Maritime News and Comment

August 2006

    SUEZMAXES TO BE CONVERTED TO CGL CARRIERS?  According to ABS, a company called SeaOne Maritime is planning to convert "several" Suezmax tankers to "compressed gas liquid carriers".  Read the ABS report here.  Nothing from SeaOne itself about this and the ABS report provides no indication of how many ships, why conversion rather than new construction, or which shipyard.  August 31, 2006.

    UNSAFE LIFEBOATS?  It has always been apparent to anyone with more than half a brain that the design of lifeboats has not kept up with the design of ships and an authoritative body has finally, at last, jumped on this problem.  The U.K.'s Maritime and Coast Guard Agency, (MCGA), has just released a study that says, among other things, that on-load release hooks are unsafe.  Read the report here.  August 30, 2006.

    MAGIC PHRASES.  I may be too easily amused but it gives me great pleasure to find reports of deranged actor Tom Cruise's business dealings showing up on maritime news web sites, as a result of the magic phrase to be found in sentences such as "Tom Cruise lines up new financing."  That's what happens when you use an internet search engine but don't check the results.  August 30, 2006.

    SEARIVER JOB SCAM OPERATING.  Several merchant mariners from around the world have sent me copies of e-mail messages that they have received that appear to offer them a job on SeaRiver's "S/R American Progress", which is apparently a chemical carrier operating in European coastal trades.  The messages appear to come from Scandic American Shipping, which is a real Norwegian company that manages the tankers owned by Nordic American Tanker Shipping.  They include a link to this web site, to the page that lists the Jones Act fleet of product carriers, including, of course, the "S/R American Progress".  All the applicants have to do is send USD350 to a lawyer in England, identified as Gideon Fiadzomor, 11 Cromwell Road, Hounslow, TW3 3QE, phone 0209 328525, who will process their contract for them.  No doubt SeaRiver's legal department is taking care of this scumbag, and probably NAT's as well,  but isn't it despicable?  August 26, 2006.

    CHAOS ON THE RIVER.  The Mississippi River was closed to traffic on Thursday in three separate locations after three separate towboat groundings.  The boats involved are the "Capt. Russell Simpson", with a tow of 25 barges, the "Robert A. Kyle", with a tow of 32 barges, and the "Noble C. Parsonage", with a tow of 25 barges.  The accidents were caused by unusually low water levels.  Read the Coast Guard's first announcement here.  A day later, according to the Coast Guard's second announcement, the river was still closed in all three locations and 28 ships were waiting.  Read the Coast Guard's second announcement here.  August 25/26, 2006.

    BUSINESS MUST BE BOOMING ON THE LAKES.  The "Edward L. Ryerson", (Manitowoc's Hull 425), was pictured recently discharging cargo in Lorain OH the slow way.  The process apparently took 50 hours.  August 25, 2006.

   MARAD APPROVES FOREIGN TRANSFERS.  The U.S. Maritime Administration (MARAD) has approved the foreign transfer of a tanker, an OSV and a drill rig.  The tanker is the "Chelsea" (NASSCO hull 386), which has been sold for scrap.  The OSV is the "Veritas Searcher" (Halter hull 837), which has been sold to a company operating under the flag of St. Vincent.  The drill rig is the jackup "Ensco 84" (Marathon LeTourneau hull 163), which has been reflagged in Liberia.  Read the announcement here.  August 24, 2006.

   MAINE ISSUES RFP FOR FERRY.  The State of Maine has released an RFP for a 154-foot ferry.  Read the notice and link to the RFP here.  August 24, 2006.

   BC FERRIES ORDERS ANOTHER FROM FLENSBURGER.  British Columbia Ferries, which has three 520-foot car ferries under construction at Flensburger Shipbuilding, has ordered another from the highly efficient German yard.  Read BC Ferries' press release here.  The new ship will be slightly smaller and will replace the 40-year-old "Queen of Prince Rupert": it will cost C$133 million and be delivered in early 2009.  Pity about the Canadian shipbuilding industry.  August 21, 2006.

