Crowley Marine Services' newly refurbished twin-screw high horsepower conventional tugs Ranger and Sea Viking took first and second place respectively in Seattle Maritime Week's annual
Unlimited Class Tugboat races held recently on Elliott Bay. A Crowley tug has won first place in the large-category class of the event every year that Crowley has participated since 1995. This year, the Ranger took first place by four boat lengths and the Sea Viking stole a close second after an exciting neck and neck race against two of the other competing tugs.
The first place tug Ranger is among 25 Crowley Invader-Class tugs to be refurbished as part of the company's $60 million tug refurbishment program. The project includes the rebuilding of the tugs' main engines, effectively returning each engine to zero hours. This provides a marked improvement in the overall operational performance and reliability of the tugs, each of which is capable of generating a powerful 150,000 pounds of bollard pull ahead and 7,200 maximum continuous bhp. Ranger averaged 14.6 knots in the 1.9 nautical mile Seattle tugboat race. She was able to finish the race in just 7 minutes and 6 seconds.
"We are pleased with the performance level of the Ranger, and all of our refurbished tugs," said Tom Crowley, Jr., Chairman, President and CEO of Crowley Maritime Corporation. "The long-term investment we have made to upgrade these tugs will be a great benefit to our customers given their enhanced service reliability and integrity."