HMCS Cormorant has now gone …

After 20 years, the former Canadian navy ship HNCS Cormorant has finally departed Bridgewater.

The vessel built in Cantiere Navale Apuania, Marine-Carrara in Italy, as a stern factory trawler was initially named Aspa Quarto. She was laid down on 8 December 1963 and launched 11 April 1965 and completed on 15 June 1965.

She was purchased in July 1975 and taken to Davie Shipbuilding at Lauzon, Quebec where the ship underwent conversion to a diving support vessel. After this refit, the ship was renamed HMCS Cormorant and commissioned into RCN Maritime Command on 10 November 1978, becoming the second Canadian naval unit to bear this name.

In naval service, between 23 August and 5 October 1989, HMCS Cormorant contributed to defence research as part of Operation Norploy 89, which took place in the Arctic region of Canada, mainly in Baffin Bay, Lancaster Sound and the Davis Strait. Using the submersible SDL-1 deployed from HMCS Cormorant, the sunken vessel Breadalbane was discovered, a ship not seen since its sinking in 1853. The Cormorant was also an integral part of the November 1994 expedition to recover the ship's bell from the wreck of SS Edmund Fitzgerald in Lake Superior.

She was decommissioned on 2 July 1997 and sold to United States owners for diving operations. The ship underwent conversion to an offshore support vessel in 1998 and later in 2000 was docked in Bridgewater, Nova Scotia. In March 2015, due to the amount of ice on deck, the ship developed a severe list and partially sank.

For the locals, the ship has been a constant eyesore while docked in the Port of Bridgewater. Many legal battles have occurred over the vessel, between the Port of Bridgewater, a Texas based company and the Federal Government about who actually has ownership of the former navy ship and who should pay for clean-up from oil leakages.

In 2019 a risk assessment was prepared stating that the ship was now an imminent threat of pollution with an estimate of 6500 litres of oil and 8500 litres of oil-contaminated water in machinery spaces, bilges and other compartments.

Finally, under The Wrecked, Abandoned or Hazardous Vessels Act, it was planned that the former HMCS Cormorant would be removed from the Port of Bridgewater, at a cost to the tax-payers of between $1.8 and $2.4 million.

The removal was today, I got to view the ship as she left the LaHave River estuary on its way to Sheet Harbour on Nova Scotia’s Eastern Shore, to be broken up for recycle at R.J. MacIsaac Construction Ltd.

I know for the folks of Bridgewater and the South Shore, the HMCS Cormorant was something that was ugly and very much an offensive nightmare to their town and region, but as I watched the ship go by me this afternoon under tow from two tugs, I was filled with sadness for the ship, she looked tired, extremely neglected and definitely derelict, while on her way to an appointment with the executioner.

Update from March 2021 ~

The photo below is of HMCS Cormorant at berth in Sheet Harbour on Nova Scotia’s Eastern Shore. It appears the process of breaking the ship up has begun ~ Canadian tax dollars at work …!!!