Etienne]

Originally Posted by MothBalls

Thanks for posting those great pics.

Q. How loud was it and what did it sound like?

I didn't notice any noise, but then I was on a rather noisy boat about three cables away. I don't recall ever hearing the machinery noise of freighters going by, either.