major_clanger | Something to try the new iPhone camera out on!

Via a Metafilter link I was having a play last night with this page, which uses the AIS ship tracking system to show a zoomable plot of shipping for various regions of the world. The UK plot showed a fair few vessels on the Thames, and zooming in I found that sure enough it was tracking the ferries and tourist boats, all of which are evidently AIS-equipped. However, it was also showing a large passenger vessel moored in the middle of Docklands, which I was a little more sceptical about.

This morning, and I am walking with

cairmen (who is staying over for the weekend) through Canary Wharf. As we cross the South Dock footbridge, I look over the dock, and sure enough AIS was right!

It's the MV Logos Hope - not actually a passenger ship as such, but rather a floating mission. And she wasn't alone; as you can see, just further along the dock was another vessel, which hadn't been showing up on AIS; this turned out to be HMAS Sydney, visiting London for the weekend. (Incidentally, I now see that the Logos Hope isn't showing up either - perhaps her AIS has been turned off whilst she's moored.)

I said yesterday that the camera in the iPhone 3GS seemed a lot better than the one in the previous models. Well, these photos were taken with it and there's just no comparison with the glorified webcam that the older iPhone was equipped with.

However, I'll probably go back anyway with my decent camera. If someone's going to plonk some nice big boats in the middle of Docklands it seems a shame to waste the opportunity for some pictures.