Maritime News Headlines
June 2005
No announcements of any kind, but, according to RigZone.com, LeTourneau's Vicksburg Marine shipyard has secured a contract to build a Super-116C jack-up for the Mexican drilling contractor, Perforadora Central, which has, in recent years, bought new jack-ups from both Texas Dry-Dock and AMFELS (6/26).
The world's largest steel company, Mittal Steel, of India, which acquired the defunct Bethlehem Steel's last two lakers in April when it bought International Steel Group, has resold them to comply with Jones Act ownership requirements (6/17). The 62,000-dwt "Burns Harbor", which was built by Bay Shipbuilding (hull # 720) in 1980, has been sold to American Steamship Company, and the 64,000-dwt "Stewart J. Cort", which was built by Ingalls (hull #1161) in 1970, has been sold to Interlake Steamship Company. Both ships have been chartered back to Mittal long-term.
Zidell Marine, which has quietly been building smallish barges in its Portland OR shipyard for decades, has announced that it has a contract to build a big one (6/17). The 85,000-barrel tank barge, for an undisclosed customer, is scheduled for delivery in November 2006. Read the announcement here.
The Navy has awarded a contract to U.S. Marine of New Orleans for the construction of three 27-meter fast patrol boats for the Royal Oman Police Coast Guard (6/10). The contract is valued at $49 million and the boats must be delivered by September 2010. Read the DefenseLink announcement here.
The House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee has doubled the number of new ships in this year's naval shipbuilding program, adding a DDG, two LCSs and a T-AKE, and cutting $1 billion from the disastrous DD(X) program (6/10). Good for them. Of course, the program isn't law yet.
It seems that the rumor that the LCS program would be sole-sourced to Lockheed had no real basis (6/10). It appears, in fact, that the Navy is now planning more Flight 0 ships from both contractors. Good news for the contractors, for the program and for the almost forgotten concept of competition.
German shipyard Lloyd Werft has finally delivered the US-flag cruise ship "Shame of America" to its Malaysian owners (6/10). The ship that was partially built by Northrop Grumman Ship Systems is now mid-Atlantic, heading for New York, whence she will sail on her maiden voyage on June 18.
Northrop Grumman announced today that the President of Northrop Grumman Ship Systems, Phil Dur, will "step down" next month and retire at the end of the year, although he is only 60 (6/3). No reason was given for Dur's early retirement. He will be replaced by Philip A. Teel, currently NG's Sector Vice President, Airborne Early Warning & Electronic Warfare Systems. Teel is an aeronautical engineer with a B.S. from Georgia Tech and an M.S. from George Washington. Read the Northrop Grumman announcement here. Read CEO Ron Sugar's e-mail to the employees here.
Navy to sole-source the LCS (6/3)? Rumor has it that GD's LCS contract is about to be terminated and the funds reapplied to the Lockheed contract.
NAVSEA takes over TACOM's ship procurement (6/3). Naval Sea Systems Command, (NAVSEA), which used to be pretty good at buying ships, has taken over responsibility for procuring the Theater Support Vessel (TSV) from the Army's Tank Automotive Command, (TACOM).
OSG and Kvaerner reach agreement (6/3). Read the announcement here.
MARAD has approved Oglebay Norton's proposed sale for scrap of the "Joseph W. Frantz" (6/3). This old ship was built by Great Lakes Engineering in its Ecorse shipyard in, wait for it, 1924. 81 seems like it might be a good age for scrapping. Read MARAD's announcement here.
May 2005
NASSCO has launched the first of the 11-ship "Lewis and Clark" class of combat support ships (T-AKE 1) (5/27). Read NASSCO's announcement in the News Releases section of its web site, here.
Kvaerner Philadelphia has delivered its third ship, the "Manulani", to Matson Navigation (5/27). Read the shipyard's announcement here.
The Navy has awarded a cost-plus contract to Raytheon for ship systems integration and detail design of the DD(X) destroyer (5/23). The contract is capped at $3,000,000,000 and work must be completed by December 2009. Read the DefenseLink announcement here.
BP's two new NASSCO-built $210-mm TAPS crude carriers are reported to have been tied up in Portland OR with cracks in their rudders (5/20). No word yet from either builder or operator.
Ensco has sold its six US-built Lake Maracaibo drilling barges to Maersk Contractors for $59mm (5/20). Read Ensco's announcement here.
Seabulk International is reported to be selling the two foreign-flag product carriers - Seabulk Reliant and Seabulk Trust - that it bought in March last year for $31mm each. At today's second-hand prices, the deal should clear at least $10mm per ship.
