Maritime News Headlines
December 2003
NOAA shortlists VT Halter Marine and Nichols Bros. Boatbuilders to design and build its SWATH replacement for the FRVs "Rude" and "Heck" (12/31). Proposals are due in May.
The St. Lawrence Seaway has closed for the season (12/30). Read the Seaway Corporation's announcement here.
The Naval Surface Warfare Center at Carderock has exercised a $6 million option on its contract with Oregon Iron Works for a second Sealion experimental submersible craft (12/30). Read the DefenseLink announcement here.
Naval Sea Systems Command has exercised two options with Bath Iron Works and one with Ingalls for the construction of DDGs 107, 108 and 109 (12/23). Read the DefenseLink announcement here.
It is reliably reported that Seabulk Offshore is about to order 5 PSVs from a U.S. shipbuilder, breaking the industry's year-long drought (12/23).
It is reliably reported that Military Sealift Command has alerted US-flag operators that a major sealift mobilization is being scheduled for early in the New Year, with all available dry cargo assets being activated to move material to Iraq. (12/23)
Naval Facilities Engineering Command has exercised an $8.8mm option on its contract with Korea's Samsung Heavy Industries for another 60-ton portal crane, this one for Puget Sound Naval Shipyard (12/22). Read the DefenseLink announcement here.
Chuck Raymond, CEO of Horizon Lines, calls for more government assistance for the maritime industry (12/22). Read the article here.
Louisiana to subsidize Bollinger (12/20). The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports that Bollinger Shipyards and the State of Louisiana have agreed on a financial support package that gives Bollinger a 10,000-ton dry-dock for $1 a year, among other things. Read the report here.
It is reliably but entirely unofficially reported that Northrop Grumman and Raytheon have agreed that if the Raytheon team wins the LCS contract, Northrop Grumman will take over from Raytheon as prime contractor (12/20). This may just be a rumor but it has a powerful ring of the truth about it.
NASSCO and SeaRiver were supposed to have reached agreement by now on price and delivery of SeaRiver's 2+1 aframaxes for the Alaskan trade. The official line is that they are still talking and a decision will be reached some time in 1Q2004 (12/20).
With surprisingly little publicity, Halliburton Industries has put its KBR subsidiary, formerly the legendary offshore contractor Brown & Root, into Chapter XI (12/20). Read their press release here.
Former Halter Marine Senior VP Anil Raj is reported to have bought Design Associates, the well-known New Orleans firm of naval architects, from Matt Kawasaki. (12/20)
The Transportation Security Administration launches a vulnerability self-assessment tool, called TMSARM, for the maritime industry (12/5). Read about it here.
JeffBoat's President/COO, Bob Herre, has been hired by arch-rival Trinity Marine Products as its Executive Vice President (12/5). Read Trinity's announcement here.
November 2003
The Navy has exercised an option on its contract with Northrop Grumman Ship Systems Avondale Operations to build the fifth of the "San Antonio" class of amphibious assault ships (11/25). This is the ship that will be named the USS "New York" (LPD 21) and will have steel from the World Trade Center incorporated into her stem bar. The contract price is $816.6 million (not a misprint). Read the DefenseLink announcement here. Read Northrop Grumman's press release here.
The FY04 Defense Authorization Act was signed into law yesterday (11/25). Read the bill here, if you're interested, but I don't know why anyone would bother. The Defense Authorization Act has become almost totally irrelevant: it's the Defense Appropriations Act that matters.
Northrop Grumman Ship Systems joins the Raytheon LCS team (11/22). Read the Raytheon press release here.
Crowley sells tanker "Courier" for scrap (11/14). Fearnleys reports that "Courier", whose OPA-90 phase-out date was 1-Jan-04, was sold to unnamed buyers last week "as is", after discharging cargo in Haifa, for $233 per LDT. The Jones Act self-propelled product carrier fleet is now down to 56 ships.
Manitowoc wins a contract from Hornbeck Offshore Transportation to build 1+3 110,000-barrel tank barges and assigns the work to its Toledo shipyard, formerly AmShip Toledo, which hasn't built a ship since it delivered the laker "Adam E. Cornelius" in 1973 (11/14).
An investment firm called Barletta, Willis, which is so low-profile as to be invisible, has bought the assets of Baltimore Marine Industries (BMI) for $9.25 million (11/7). They are apparently planning to invest $20 million in the facility now and $200 million over the next five years. Read the report in the Baltimore Sun here.
The Japanese-built car carrier "Takamine" has been renamed "Freedom" and registered in the U.S. by its owners, American Roll-On/Roll-Off Carrier LLC, (ARC) (10/31). Read MARAD's press release here.
Reliable sources report that the Great Lakes Fleet will be managed for Canadian National by Keystone Shipping (10/24). CN has apparently satisfied the citizenship requirements, but how this was done is not yet clear.
Late news but good news: Rollie Webb, who resigned in May after ten years' service as President and COO of Todd Shipyards has resurfaced in Vancouver BC as Senior Vice President, Shipyards, for the Washington Marine Group, a very much larger organization than Todd Shipyards (10/23). Read the press release here.
Tampa Port Authority voted yesterday to lend $7mm for 15 years at 6.75% interest to Tampa Bay Shipbuilding & Repair Co., Inc. (10/22). The loan will allow Tampa Bay to develop its own steel fabrication capability. Read the report in the Tampa Tribune here.
Keppel Offshore & Marine has confirmed that Boeing has awarded the contract for completion of the Sea-Based Test (SBX) platform to AMFELS (10/22). Read KOM's press release here.
Canadian National acquires Great Lakes Transportation, which includes a fleet of eight lakers (10/20). The extensively detailed press release (read it here) does not reveal how CN proposes to become a U.S. citizen for the purpose of owning Jones Act vessels.
GD takes a "significant" charge against earnings (understood to be $45mm) on NASSCO's BP tanker contract (10/20). Read GD's press release in the "News" section of their web site here.
NOAA has exercised its first option with Halter Marine for the second of four Fisheries Research Vessels (10/20). Read the joint Halter/NOAA press release here.
Matson has chartered in TOTE's trailership "Northern Lights" to serve as a car carrier on its West Coast-Hawaii route, reliable sources report. An interesting move in view of the scheduled introduction of Pasha's new Halter-built PCTC on the route later next year (10/20).
Reliable sources report that the inappropriately named "Pride of America", being completed in Germany for its Malaysian owners, is stuck on the dry-dock. Apparently Lloyd Werft, having completed the conversion, cannot sink the dock sufficiently to float her off. The Project America saga continues (10/19).
CEO replaced at Kvaerner Philly (10/15). An internal announcement reveals that David E. Meehan has been appointed President and Chief Executive Officer of Kvaerner Philadelphia Shipyard, replacing Gunnar Skjelbred who "will return to Norway and take on other Senior Management positions within Aker Kvaerner Yards." Mr. Meehan is a civil engineer: he was previously Vice President and General Manager of Kvaerner Engineering & Construction, in Pittsburgh.
EU goes ahead with its accelerated ban on single-hull tankers (10/3). It is effective on October 21, the 198th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar. Read the language of the new regulation here and the language of the earlier regulation, which this new regulation amends, here. Analysis and comment will follow, when I have time.
FastShip gives up on U.S. shipyards and signs up with IZAR (10/3). The next round of spending on this loser of a project is now, apparently to be subsidized by the poor, unsuspecting, Spanish taxpayer. Read IZAR's press release here.
Bay Shipbuilding wins contract for two 110,000-barrel hot-oil tank barges for Moran (10/1). Read Manitowoc's news release on the News Releases section of their web site here.