There was a really interesting podcast I listened to recently and the name is escaping me, however they had Mark Kelly and the rep from Indiana who are sponsoring SHIPS for America act, and they went through the funding for what’s laid out in the bill which I imagine will be essentially the same for what was going to be a new office but has been pushed to an already existing office, per John Konrad.
I read the proposed act there are a lot of good things in it, I’d encourage everyone to read it. Mariner credentialing is mentioned several times.
All is supposed to be funded by the Maritime Security Trust Funds plus tax breaks and loan guarantees.
“The Maritime Security Trust Fund would be financed by funds collected from Customsand Border Protection through duties, fees, and penalties imposed on vessels in international commerce, the proceeds from regular tonnage taxes (as amended by section 202), special tonnage taxes, light money, and tariffs and duties imposed on foreign nations, to include Section 301 tariffs.”
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Without motivation there ain’t no innovation.
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It’s encouraging to hear about foreign built ships getting reflagged and the potential for more JA ships getting built.
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Small boats and aircraft carriers.
Time to beat the dead horse. Canada is getting a big new icebreaker. In about half the time the Coast Guard can get one. The day is coming when lack of breakers is going to bite us in the, well, you know. I tend to think of the Polar Star as being like the man said about his ax. He has had the same ax for 50 years, Of course, it has had three new heads and twelve new handles, but it is still the same ax.
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They are in the works as Trump said in January, “We’re going to order about 40 Coast Guard icebreakers, big ones,”
Be patient.
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I’m surprised that Trump didn’t say “400, of the biggest icebreakers anyone has ever seen.”
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It seems to me MARAD has lost sight of it’s initial charter goals, namely promoting American shipping. I think they could focus on running Short Sea supply runs up and down the East and West coasts to prove efficiency, and make enough money to push the deferred maintenance up on the Ready Reserve Fleet, while cleanly outcompeting trucking and any other competition, keeping the I 95 and I 5 corridors clear during high traffic times. Once the routes are established and proven profitable then they could be sold to Commercial Carriers who would be motivated to build and manage their own ships (with a bit of help from Uncle Sam) to take charge of our own Jones Act runs.
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Short Sea Shipping is not viable or competitive with trucks because of the very high cost longshoremen.
Short Sea Shipping only works for the tug and barge trade (4-6 man crews) when they can handle the cargo at company docks or micro ports without using longshoremen.
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That’s just false.
Columbia Coastal has been running on the East Coast for over 35 years. All their calls are at regular terminals with ILA labor. They’re still getting it done to the tune of 50,000 boxes a year Norfolk/Baltimore/Philly.
They are down from their peak, but what’s hurt feedering in the east coast is the reduction in the number of container lines, slot chartering between remaining carriers, and migration of distribution centers away from the docks.
Consider Boston - why barge a box from Newark just to turn it around and truck it out to 495 or even past Worcester to get stripped?
"And they will be beautiful, the most powerful the world has ever seen, and people will love them like they love me. No one has ever built as many beautiful ships as I will. We will base them in Florida and the Gulf of America, but not in California. "
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The more I think about this, the more I realize this has a potential to absolutely wreck some smaller ports. Palm Beach, for example really only has Tropical shipping running container services out of it, most of their vessels are built in China, Their numbers aren’t public but 1.9 million dollars every time you hit your home port has got to be cost prohibitive. Same with Seaboard marine out of Miami. The major carriers can probably figure out a way around this, but there have got to be more small outfits like this that are just going to take it up the ass.
I don’t see any way this just isn’t going to fuck a lot of Americans, and our neighbors. There is going to be so much collateral damage out of a policy like this.
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Stuffing and unstuffing containers for LCL shippers has moved to “inland ports” to avoid the very high cost with sticky fingers longshoremen.
Philly/Baltimore/Norfolk is a nearby inland run, that never passes a sea bouy. That’s not “short sea” shipping.
When containers need to be lashed for sea on an exposed route by longshoremen, it quickly becomes uneconomic.
Kress might be surprised to learn that his boats aren’t doing short sea shipping, but I’ll let him know. On the other hand I’m sure Todd will be happy to learn he doesn’t have to maintain the lashing gear anymore!
What is this the 1960’s?
Wait, they’re sending barges around Chesapeake bay not lashed?? Someone’s gotta call ABS/USCG
I haven’t seen these barges. Do you have some photos that show the lashings?
Are they lashings that you would go up or down the coast with in midwinter?
On a Navy FB page, I have read about the LCS and I have never read one word of “praise” for them.
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Forbes said they felt President Trump misspoke when he said 40. (What president hasn’t misspoken from time to time. BTW, at one time, before her decom, the Northwind was homeported in Wilmington, NC, 30 miles up the Cape Fear River. Besides, I seriously doubt the Coast Guard will ever get 4 ice breakers, let alone 40.
The LCS (FREEDOM class) design sucks, but the execution by FMC sucks as well. A good friend works on the program. The “you won’t believe this” calls come about every other day. It’s about 50/50 whether the issue is design or build.
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