Weekly News Summary for January 28 to February 3, 2008:
A large group of individuals representing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the towing industry, dock operators and the local media were on hand as the new 800- by 110-foot lock chamber at Marmet Locks and Dam, Mile 68 Kanawha River, officially opened to traffic at 1 p.m. January 22.
The new lock replaces two 360- by 56-foot chambers that were constructed in the 1930s. The original chambers had become a severe bottleneck to the navigation system due to the amount of tonnage handled annually by the facility, compounded by the fact that the size of the old chambers required that 195-by 35-foot barges be locked one at a time, resulting in a total of five lockages for the normal five-barge tow. Each barge had to be pulled out of the chambers by winch and stopped with a line by the deck crew, a time-consuming, physically demanding and sometimes risky process.
The new lock chamber was authorized by the Water Resources Development Act of 1996. Kokosing/Fru-Con was awarded the construction contract in May 2002, with actual construction commencing in July of that year. Even though the new chamber is now in operation, the entire construction project is not slated for completion until 2009….
The new director of the Coast Guard’s National Maritime Center (NMC) outlined ambitious plans that will make licensing renewals speed along much akin to “TurboTax,” the software program that allows people to do their income taxes on a computer.
Capt. David C. Stalfort, commanding officer of the NMC, explained some of his plans to speed the licensing process to maritime officials who attended the Southern Region winter meeting of the American Waterways Operators (AWO) at the Intercontinental Hotel in New Orleans on January 18.
“How many of you have bought merchandise online?” Stalfort asked several hundred members in attendance. Most raised their hands. “Why, then, can’t licensing be handled online?”
Capt. Stalfort said paying fees could be handled on line. Fingerprints, which are also required for the Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC), can be obtained by the NMC from the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). No longer should mariners be required to drive many miles to a Coast Guard Regional Exam Center (REC) for fingerprinting and to a TWIC center….
American River Transportation Company (ARTCO) and St. James Stevedoring Company LLC (SJS) have announced the formation of a stevedoring joint venture. Operating under the name St. James Stevedoring Partners LLC, the venture will be headquartered in Convent, La.
St. James Stevedoring Partners will provide the midstream transloading of bulk and breakbulk cargo between ships and barges in the Lower Mississippi River area, primarily operating from seven mooring buoy locations spread between Mile 167 and 121. Additionally, the company is permitted to operate at most potential stevedoring locations between Baton Rouge and the mouth of the Mississippi River.
Current customers of ARTCO and SJS will benefit from the joint venture through an enhanced service package, the firms said in an announcement.
“We’re pleased to partner with St. James Stevedoring Company,” said Royce Wilken, president of ARTCO. “Together, our expertise in transportation markets will provide productive, cost efficient stevedoring packages to current and future customers.”…
The U.S. Coast Guard is investigating why the twin-screw towboat Senator Stennis struck the sunken wreckage of a replica 17th century French warship, Le Pelican, on January 19 at Mile 175.5 on the Lower Mississippi River.
The Coast Guard reopened the river after closing it at 10:18 a.m. from Mile 167 to 177 for five hours. Nine vessels waited to go northbound, and six waited to go southbound when the river reopened to one-way traffic. The Coast Guard Vessel Traffic Center from New Orleans regulated the traffic. The river was completely reopened the following day.
The Senator Stennis sustained a hole in one of its fuel tanks. Two of the other fuel tanks were creased, said Lt. Todd Peterson with the U.S. Coast Guard. The 3,800 hp. Senator Stennis is owned by Kirby Inland Marine.
“We were really lucky, because it was 90,000 gallons of diesel fuel that could’ve spilled,” Peterson said.
The towboat struck the Le Pelican as it was going through a crew change. The Le Pelican used to be visible before sinking completely in 2004.
“Over the years, the high water and other things and pieces of it have fallen down or broken,” said Peterson….
E.N. Bisso commissioned its first tractor tug, the (ASD) Z-drive Josephine Anne, at ceremonies on the chilly banks of the Mississippi River on January 20.
The 4,000 h.p. boat, designed for ship-assist work on the Lower Mississippi River, was built at Eastern Shipbuilding Group of Panama City, Fla.
To represent the many years of corporate commitment to providing customers with state-of-the-art equipment, company president Walter Kristiansen also had two previous generations of E.N. Bisso tugs at the ceremony, including the 2,400 hp. Gladys B, which was built in 1937 with teak decks and brass deck fittings, and has since been repowered and rebuilt, and the 4,200 hp. Dee White, which was built in 1995 with enhanced firefighting capabilities to meet the needs of both river and offshore customers.
Kristiansen told the almost 400 people who gathered for the event that Sen. David Vitter (D-La.) played an important role in building the Josephine Anne.
Vitter delivered a brief keynote address, praising the efforts of the marine industry for its contribution to the economy of the nation and for leading the rebuilding of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina….
The first of AEP River Operations’ new class of 6,000 hp. line boats left Quality Shipyards in Houma, La., on January 21 for the Mississippi River and river trials with its first tow to Convent, La.
The AEP Mariner is a Corning Townsend design that was modified to meet the company requirements. In all, the design and construction took 14 months. Four other boats of the same design are scheduled to be built at Quality Shipyards with deliveries about six months apart. Five more boats of the design are planned, bringing the total to 10.
The second boat, the Chuck Zebula, was launched January 18.
The boats will be 166 by 48 by 11-1/4 feet. The boat’s design is state-of-the-art with the entire accommodations deckhouse isolated from the main deck and mounted on 35 “seismic-grade” anti-vibration springs, making the boat very quiet inside….
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