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By Roger Barkan, Dan Katz, and Todd McClary
Answer: CROW'S NEST

The given pieces can be reconstructed to form three Hashiwokakero, or Bridges, puzzles, each of which has a unique solution. As illustrated in the example (which spells out EXAMPLE), each boat then spells out a word, as follows:

1) The boat begins by carrying an A.

2) Every time the boat crosses a single bridge, shift the letter on the boat forward in the alphabet by the sum of the two islands connected by that bridge.

3) Every time the boat crosses a double bridge, shift the letter on the boat forward in the alphabet by twice the sum of the two islands connected by that bridge.

4) Every time the boat reaches a buoy, output the current letter.

Doing this for each boat spells out the name of a noted bridge, with one letter missing. These missing letters, ordered by boat number, give the answer CROW’S NEST.

Boat Number Bridge Name Missing Letter
1 MACKINAC C
2 HARVARD R
3 BROOKLYN O
4 TOWER W
5 ORESUND S
6 LONDON N
7 GOLDEN GATE E
8 BOSPHORUS S
9 RIALTO T