The BRAC's list of base closures, announced today, includes Portsmouth Naval Ship Yard, which has over 4,000 employees (5/13). This reduces the number of naval shipyards to three - Norfolk, Puget Sound and Pearl Harbor. The list also includes Submarine Base New London, which has 7,000 employees, and the only naval bases on the Gulf Coast - Pascagoula and Ingleside. Read the full list here.
The first littoral combat ship, LCS 1, the keel of which will be laid at Marinette Marine on June 2, will be named USS Freedom (5/13). Read the DoD's announcement here. What's the betting that LCS 2 will be named USS Liberty? Or maybe USS Democracy? It's going to be hard to keep this up for the whole class.
Harvey Gulf Marine has ordered a 280-foot PSV from Eastern Shipbuilding (5/13). No price or delivery were given. Read the report in Marine Log here.
Non-Norwegian Cruise Line's ill-starred US-flag ship "Shame of America" will call at New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Norfolk and Miami on its maiden voyage from the builder's yard in Germany to its permanent cruising ground in the Pacific (5/13). And, oh joy, Regis and Kelly will be on board. Isn't that just super? Presumably the bubbly duo are not familiar with this ship's embarrassing history. Read NCL's PR babble here.
In an announcement that will raise eyebrows all over the industry, Hornbeck Offshore has announced that it will buy the second of the two small sulfur carriers built by Eastern Marine in 1992 - the Wiliam K. McWilliams" and the "Benno C. Schmidt" - and will convert both ships into OSVs (5/6). That's right, OSVs, at 370 feet long, the largest OSVs in the world. It would be easy to put this in the category of "Every time you turn around in this business you find someone doing something stupid" but Hornbeck's Engineering department is a good one and Hornbeck wouldn't be doing this if it didn't make sense. I hope. More info later, I hope. Read Hornbeck's announcement here.
Maritrans has won its lawsuit against Penn Maritime over the latter's infringement of the former's double-hull technology patents and will be paid $4 million by Penn Maritime (5/6). Read Maritrans' announcement in the News Releases sub-section of the Investor Relations section of their web site here.
Diamond Offshore Drilling has executed a letter of intent with Keppel Offshore & Marine for 2+1 jack-ups, of Keppel's Mod V-B design (5/6). One of the first two of these rigs will be built by AMFELS, for delivery in 2Q-2008. Read Diamond's announcement in the News Releases sub-section of the Investor Relations section of their web site here and Keppel's here.
April 2005
Sources say that representatives from Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering, (DSME), (one of the world's most efficient shipbuilders), were at NASSCO last week to discuss a technology transfer deal (4/29). More to come on this topic, no doubt.
It is reliably reported that Richard McCreary, formerly President of Halter Marine, and later EVP of VT Halter Marine, has joined Manitowoc Marine Group as EVP and GM of Marinette Marine (4/30).
LPD 17, the future USS San Antonio, the first of the Navy's new class of assault ships, left Ingalls' shipyard for its sea trials today (4/29). All being well, it will be delivered on May 13.
Reliable sources report that Carol Hulgus, Lockheed Martin's VP and General Manager for littoral warfare, has resigned (4/29). Can this mean there are problems with their LCS program?
Despite its public position that all its ships will last at least 45 years, Horizon Lines is reliably reported to be talking to NASSCO about new construction, and even visiting several Far East shipyards, together with NASSCO, to inspect candidate designs (4/24). They must have been reading the comments on this web site.
American Transport Leasing has ordered a 14,000-dwt self-unloading dry bulk barge from Manitowoc Marine (4/22). The barge will be built by Manitowoc's Bay Shipbuilding, in Sturgeon Bay, and delivered in the second quarter of 2006. Read Manitowoc's announcement here.
Reliable sources report that Shell is soliciting proposals for 2+2 Jones Act product carriers (4/15).
In a public-relations fandango attended by former President Bill ($20,000-a-speech) Clinton and scads of local politicians, and redolent with political claptrap and PR hyperbole, Kvaerner ASA has revealed that (a) Kvaerner Philadelphia Shipyard will become a subsidiary of newly formed American Shipping, Inc., (ASI); (b) it will build 10+2 46,000-dwt product carriers for ASI; (c) the average price per ship, if all 12 are built, will be about $83mm; (d) Overseas Shipholding Group, (OSG), will bareboat-charter these ships for five years; and (e) former Matson chief Brad Mulholland will head ASI (4/15). Read Kvaerner's announcement here and OSG's here. OSG's stock price fell by almost 5% yesterday.