Nippon Maru is permanently docked

It is a familiar sight: a museum ship that will never set sail again; in England, the Cutty Sark; in the Netherlands, the Amsterdam; and in Sweden, the Vasa. But Japan, too, has a source of nautical pride: the Nippon Maru.

The debate over whether to keep a ship permanently moored or to return it to the sea will likely never end. In Japan, all the sails of the Nippon Maru are unfurled once a month.

The vessel was built in 1930 at Kawasaki Dockyard in Kobe. About 97 meters long, it has four masts, including a mainmast rising some 46 meters above the water.
At a time when small fishing boats and private vessels were being used for navigation training at public merchant marine schools, the Nippon Maru played an important role in training sailors as a large training ship equipped with a diesel engine. By the time it was retired in 1984, the vessel had sailed one million miless,the equivalent of circling the globe about 45 times, trained 11,500 sailors.

Its outer hull was built by joining steel plates with rivets, and even today 70% of the original steel remains. Compared with the smooth hulls of modern welded ships, it can look patched together, but it also incorporated safety measures that anticipated international treaty standards, including a compartmentalized double bottom.
With wind filling its white sails and its gleaming white hull crossing the ocean, it was known as the “white swan of the Pacific.” About 12 times a year, all 29 sails are unfurled in a full-sail display, recreating the ship’s appearance from its heyday.

At the beginning of World War II, her sailing rig was removed and she served as a training and postwar transport motorship. In 1952 her rig was reinstalled and she resumed her training voyages until she was replaced in September 1984 by her successor, also named Nippon Maru.

Nippon Maru measures 97 metres (318 ft) long, with a beam of 12.95 metres (42.5 ft) and a draft of 6.90 metres (22.6 ft) Her gross tonnage is 2,286.[2] She is rigged as a four-masted barque, with 32 sails covering 2,397 square metres (25,800 sq ft), and two 600-horsepower diesel engines for auxiliary functions. During her career as a training ship, she was manned by a crew of 27 officers, 48 seamen, and 120 trainees.

Bron: Mainichi
Image: Tallship.com