Hankering to go down under? Sell A Boat
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Got a few thousand bucks to spare?
For the price of a luxury car or a fraction of the cost of a house or condominium, you could buy a submarine to park in your driveway or hang your hat in.
But if you want to take it out for a spin, well, you might need to invest a bit more.
The Canadian navy's four mothballed Oberon-class subs, tied up just north of the Angus L. Macdonald Bridge on the Dartmouth side of Halifax Harbour, should be up for bids by summer or fall.
"We are anxious to get rid of them," Defence Department disposal co-ordinator Pat MacDonald said from Ottawa on Tuesday. "We have been for some time."
HMCS Onondaga was the last of the subs to be taken out of service in 2000. That boat and its sisters Ojibwa and Okanagan were all acquired between 1965 and '68. Olympus, which was only used for training in the harbour, was purchased later as a used vessel.
Retired submariner Buster Brown, who served on Okanagan, writes on the Submariners Association of Canada web page that the three working vessels were dubbed Go-Boat, No-Boat and Show-Boat.
Okanagan once bumped into a British ship during underwater exercises, but the same sub also helped recover the black box after the 1998 Swissair plane crash.
Mr. MacDonald said it's unlikely the subs will be put back to use. He estimated they might fetch $50,000 to $60,000 each as scrap metal - well below the base price for a Hummer sport utility vehicle.
"It's not really our intention to sell them for reuse because then you get into all kinds of things like whose hands they may fall into," he said. "For security reasons we really don't want them to leave the country in the first place."
Used Victoria-class subs bought from the Royal Navy in 1998 are replacing the old boats.
Very little maintenance has been done on the old subs since they were taken out of service. Mr. MacDonald said it would take a major effort to make them seaworthy again.
Ideally, the navy would like the subs used as museums or for historical displays. But most have deteriorated even beyond that point, Mr. MacDonald said.
"There's really only one of the four, Onondaga, that might be considered a candidate for preservation. The other three are not really in the best of shape."
Last spring the navy had an agreement to sell Olympus to a historical group in Barrow in Furness, England, where the subs were made. It was to be towed across the Atlantic and made into a land-based exhibit at a centre celebrating the town's sub-making history. But the deal fell through.
www.UsedBoatsForSale.Com
"The hull is not really in very good shape," Mr. MacDonald said.
In 2003, Brian Warshick, then a Halifax regional councillor, suggested the city buy one of the subs for a waterfront display. The idea was torpedoed when estimates pegged the cost of lifting a sub out of the water at $2 million.
The Okanagan has already been transferred to Crown Asset Distribution, Mr. MacDonald said. The others should go to the federal agency in the coming months.
"There's a bit of work that's still being done on the subs. There are a few items being taken off that can be used, oddly enough, on the Victoria-class subs. That's taking a bit of time."
He said there was also some discussion of sinking the subs for use as artificial reefs, the way some other navy ships are. That idea was scuttled.
Navy spokeswoman Lieut. Sue Stefko said plans to dispose of the destroyers Gatineau and Terra Nova, decommissioned in 1996 and '97 respectively, are proceeding more slowly.
She said any offers will be considered, but officials would like the ships preserved.
"Hopefully what will happen with these is that someone will take them and either restore them or do something so that they will be used and enjoyed by Canadians."
The ships each had almost 40 years' service.
Terra Nova saw duty in the Persian Gulf War more than a decade ago.
www.Boathoo.Com
Got a few thousand bucks to spare?
For the price of a luxury car or a fraction of the cost of a house or condominium, you could buy a submarine to park in your driveway or hang your hat in.
But if you want to take it out for a spin, well, you might need to invest a bit more.
The Canadian navy's four mothballed Oberon-class subs, tied up just north of the Angus L. Macdonald Bridge on the Dartmouth side of Halifax Harbour, should be up for bids by summer or fall.
"We are anxious to get rid of them," Defence Department disposal co-ordinator Pat MacDonald said from Ottawa on Tuesday. "We have been for some time."
HMCS Onondaga was the last of the subs to be taken out of service in 2000. That boat and its sisters Ojibwa and Okanagan were all acquired between 1965 and '68. Olympus, which was only used for training in the harbour, was purchased later as a used vessel.
Retired submariner Buster Brown, who served on Okanagan, writes on the Submariners Association of Canada web page that the three working vessels were dubbed Go-Boat, No-Boat and Show-Boat.
Okanagan once bumped into a British ship during underwater exercises, but the same sub also helped recover the black box after the 1998 Swissair plane crash.
Mr. MacDonald said it's unlikely the subs will be put back to use. He estimated they might fetch $50,000 to $60,000 each as scrap metal - well below the base price for a Hummer sport utility vehicle.
"It's not really our intention to sell them for reuse because then you get into all kinds of things like whose hands they may fall into," he said. "For security reasons we really don't want them to leave the country in the first place."
Used Victoria-class subs bought from the Royal Navy in 1998 are replacing the old boats.
Very little maintenance has been done on the old subs since they were taken out of service. Mr. MacDonald said it would take a major effort to make them seaworthy again.
Ideally, the navy would like the subs used as museums or for historical displays. But most have deteriorated even beyond that point, Mr. MacDonald said.
"There's really only one of the four, Onondaga, that might be considered a candidate for preservation. The other three are not really in the best of shape."
Last spring the navy had an agreement to sell Olympus to a historical group in Barrow in Furness, England, where the subs were made. It was to be towed across the Atlantic and made into a land-based exhibit at a centre celebrating the town's sub-making history. But the deal fell through.
www.UsedBoatsForSale.Com
"The hull is not really in very good shape," Mr. MacDonald said.
In 2003, Brian Warshick, then a Halifax regional councillor, suggested the city buy one of the subs for a waterfront display. The idea was torpedoed when estimates pegged the cost of lifting a sub out of the water at $2 million.
The Okanagan has already been transferred to Crown Asset Distribution, Mr. MacDonald said. The others should go to the federal agency in the coming months.
"There's a bit of work that's still being done on the subs. There are a few items being taken off that can be used, oddly enough, on the Victoria-class subs. That's taking a bit of time."
He said there was also some discussion of sinking the subs for use as artificial reefs, the way some other navy ships are. That idea was scuttled.
Navy spokeswoman Lieut. Sue Stefko said plans to dispose of the destroyers Gatineau and Terra Nova, decommissioned in 1996 and '97 respectively, are proceeding more slowly.
She said any offers will be considered, but officials would like the ships preserved.
"Hopefully what will happen with these is that someone will take them and either restore them or do something so that they will be used and enjoyed by Canadians."
The ships each had almost 40 years' service.
Terra Nova saw duty in the Persian Gulf War more than a decade ago.
www.Boathoo.Com
posted by SellABoat.Com @ 5:11 PM
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