Joseph L Block News

Along the 1,600-mile, ice gray arch of the St Lawrence Seaway, the 2020 Great Lakes commercial shipping season will lurch back to life on March 25 when the Soo Locks at Sault Ste. Marie, Mich. reopen.The ceremonial opening signals a passage with passable ice and the 114th Great Lakes season for its fleet of 45 venerable lakers. Most of these huge self-loading freight haulers are at least 50 years old, rust free, and fit; American steel sailing on a freshwater sea.To handle Great Lakes cargo…

The Coast Guard presented the crew of the cargo ship Joseph L. Block with a lifesaving award in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, Saturday. Capt. Amy Cocanour, the Coast Guard Sector Lake Michigan commander, presented the Capt. David P. Dobbins Award to Raymond Sheldon, Thomas Garvey, David Schwarz, Keith Breyfogle, Basil Friend, Joyce Greenisen, Aaron Vonsprechen, Stephen Kowalski, Michelle Fetterly, Betty Benish, Guy Curtis, Roger Long, Carlos Ledezma, Kyle Long, Jeffrey Thompson, David Morrow, Nicholas McCall, Larry Noirot, Glenn Woodford, Ronald Fey, David Deverin, Shawn Bowman, and Gary Warner for their role in saving the life of a boater in Lake Michigan, August 2015. The Capt. David P.

The Lake Carriers’ Association (LCA) announced that the 2016 shipping season on the Great Lakes began on March 2 when the tug/barge unit Dorothy Ann/Pathfinder loaded 4,600 tons of iron ore at Cleveland Bulk Terminal for delivery to ArcelorMittal Cleveland at the end of the navigable portion of the Cuyahoga River. That much iron ore will keep the mill in operation for about one day. The vessel could have delivered another 4,100 tons, but the Cuyahoga River is notorious for silting up over the winter, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will not dredge the river again until mid-May. The next vessel to get underway will be the cement carrier G. L. Ostander/Integrity on March 7, LCA said.

Cleveland—The U.S.-flag Great Lakes fleet is returning to service to keep industrial America on the mend. The first vessel to get underway was the tug/barge unit DOROTHY ANN/PATHFINDER on March 5. The vessel will spend the month shuttling iron ore within Cleveland Harbor. Next to sail was the cement carrier SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN/INNOVATION. The tug/barge unit left its winter berth in Cleveland on March 7 and sailed to Alpena, Michigan, where it loaded cement to resupply silos in Chicago. The self-propelled laker JOSEPH L.

Investment Averages $1.4 Million Per Vessel Maintaining and Modernizing U.S.-Flag Lakers Will Keep Great Lakes Shipyards Busy This Winter. More than 1,200 boilermakers, welders, electricians and other skilled craftsmen will be hard at work this winter maintaining and modernizing U.S.-flag Great Lakes freighters when they lay up between late December and mid-January. The major U.S.-flag operators will invest more than $75 million in their 56 vessels so the fleet will be ready to replenish stockpiles of iron ore, coal, cement, salt and limestone when shipping resumes next March.

Thanks to a significant increase in funding for dredging on the Great Lakes in FY08, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was finally able to start reducing the backlog of sediment that is clogging the Great Lakes Navigation System announced Great Lakes Maritime Task Force in its 2008 Annual Report released March 20. “Congress really stepped up to the plate and gave the Corps nearly $140m to dredge Great Lakes ports and waterways in FY08. The outlook for FY09 initially was not as positive. The Bush Administration’s final budget proposed to slash the Lakes’ dredging appropriation by nearly $50m. “Thanks to the Great Lakes delegation, the omnibus bill did bring the Lakes’ dredging appropriation back up to $125m, an increase of $35m over what the Bush Administration had proposed.