Tag: freighters

Looking Back on the “Slick of ’76”

  • Officials placed containment booms around the barge. Most of them failed to prevent the oil from floating downriver, contaminating dozens of miles of pristine shoreline. (Courtesy of the NY State Dept. of Conservation)

30 years ago, an oil barge ran aground in the St. Lawrence River. Hundreds of thousands of gallons of thick crude oil coated the shoreline of northern New York state. The accident remains one of the largest inland oil spills in the United States. It’s a reminder that freighters haul millions of gallons of toxic liquids across the Great Lakes. And many people worry about another spill. The GLRC’s David Sommerstein talked to witnesses of the 1976 spill:

Transcript

30 years ago, an oil barge ran aground in the St. Lawrence River. Hundreds
of thousands of gallons of thick crude oil coated the shoreline of northern New
York State. The accident remains one of the largest inland oil spills in the
United States. It’s a reminder that freighters haul millions of gallons of toxic
liquids across the Great Lakes. And many people worry about another spill.
The GLRC’s David Sommerstein talked to witnesses of the 1976 spill:


It was really foggy that morning. Bob Smith awoke to two sounds:


“You could hear the anchor chains going down, and next thing we know
there was a young Coast Guard guy knocking on the front door.”


The Coast Guard guy had driven up, asking around for a missing barge.
Smith remembered the anchor chains echoing across the water that woke
him up. He went outside to look.


(Sound of walking outside)


Thirty years later, Smith lives amidst cozy cottages on manicured lawns in
the heart of the touristy Thousand Islands.


“Just right about straight out there. See where that boat’s coming up there
now?”


That’s where a barge carrying oil from Venezuela had dropped anchor after
running aground. That morning Smith watched crude as thick as mud drift
out of sight downriver:


“If you’re born and raised here on the river, you don’t like to see anything go
in the river that doesn’t belong there.”


The Coast Guard placed booms in the water, but the oil quickly spilled over.
It carried 50 miles downstream. It oozed as far as 15 feet into the river’s
marshes. Tom Brown was the point man for New York’s Department of
Environmental Conservation. He says the spill couldn’t have come at a
worse time for wildlife:


“All the young fish, waterfowl, shorebirds, furbearers, were coming off the
nests and were being born.”


Thousands of birds and fish suffocated in black goo. As images of
devastation flashed on national TV, the spill killed the tourism season, too.
It was a summer with no swimming, no fishing, no dipping your feet in the
water at sunset. Really, it was a summer with no river.


(Sound of river at Chalk’s dock)


30 years later, everyone still remembers the acrid smell:


“When I woke up in the middle of the night and I could smell oil, I was
afraid I had an oil leak in my house.”


Dwayne Chalk’s family has owned a marina on the St. Lawrence for
generations. Chalk points to a black stripe of oil on his docks, still there
three decades later, and he’s still bitter:


“The Seaway has done this area, well, I shouldn’t say that, it hasn’t done any
good. To me it hasn’t.”


The St. Lawrence Seaway opened the ports of the Great Lakes to Atlantic
Ocean freighters carrying cargoes of steel, ore, and liquid chemicals. It
generates billions of dollars a year in commerce, but it’s also brought
pollution and invasive species.


Anthropologist John Omohundro studied the social effects of the 1976 oil
spill. He says it helped awaken environmentalism in the Great Lakes:


“The spill actually raised people’s consciousness that the river could be a
problem in a number of areas, not just oil.”


Groups like Save the River and Great Lakes United began lobbying for
cleaner water and safer navigation in the years after the spill:


“If a vessel carrying oil or oil products were in that same type of ship today,
it would not be allowed in.”


Albert Jacquez is the outgoing administrator for the US side of the St. Lawrence
Seaway. The 1976 barge had one hull and gushed oil when it hit the rocks.
Today’s barges are mostly double-hulled and use computerized navigation.
Jacquez says a lot has changed to prevent spills:


“The ships themselves are different, the regulations that they have to follow are
different, and the inspections are different. Now does that guarantee? Well,
there are no guarantees, period.”


So if there is a spill, the government requires response plans for every part of
the Great Lakes. Ralph Kring leads training simulations of those plans for
the Coast Guard in Buffalo. Still, he says the real thing is different:


“You really can’t control the weather and the currents and all that. It’s definitely going to be a
challenge, especially when you’re dealing with a real live incident where
everyone’s trying to move as fast as they can and also as efficient as they
can.”


Critics question the ability to get responders to remote areas in time. They
also worry about spills in icy conditions and chemical spills that oil booms
wouldn’t contain.


(Sound of river water)


Back on the St. Lawrence River, Dwayne Chalk says the oil spill of 1976
has taught him it’s not if, it’s when, the next big spill occurs:


“You think about it all the time. Everytime a ship comes up through here,
you think what’s going to happen if that ship hits something.”


Chalk and everyone else who relies on the Great Lakes hope they’ll never
have to find out.


For the GLRC, I’m David Sommerstein.

