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I've recently been on Rügen and I have seen this:

enter image description here

Does anybody have an idea what this is?

(To give Google a chance: A ship with four "towers" made out of steel on it. They looks a bit like high-voltage electrical towers.)

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    $\begingroup$ It looks like a ship that's transporting travelling cranes, possibly for use in a port somewhere. $\endgroup$
    – Dave Tweed
    Sep 8, 2016 at 11:18
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    $\begingroup$ Those things don't look like electrical towers at all. $\endgroup$ Sep 8, 2016 at 12:20
  • $\begingroup$ @OlinLathrop view.stern.de/de/picture/2358696/… $\endgroup$ Sep 8, 2016 at 12:40
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    $\begingroup$ My guess is that those are the base-towers for off-shore wind towers, with the wind towers finished those parts will be beneath the waves. $\endgroup$
    – mart
    Sep 8, 2016 at 12:49
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    $\begingroup$ I believe that kind of ship is categorically called a 'heavy lift ship.' The towers are just its cargo. $\endgroup$
    – Ethan48
    Sep 8, 2016 at 13:12

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It's a heavy-lift vessel, carrying four identical structures as cargo.

It's very likely they are jacket foundations for offshore wind turbines. The excellent 4C Offshore has a database of such vessels used on offshore wind farms. It also has a list of all offshore windfarms under construction by country, and tells you which vessels are working on it, so given that you know where the photo was taken, you may able to work out which farm it's supplying.

I think they're going to Wikinger offshore wind farm. That's using jacket foundations, is being built as I write this post, and is about 20 km north-east of Rügen.

Here's a jacket foundation in situ at alpha ventus windfarm, courtesy of the IET: enter image description here

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