Tug in N.Y. Target of Molotov Cocktail

A Molotov cocktail was dropped off a bridge Wednesday onto one tugboat and flares were fired at another in violence apparently stemming from a 2-week-old longshoreman’s strike, police said.

The incendiary device bounced harmlessly off the tugboat, which was towing a gasoline barge, and fell into the East River, Sgt. Raymond O’Donnell said. Several flares from a flare gun were fired later from a pier at a tugboat towing two city Sanitation Department barges but missed the vessels, he said.

Police have recorded more than a dozen incidents of violence since the strike began on Feb. 16, including the wounding a week ago of a tugboat captain when shots fired at his boat shattered the glass in the pilot house.