Tuesday and Wednesday have been clear and cold in New York, with morning temperatures below freezing, but weather is coming, with warmer temperatures and rain arriving Thursday. Observed traffic has been lighter after the Monday rush, with some hopper traffic of note. Adeline Marie, who anchors frequently in the River but rarely seems to move cargo north, left her spot off 79th Street Tuesday night, loaded new cargo at the Buckeye Port Reading terminal, and was heading for New Haven by Wednesday evening.

Away from the North River, the big maritime news in the harbor was the large fire in an NYPD warehouse on the pier protecting the Erie Basin in Red Hook. The FDNY has two large fireboats who do not seem to get much action—the typical boat fires we see have been handled by the department’s medium size and small boats, with their greater speed and smaller draft. Pier fires used to be much more common in New York and the FDNY used to have an additional large fireboat based at the Battery, but Tuesday’s fire on a pier needing large volumes of water and approachable by a 9’ draft boat seems to have been exactly what these big boats are built for. Both the Three Forty Three boat based in Chelsea and the Fire Fighter II boat based in Stapleton were on the scene Tuesday. By Wednesday, there were no longer any Marine units showing up there on AIS. The barge port in the basin does not appear to have been impacted.

#FDNY Chief of Department John Hodgens provides an update from the scene of a 3-alarm fire at 700 Columbia Street in #Brooklyn. Read more: https://t.co/bfssnco8a1 pic.twitter.com/3PH9S0HZrT

— FDNY (@FDNY) December 13, 2022