PORT MORESBY - 10th Waypoint

 

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Port Moresby is the capital and largest city of Papua New Guinea (PBG) and the largest city in the South Pacific outside of Australia and New Zealand. It is located on the shores of the Gulf of Papua, on the south-western coast of the Papuan Peninsula of the island of New Guinea. The city emerged as a trade centre in the second half of the 19th century.

 

There was already an important trade centre on the site of Port Moresby when the English Captain John Moresby of HMS Basilisk first visited it. He sailed through the Coral Sea at the eastern end of New Guinea, saw three previously unknown islands, and landed there. On 20 February 1873, he claimed the land for Britain and named it after his father, Admiral Sir Fairfax Moresby.

In September 1975, Papua New Guinea became an independent country with Port Moresby as its capital city. Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, represented the Queen of Papua New Guinea at the celebrations.

During World War II PNG was a prime objective for conquest by the Imperial Japanese forces during 1942–43 as a staging point and air base to cut off Australia from Southeast Asia and the Americas.

 

 

 

 

 

In 2000 Port Moresby had a population of 254,158. As of 2011 it had a population of 364,145. The place where the city was founded has been inhabited by the Motu-Koitabu people for centuries. Port Moresby hosted the APEC summit in November 2018 despite concerns about security.

 

Papua New Guinea is rich in natural resources, which account for two thirds of their export earnings. In recent years Port Moresby has been economically booming. There has been substantial building of housing, office towers, shopping malls and commercial establishments over much of it  raising their carbon footprint. The waterfront area has been completely redeveloped with apartments, restaurants and shopping centers.

Most of the people still live in strong traditional social groups based on farming. Papua New Guinea is one of the most culturally diverse countries in the world. It is also one of the most rural, as only 18 per cent of its people live in urban centres. There are 852 known languages in the country, of which 12 now have no known living speakers

Papua New Guinea is a full member of the Pacific Islands Forum (formerly South Pacific Forum) and the Commonwealth of Nations.

 

 

Our Trustees believe that it might be useful to anyone interested in progressing low carbon transport, for us to plan a route for the Elizabeth Swan, such that if it is deemed a worthy cause in the battle to tackle climate change, that we have a plan in place to demonstrate that clean ocean transport is not as far away as one might imagine, should the political will crystallize to accelerate sustainable technology after COP 24 in December 2018.

 

If the Foundation were to support the initiation of such a challenge, it would be in a dual format, also being designed as  an ocean awareness event to attract a global audience to gain the highest potential media coverage.

 

 

 

 

Hence this is a theoretical exercise to determine what might be possible in the world of cargo and passenger transport if future ships were to use a power formula derived from the Elizabeth Swan and SeaVax platforms, to increase voyage speed for zero carbon shipping such as to be commercially viable and non polluting.

 

 

 

10TH LEG - The tenth leg of this zero carbon voyage is approximately 340 nautical miles from Port Moresby to Thursday Island, Cape York. At a cruising speed of 7 knots this leg of the ocean awareness campaign would take 2 days to complete. At 6 knots the journey would take 2.5 days.

 

 

The following then is a contingency plan to be ready should the Foundation or any Government, Organization, ocean literacy associate or collaborative research partner decide (jointly) that we are in a suitably robust position to mount such a challenge to be worthwhile in awareness terms, including advancing climate control knowledge.

 

The above does not preclude the possibility of  responsible commercial associates enjoining - being a most welcome prospect, perhaps when the Foundation is further along the R&D line and any proposed circumnavigation presents less of a technical risk share to potential contributors and end users, such as ship builders and fleet operators. Such partnerships might accelerate project development considerably.

 

 

 

 

OCEAN AWARENESS - PROVISIONING & MEDIA STOPS

 

We are making allowance for nineteen (19) provisioning and Public Relations stops of three days duration each. This adds an extra 57 days to the expedition in the interests of furthering awareness objectives. Hence, the passage would not be an outright race, unless any consortium providing financial incentives decided not to stop for photo opportunities by way of a condition in accepting support. If a race was decided on, provisions for a 3-4 person crew would need to be stored on board. Being solar and wind powered there is no need for conventional refueling.

