The Ship Report

New Year's Eve Ship Horns in Astoria

Hear Astoria's visiting ships ring in 2026 with the sonorous sounds of their horns at midnight on New Year's Eve on the Columbia River.

How many ships will be off Astoria on NY's Eve? And, a look at the Dungness crab fishery

Tomorrow is New Year's Eve, and we'll hopefully hear some ship horns off the Astoria waterfront. Today, we'll also take a look at the Dungeness Crab Fishery, which kicked off in the local area this past weekend.

End of the year stuff: New Year's Eve ship horns, and - the Ship Report is now on Substack

I'm gearing up once more to record ship horns on the Astoria waterfront again this year, when the clock strikes midnight on New Year's Eve - an annual tradition I happily seek out.

I'll share the recording with you on January 5th, when the Ship Report returns for the New Year. We never know what it will like: how many ships will be there, how many will choose to participate. So it's always a surprise. Let's hope for good sounds and let's send our good wishes to the mariners on those ships for a good year for them as well as for all of us.

Also, the Ship Report is now on Substack, an easy place for you to go to see all that I create, and other info I share - whether it be podcasts, marine weather, ship schedules and more. Look for The Ship Report on Substack and you'll find my new page.

A new storm looms for the coast, and - Santa is saved by the US Coast Guard

Well, weather watchers are tracking an approaching storm that might (or might not) bring damaging winds to our area. We'll see how that shakes out.

And today we'll hear a Ship Report holiday tradition: "Coastal Christmas," a retelling of the story of The Night Before Christmas, coastal- style. It's a book written by Long Beach Peninsula author Lynette Rae McAdams, illustrated by local artist Sally Lackaff.

In this updated telling of the age-old tale: Santa is saved by the US Coast Guard after his sleigh ends up in the water, essentially saving Christmas. And Santa gets to head home to the North Pole with Dungeness Crab for Mrs. Santa.

Happy Christmas to all!

'T is the season, for Dungeness crab, that is

Today we'll talk about the opening at the end of this month of the 2025-26 Dungeness crab fishery in our local area. And hear an excerpt from a 2016 interview I did with a commercial crabber. His name is John Corbin, and he'll tell us a bit about the process of catching and harvesting Dungeness.

More weather as our next atmospheric river arrives today

The fire hose of rain is aimed south of us in Clatsop County this time, but meteorologists predict we are looking at about and inch and half  in Astoria, and 3 inches or more Tillamook and points south.

The big deal right now is a matter of time, rain and its long term effect on soils. It’s been raining for awhile now and we are seeing the effects of saturated soils on trees, roadbeds and power lines. I read an interesting piece about how the more soaked the ground gets, the less wind it takes to know down a tree. And we are seeing older roadbeds collapse and landslides claim land and dover roads. So be careful out there – things in the landscape may not be the way you last saw them when you next venture out.

Today, a real look at how weather can affect ship traffic

We've got some rowdy weather on the Columbia River Bar today and it may cause ships to be delayed until the weather's better. We'll take a look at how that sort of thing works and what you can expect.

Another round of atmospheric river conditions kicks in Tuesday

We seem to be in an atmospheric river phase at the moment: we'll talk about what to expect today from a maritime perspective.

Another atmospheric river today - let's look at what's next

We'll be looking at more atmospheric river activity this week. We'll take a look at what to expect. The short answer: with already saturated soils in our region, be prepared for power outages, landslides and downed trees. We'll also take a look at today's ship schedule.

A look at crazy rainfall totals from our atmospheric river, and what's next...

Today we'll take a look at some really crazy rainfall totals from this week's storm, and a look at what's next as next week unfolds. The short answer: more rain.