Part of the difference is that old Tom Crowley immigrated to San Francisco in 1897 and started his launch service with a rowboat in SF Bay. That became a very high cost locale. By California standards Crowley was a small fish in an antiquated industry in a big high tech pond. So much so, that Crowley had to flee all the California taxes, regulations, employee rights, and in general super high cost of doing business.
Chouest was fortunate (I’m saying that tongue in cheek) that his ancestors immigrated to Louisiana where he is a very big fish in a small pond. His business, offshore oil, is the most important in the state. Louisiana is a low tax, low regulation state where employees have few rights. It’s a cheap place to do business. It’s also a cheap place to buy a lot of political clout. So is Alaska. Chouest is an exceptionally good businessman. These are Chouest’s most important competitive advantages.
Crowley had 30 years of doing the Valdez job very well with the best purpose designed Pacific Northwest built vessels for the job. They also were staffed with very skilled people who had 30 years of Alaska experience doing the job very well. Yes, they had a few minor incidents over 30 years, but that is to be expected. Overall Crowley did a great job.
Chouest’s proven lack of ability to build, own, manage, and staff a towing operation in Alaska can be summed up in two words: AIVIQ and KULLUK.
Proven long term quality and experience is more important than price, or a few new bayou built boats.
All of the things you described are competitive advantages. Differences is settings, taxes, etc… while relevant all play a part in what company has a competitive advantage. We don’t have to like it but again that’s business.
Chouest had a large screw up in Alaska and a lot of that blame could also be put on Shell. But that’s another story and I don’t want to digress…
Chouest has a lot to prove so I definitely agree with you there. We’ll see how it plays out in the end.
Well said. If someone is looking for a beautiful boat then buy a yacht. Beautiful doesn’t help the bottom line in the world of commercial ship operations.
I believe that the new Chouest boats in Alaska are proven Damen designs. I assume the Damen production engineers were in the Chouest yard everyday showing them how to build them efficiently with good quality. They should be good boats.
They appears to me to be purpose built for the job in harsh and freezing cold climate with the latest and best of of equipment, incl. LP hydraulic winches in covered spaces. They are of similar design as the tugs used for the same purpose at Melkoya, near Hammerfest, Norway. The main difference being that those are dual fuel (LNG/MGO)
Did you see the video of the new Ukrainian Tugs? They are certainly different and I have some doubts about line handling but they look good. Safer too.
Same here. It should be possible to raise the bridge, both for a safe navigation and here to comply with the Dutch rule that only a forward blind sector of one ship length is allowed.
Another solution to meet the requirement is to raise the bridge of an inland waterway ship hydraulically to the required height, depending on the loading conditions.
Tonnage 5175 ton
Length 134.16 m
Width 16.90 m
Draft. 3.2 m
Propulsion Caterpillar 3 x 918 pk
Motor type 3508 (B) DI-TA electronic
Bow thrusters 520 pk Caterpillar - Veth-Jets
Hull built by Astrachan Plant, Astrachan Russia
The Chinese design is a cheap one and niet very sophisticated, also dangerous. The difference with the Jowi is the crew accommodation. The Dutch ships are in almost all cases crewed by man and wife, a family business which requires another kind of living quarters. The forward position is also unsafe in case of a collision.
Hmm, some truth to this, but weren’t a lot of the tugs Crowley was using up there built in Louisiana back in the 70s? I believe that they were a west coast design, though. . . . as far as Chouest dominance, they were there at the right time when the oil business needed to get out in the water and they had the boats to to it. . . .
3:30 he says that this situation is different than the Aiviq/Kulluk because “they work for us, we have stop work authority/not accepting risk, not getting into a position where that could happen.” Shell was the leader of that entire Alaska venture, they had stop work authority, Chouest worked for Shell and Chouest had/has stop work authority, Noble, who owned the rig and had crew on it, had stop work authority. Stop work authority is not the be all, end all of safety procedures. Lots of times people would rather keep their jobs than risk it with using SWA.
Yes. That Alyeska spokesman is full of brown stuff.
When the brown stuff really hits the fan AGAIN with Chouest in Alaska, all those Alyeska decision makers, apologists, and excuse makers should be tarred and feathered and run out of Alaska on a Choust built vessel during a winter storm.
I wish I had a better sense of how big Chouest is on the world stage. Apples to oranges, but Maersk-sized? Does the government prefer to give out MSP slots to the Maersks and CMA-CGMs of the world because they can provide a lot more sealift in a hurry outside the MSP context if necessary?