 

 

 

RECORD HOLDER - On the 4th of May 2012, history was made, as Raphael Domjan, at the helm of a giant of a catamaran powered only by solar panels crossed the finishing line at Monaco to become the first electric boat to sail around the world. MS Tūranor PlanetSolar, known under the project name PlanetSolar, was (@ 2018) the largest solar-powered boat in the world. The vessel was launched on the 31st March 2010, also going into the Guinness Book of World Records with a time of 584 days to better by any contender. The project was mostly financed by Immo Stroeher, the owner of the boat. Though a magnificent endeavour, PlanetSolar was not designed at the outset to take full advantage of energy from nature, but was rather a very much modified ferry design.

 

 

 

FOSSIL FUELS - The Cable and Wireless Adventurer was built for the purpose of circumnavigating the world in less than 80 days. This was successfully accomplished in July 1998 in 74 days, 20 hours, 58 minutes, traveling more than 22,600 nautical miles (26,000 miles or 41,855 km). This achievement set a new Guinness World Record for a diesel powered vessel. The nautical mile or knot, is a unit of speed equal to approximately 1.15078 miles per hour on land (1.852 km). Solar power cannot compete with diesel engines. This boat is though one of the links in the evolution, or archaeology of efficient hulls.

 

 

CIRCUMNAVIGATION MILESTONE EXPEDITION ESTIMATES

 

LEG

NAUTICAL MILES

TIME IN PORT

WAYPOINT

SUNSHINE DAYS

-

-

-

-

-

START

-

-

Monaco

0.00

1

784

2

Gibraltar

4.67

2

729

2

Tenerife, Canary Islands

4.34

3

3,154

2

Trinidad, Port of Spain

18.77

4

1,182

2

Panama City

7.04

5

970

2

Galapagos

5.77

6

3,640

2

Tahiti

21.67

7

1,423

2

Tonga, Nukualofa

8.47

8

410

2

Fiji, Suva

2.44

9

1,886

2

Port Moresby PNG

11.23

10

340

2

Thursday Island, Cape York

2.02

11

724

2

Darwin

4.31

12

1,572

2

Jakarta, Indonesia

9.36

13

1,881

2

Colombo, Sri Lanka

11.20

14

2,109

2

Aden, Yemen

12.55

15

698

2

Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

4.15

16

670

2

Port Said, Egypt

3.99

17

1,111

2

Palermo, Sicily

6.61

18

170

2

Naples, Italy

1.01

19

393

FINISH

Monaco

2.34

-

-

-

-

-

-

23,846

36

RUNTIME DAYS @ 7kts

141.94

-

-

-

-

-

+ 10% service

= 156.13 Days

-

7 KNOTS AVE INC PORT & %

192.13

-& maintenance

-

-

AT 6 KNOTS AVE

224.16

 -

-

-

AT 5 KNOTS AVE

268.99

 

CLIMATE CHANGE CHALLENGE - The above table illustrates one of the most likely ocean awareness expedition routes, known as the 'Sunshine Route,' showing the time elapsed in days for 7 knots average cruising speed, including times for 5 and 6 knot averages - allowing for 10% downtime and 36 days in ports. Hence, although the objective is to reduce the current solar circumnavigation record from 584 days, the event in not an outright non-stop yacht competition in the offshore racing sense. It remains to be seen how accurate such a prediction might be. In this table we only allowed 36 days for provisioning and PR but added a 10% contingency for servicing, that could be used for additional time in ports. As a Climate Changing event, performance is one of the main criteria, especially concerning the possibilities for a transition to low carbon shipping and the contribution this might make in combating global warming.

 

 

USE THE LINKS ABOVE TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THE PROPOSED WORLD ROUTE WAYPOINTS

 

 

 

 

 

 

BOC Challenge British Oxygen Company sailing yachts Clipper round the world yacht race Global Challenge steel formular yacht race round the world Golden Globe

 

Velux ocean 5 sailing yacht race Vendee Globe Volvo ocean race Whitbread round the world yacht race

 

 

LINKS & REFERENCE

 

https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/voyage-planner

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papua_New_Guinea

https://www.planetsolar.org/

http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/first-circumnavigation-by-solar-powered-boat

 

 

 This website is provided on a free basis as a public information service. Copyright © Cleaner Oceans Foundation Ltd (COFL) (Company No: 4674774) 2019. Solar Studios, BN271RF, United Kingdom. COFL is a charity without share capital.

 

 

 

 

OCEAN AWARENESS CIRCUMNAVIGATION WORLD RECORDS EXPEDITION