Laying aloft to check the rig
New London — Lead deckhand Gray Meyer climbed aloft to check the rigging of the schooner Columbia on Tuesday at City Pier.
Columbia is a steel-hulled replica of the original Gloucester fishing schooner of the same name, which went down in heavy seas with all hands on Aug. 24, 1927, near Sable Island in the north Atlantic.
Columbia's rebirth was the dream of Brian D'Isernia of Eastern Shipbuilding of Panama City, Fla. The original Columbia was a 141-foot classic Gloucester fishing schooner built at the historic A.D. Story shipyard of Essex, Mass., and designed by the innovative William Starling Burgess as both a fishing schooner and to compete in the annual International Fisherman's Cup races between the fishing fleets of Gloucester, Mass., and Halifax, Nova Scotia.
The 21st century Columbia is laying over in New London between late-summer charters.
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