The British ships rolled at anchor, sent out picket boats and waited for orders from London.

Unsinkable slowed and stopped, hundreds of brilliant white flares swayed eerily down from the black, the air raid sirens ashore rose in a keening shriek, the anti-aircraft guns coughed and chattered -- and above it all motors roared and the bombs came whispering and wailing and crashing down among the ships at anchor at Bari.

Poet nodded, swung below and a moment later emerged from the forward hatch where he picked up the anchor.

An anchor is a device, normally made of metal, that is used to connect a vessel to the bed of a body of water to prevent the vessel from drifting due to wind or current.

This is linked to the term to weigh anchor, meaning to lift the anchor from the sea bed, allowing the ship or boat to move.

Since one fluke always protrudes up from the set anchor, there is a great tendency of the rode to foul the anchor as the vessel swings due to wind or current shifts.

Once the anchor is hauled up to the hawsepipe, the ring end is hoisted up to the end of a timber projecting from the bow known as the cathead.

Before dropping the anchor, the fishing process is reversed, and the anchor is dropped from the end of the cathead.

It is not unknown for the anchor to foul on its own rode, or to foul the tines with refuse from the bottom, preventing it from digging in.

On the other hand, it is quite possible for this anchor to find such a good hook that, without a trip line from the crown, it is impossible to retrieve.

This claw-shaped anchor was designed by Peter Bruce from the Isle of Man in the 1970s.

The depth of water is necessary for determining scope, which is the ratio of length of cable to the depth measured from the highest point ( usually the anchor roller or bow chock ) to the seabed.

The location to drop the anchor should be approached from down wind or down current, whichever is stronger.

Then, taking in on the first cable as the boat is motored into the wind and letting slack while drifting back, a second anchor is set approximately a half-scope away from the first on a line perpendicular to the wind.

When a vessel is in a narrow channel or on a lee shore so that there is no room to tack the vessel in a conventional manner an anchor attached to the lee quarter may be dropped from the lee bow.

The Mariner's Cross is also referred to as St. Clement's Cross, in reference to the way this saint was martyred ( being tied to an anchor and thrown from a boat into the Black Sea in 102 ).

Roots anchor it to the ground, gather water and mineral nutrients from the soil, and produce hormones.

By 16: 00, Alexander and Swiftsure were also in sight, although some distance from the main British fleet, and Brueys gave orders to abandon the plan to remain at anchor and instead for his line to set sails, although Blanquet protested the order on the grounds that there were not enough men aboard the French ships to both sail the ships and man the guns.

Both ships were soon fighting enemies much more powerful than themselves and began to take severe damage: Captain Henry Darby on Bellerophon missed his intended anchor near Franklin and instead found his ship underneath the main battery of the French flagship, while Captain George Blagdon Westcott on Majestic also missed his station and almost collided with Heureux, coming under heavy fire from Tonnant.

Likewise the French ships Tonnant, Heureux and Mercure all cut their anchor cables and drifted southwards away from the blazing ship.

Nelson, who on surveying the bay on the morning of 2 August said " Victory is not a name strong enough for such a scene ", remained at anchor in Aboukir Bay for the next two weeks, preoccupied with recovering from his wound, writing dispatches and assessing the military situation in Egypt using documents captured on board one of the prizes.

Since all anchors that embed themselves in the bottom require the strain to be along the seabed, anchors can be broken out of the bottom by shortening the rode until the vessel is directly above the anchor ( at this point the anchor chain is " up and down " in naval parlance ).

An anchor frequently appears on the flags and coats of arms of institutions involved with the sea, both naval and commercial, as well as of port cities and seacoast regions and provinces in various countries.

He instructed his naval commander, Vice-Admiral François-Paul Brueys D ' Aigalliers, to anchor in Alexandria harbour, but naval surveyors reported that the channel into the harbour was too shallow and narrow for the larger ships of the French fleet.

The International Maritime Bureau reports offshore waters in the Gulf of Aden are high risk for piracy ; numerous vessels, including commercial shipping and pleasure craft, have been attacked and hijacked both at anchor and while underway ; crew, passengers, and cargo are held for ransom ; the presence of several naval task forces in the Gulf of Aden and additional anti-piracy measures on the part of ship operators reduced the incidence of piracy in that body of water by more than half in 2010.

The pronounced inferiority of the Dutch fleet, and its state of " unreadiness " was a frequently reiterated excuse for the Dutch naval commanders, especially vice-admiral Andries Hartsinck, who commanded the Texel squadron, to keep the fleet at anchor, thereby ceding dominance of the North Sea to the blockading British fleet.

It is notable for being the last major naval battle in history to be fought entirely with sailing ships, although most ships fought at anchor.

The municipal coat of arms depicts a rooster from which the name Haninge is believed to have been derived ( the Swedish word hane means rooster ), while the anchor symbolizes the naval base in the municipality.

A large anchor from the " USS Blakeley ( DD-150 )" Destroyer memorializing this naval hero of the War of 1812 for whom the Borough of Blakely is named .< ref > Science Fiction Club.

A monument on Lyle Hill in Greenock, in western Scotland, in the shape of the Cross of Lorraine combined with an anchor, was raised by subscription as a memorial to the Free French naval vessels that sailed from the Firth of Clyde to take part in the Battle of the Atlantic.

U. S. naval forces including carriers in the distance at anchor in Ulithi March 1945

There were also two battles fought nearby: the first was a land battle in 1558 resulting in a victory by Spanish forces of Lamoral, Count of Egmont over the French under Marshal Paul des Thermes, while the second was a naval attack using fire ships in 1588 launched by England's Royal Navy under Lord Howard against the Spanish Armada at anchor.

That night, two cars drove in darkness across the Causeway to the naval base in Singapore, where the ' Alert ' was at anchor, and went onboard.

Next day, June 26, the French naval dispatch steamer Kienchang was also riding anchor outside the strait, when rebel Japanese artillery atop the bluffs surrounding Shimonoseki opened fire on her.

On May 16, the naval squadron reached Nagasaki Bay and a week later lowered anchor near the mouth of the Han.

The naval ensign ( used by coast guard vessels ) is an unusual design consisting of red, white, and blue vertical stripes of unequal widths defaced by a central anchor / key emblem.

Cruise line and naval ships drop anchor in any of the three berths at Port Klang Cruise Centre, which was under the management of Star Cruises before being taken over by the Glenn Marine Group.

A British naval task force attacked the French fleet, which was at anchor and not expecting an assault from Britain, France's presumed ally.

The original variant was topped by a silver imperial eagle with a loop through which the suspension ring passed, all other variants were and are topped by a device composed of a breastplate superimposed over crossed cannons, a naval anchor, sabres, swords and battle axes, to which the suspension ring passes through a loop for attachment to a ribbon.

The anchor denotes naval service, and the wreath represents strength ( oak ) and victory ( laurel ).

On the announcement of the United States naval officer, who boarded the Brooklyn as she came to anchor, that the emigrants " were in the United States of America ," three hearty cheers were given in reply.

* an anchor for naval forces.

Months before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Japan's naval ministry registered a fallacious protest with Ambassador Grew in Tokyo: " On the night of July 31, 1941, Japanese fleet units at anchor in Sukumo Bay picked up the sound of propellers approaching Bungo Channel from the eastward.