Tugboat Tour

In the early 1980’s I was a freelance shooter or “stringer” first for UPI and later for the Associated Press. Lacking hard-core experience as a photojournalist I had. to come up with most stories on my own. On occasion I would get paged to shoot a fire, a politician, or a grieving mother, but most of my shots they put out on the wire I researched and shot.

After repeated attempts to talk a fishing boat skipper into taking me out for half a day, I got the go-ahead from the captain of a tug in Boston harbor. In the 8 hours we spent motoring around the harbor the tug got only one call to assist a freighter enter the harbor. It was quite a show, with several tugs coordinating and communicating with coded “toots” from their whistles.

This deckhand maneuvered the massive “hawser” with great skill and strength. I believe this is the shot that ran as a “feature.”

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