   TUG SINKS NEAR APOLLO BEACH.  The 50-year-old harbor tug "Marilyn K. McFarland" sank in Big Bend Channel, near Apollo Beach, on Saturday.  Read the Coast Guard's press release here.  August 21, 2006.

   BATH TO BUILD DECKHOUSE FOR NGSS.  As predicted here, Bath Iron Works has been contracted by NAVSEA to build replacement blocks for the deckhouse of DDG 103, which is being built by NGSS at Ingalls and which suffered a fire, also reported here.  Read the DefenseLink announcement here.  Why couldn't Ingalls do this themselves?  And why couldn't they contract directly with Bath?  Why did NAVSEA have to do it?  August 19, 2006.

   NASSCO DELIVERS FOURTH BP TANKER.  NASSCO has delivered the fourth and last of its series of 185,000-dwt Alaskan-trade tankers, the "Alaskan Legend",  to BP Shipping Company.  Read the announcement here.  See how NASSCO's performance compares to Avondale's.  The significant interval, in terms of efficiency, is KL-D, the time required from keel-laying to delivery.  A Korean shipyard can build ships like these in 10 to 12 weeks - 7 or 8 weeks for erection plus 3 or 4 in the water.  NASSCO required an average of about 74 weeks and Avondale a mind-boggling 154 weeks - almost three years - even if you don't count the fifth ship in their series because of the special circumstances surrounding her.  August 18, 2006.

   COAST GUARD ALLOWS SEABULK TO REBUILD IN CHINA.  This is slightly old news but it only just trickled down to me here on the beach and I haven't seen it reported anywhere, although it is clearly an event of some significance in the narrow world of Jones Act shipping.  It seems that the U.S. Coast Guard has allowed a request by Seabulk Tankers to double-hull the "Seabulk Challenge" and "Seabulk Trader" in a foreign shipyard.  Read its determination here.  The actual shipyard involved is rumored to be in China.  The two ships were originally built by Avondale in 1981 as the double-bottomed chemical carriers "Ogden Dynachem" and "Ogden Hudson".  One suspects that there will be some in the U.S. maritime community who will not be happy with this decision.  August 16, 2006.

   BOLLINGER TO REBUILD IRAQI NAVY?  Reports from Iraq say that Bollinger Shipyards is favored to build 15 patrol boats for the new Iraqi Navy.  Read the report on defensetalk.com here.  August 16, 2006.

   CASTLE HARLAN BAILING OUT OF HORIZON.  Horizon Lines has announced that it will offer for sale the remaining 5.25 million shares, worth around $90mm, that are owned by Castle Harlan.  Read Horizon's announcement here.  In June, Horizon sold 5.75 million shares owned by Castle Harlan for about $80mm and last September it sold 12.5mm shares for about $125mm.  Horizon has about 34 million shares outstanding and its market capitalization is currently around $515mm.  All this is a long way from the $663mm that Castle Harlan paid for it in July 2004.  Well they can't say that I didn't warn them.  August 14, 2006.

   HERE COMES EMMA.  A. P. Moller has christened another giant containership at its Odense shipyard and for once it has not been coy about the ship's size.  The "Emma Maersk" is described as having a capacity of 11,000 TEUs and being powered by a 14-cylinder Sulzer engine of 110,000 bhp, making her clearly the biggest containership yet built.  Note that she is operated by a crew of only 13 (Horizon Lines averages 23).  Read A. P. Moller's announcement here.  August 14, 2006.

   TIDEWATER SELLS US-FLAG AHT FLEET.  Tidewater Marine is planning to sell 14 AHTs, including 12 of its US-flag AHTs, to Crosby Marine Transportation, for a total price of $45mm.  All the boats were built in the 1970s.  Read Tidewater's announcement here.  Note that Tidewater's CEO, Dean Taylor, describes the tugs as "non-core assets", which is kind of interesting.  August 14, 2006.

   $336MM TO DESIGN A DDG.  The Navy has awarded a cost-plus contract to Bath Iron Works for the detail design of the DDG 1000, which is the new name for the DDG(X), which was itself previously known as the DDG-21.  The contract itself is valued at $116mm but an unusually informative announcement reveals that the total value of the total detail design effort is $336mm.  Read the announcement here.  August 9, 2006.

   ANOTHER FATAL ACCIDENT AT NGSS.  Local sources report that a rigger at Avondale was killed recently when the shipyard dropped the after mast for the future LPD 21.  No announcements or press reports yet.  Apart from the personal tragedy here, the incident creates a new problem for NGSS.  The mast on an LPD 21-class ship is not just a mast.  It's an "Advanced Enclosed Mast System" and it's made from composite materials: replacement is not simple.  But the bigger issue remains: how much worse can things get at Avondale?  August 8, 2006.

   SEACOR APPOINTS STRATEGY WHIZ.  Seacor Holdings has appointed a member of its Board of Directors, James Cowderoy, to be its Senior Vice President, Strategy and Corporate Development.  Read Seacor's announcement here.  What the announcement doesn't say is that Cowderoy was for many years a maritime business consultant at Mercer Management Consultants and its predecessor, Temple, Barker & Sloane, (competitors of mine), and he knows the U.S. market as well as he knows the international scene.  Does this portend exciting new developments at Seacor?  Some product carriers, maybe?  August 7, 2006.

   FIRST PHILLY TANKER TO BE "OVERSEAS HOUSTON".  The first of the Philly shipyard's series of product carriers will reportedly be called the "Overseas Houston", a name that's fully in accord with OSG's traditions.  August 5, 2006.

   MARAD TO SPEND $1MM ON "SAVANNAH".  The Maritime Administration has announced that it will spend just under $1 million on what can only be described as cosmetic work on the historic nuclear cargo ship "Savannah", which is laid up in the James River Reserve Fleet.  Read MARAD's announcement here.  Note that "The date and location of the removal of the ship’s reactor has yet to be determined."  Isn't it time we did something constructive with this great ship?  We need some kind of industry-wide coalition, and probably some nuclear industry money, to take care of her.  Maybe it's time to build some nuclear-powered cargo ships.  Or cruise ships, even.  Why not?  August 4, 2006.

   HORNBECK TO BUILD MORE PSVS.  In a new SEC filing, Hornbeck Offshore Services, (HOS), has announced plans to increase the number of 240-foot PSVs currently under construction from 9 to 13: the shipyard(s) involved are still undisclosed but presumably include Leevac Industries.  HOS apparently also plans to add sufficient tugs to its tank barge fleet to achieve a one-to-one ratio of tugs and barges: Right now they have 14 tugs for 18 barges and they have apparently just bought four existing 3,000-hp tugs, so it is not clear how many new tugs will be ordered.  August 3, 2006.

   LEHMAN CLOSES ON ATLANTIC.  Former SECNAV John Lehman's company, J. F. Lehman & Partners, has closed its deal to acquire Atlantic Marine Holdings, parent of the Atlantic shipyards in Jax and Mobile.  Read Atlantic's announcement here.  Note that Ron McAlear becomes CEO of the whole thing.  August 2, 2006.

   CBI BUYS BEAUMONT SHIPYARD.  According to Marine Log, Chicago Bridge & Iron, (CBI), has bought the shipyard in Beaumont that is best known as Bethlehem Beaumont, although it had at least three owners before Bethlehem and at least three more since.  CBI will use it as a construction base for its contract to build the Golden Pass LNG terminal at Sabine Pass.  Sounds like a smart idea.  August 2, 2006.

   USS CLOSES WITH NASSCO.  US Shipping Partners has released an 8-K that reveals that its contract with NASSCO is a done deal.   Read the filing here.  August 2, 2006.

   OGLEBAY SELLS LAST THREE.  Oglebay Norton has sold its last three lakers and a famous shipping name leaves the stage.  The three, all built by AmShip at its Lorain shipyard in 1973/74 - AmShip hulls 901, 902 and 903 - are the "David Z. Norton", "Earl W. Oglebay" and "Wolverine".  The buyer is Wisconsin & Michigan Steamship Co., which will bareboat them to Lower Lakes Transportation.  The price is $18.7mm for the three.  Read ON's announcement here.  August 1, 2006.

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