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Farewell Tour of Historic Icebreaker

  • The Mackinaw is a historic ship that was built during World War II. In June it will be decommissioned. (Photo courtesy of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)

The historic Coast Guard icebreaker Mackinaw has docked for the final time. The vessel is scheduled to be decommissioned at the beginning of June, after more than six decades of service on the Great Lakes. The GLRC’s Sarah Hulett visited the ship on its farewell tour of the lakes, and has this report:

Transcript

The historic Coast Guard icebreaker Mackinaw has docked for the final
time. The vessel is scheduled to be decommissioned at the beginning of
June, after more than six decades of service on the Great Lakes. The
GLRC’s Sarah Hulett visited the ship on its farewell tour of the lakes, and
has this report:


I’m on the bridge of the 290-foot icebreaker, and I’m just in time for the
daily test of the vessel’s alarms and whistles.


(Sound of bell)


After 62 years, they’re still working.


(Sound of alarm)


The Mackinaw was built in Toledo, during World War Two – when
demand for raw materials from the Great Lakes region exploded.


The icebreaker extended the shipping season through the winter, and
helped make sure iron ore and other cargo could get to the industrial
cities at the center of the war effort.


Today, Pat Pietrolungo and his 80 fellow crewmembers are still keeping
the shipping lanes cleared for commercial transport. They can spend up
to two weeks at a time on the ship, cutting ice during the winter months.


But cruising Lake Superior in the dead of winter can get spooky on those
long, cold winter nights.


Pietrolungo says there are some crew members who think there’s a ghost
on board the Mackinaw.


“Certain little weird things happen. Lights will flicker that shouldn’t,
doors will shut, some of the wheels on the scuttle will turn. I guess it
was a former crew member that died on board.”


But that ghost will have a lot less company soon, when the crew moves
to the Mackinaw’s smaller, more efficient replacement this summer.


The old ship isn’t flexible enough to serve other purposes for the Coast
Guard. And Pietrolungo – the Mackinaw’s machinery technician – says
finding parts for the vessel’s huge diesel engines is getting more difficult
by the year.


“It’s more or less along the lines of a locomotive engine. So you’ve got
to go start searching train museums, more or less, to find the big parts if
we needed them.”


A non-profit group based in Cheboygan, Michigan wants to make the
Mackinaw itself a museum.


Hugh O’Connor and his two young children were the first in line to
board the vessel when it docked in Detroit during its farewell tour. He
says he’ll be sad to see the Mackinaw decommissioned, but he says he
would visit the ship as a museum. Like a lot of boys who grew up along
the lakes, O’Connor says he and his friends knew the names of all the
freighters, and looked forward to catching a glimpse of the Mackinaw.


“We always used to ice fish in the winter, and I remember from our ice
shanty you’d get out and see it going by, breaking ice on Lake Saint
Clair for the freighters. That was when they were trying to run the boats
year-round. I don’t think they do that much anymore though. That was
pretty cool. Back then it was all white, though. Painted all white.”


The Mackinaw’s hull – painted red since 1998 – powered through thick
sheets of Great Lakes ice for the last time this past winter.


For the GLRC, I’m Sarah Hulett.

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Cargo ‘Sweepings’ Called Into Question

Every year freighters wash two hundred million pounds of refuse into the Great Lakes leaving the equivalent of underwater gravel roads along shipping lanes. The practice is called “cargo sweeping” and it’s allowed in spite of U.S laws and an international treaty banning dumping in the lakes. The GLRC’s Charity Nebbe has more:

Transcript

Every year freighters wash two hundred million pounds of refuse into the
Great Lakes leaving the equivalent of underwater gravel roads along
shipping lanes. The practice is called “cargo sweeping” and it’s allowed
in spite of U.S. laws and an international treaty banning dumping in the
lakes. The GLRC’s Charity Nebbe has more:


The dumping occurs when cargo ships pump water over the deck and
through loading tubes to wash away any refuse that has collected from
the loading and unloading process. Industry insiders say the practice is
necessary to protect the safety of the crew and the integrity of the cargo.


James Weakley is President of the Lake Carriers’ Association.


“I’m very confident that what we’re putting over the side are naturally
occurring substances… and we’ve been doing this practice for hundreds
of years and as yet we haven’t seen an environmental harm.”


Critics are concerned about toxins that might be carried in the coal, iron
ore, and slag jettisoned by the ships, and they’re concerned about the
habitat that might be buried under the refuse.


This year the U.S. Coast Guard is reviewing the 1993 interim policy that
allows cargo sweeping, but as of yet no scientific study has been
commissioned.


For the GLRC, I’m Charity Nebbe.

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Ten Threats: Expanding the Seaway

  • A freighter leaving the Duluth harbor in Minnesota. (Photo courtesy of EPA)

One of the Ten Threats to the Great Lakes identified by many of the experts we surveyed
is dredging channels deeper and wider for larger ocean-going ships. In the 1950s, engineers
carved a shipping channel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes via the St. Lawrence
River. The St. Lawrence Seaway was to make ports in cities such as Chicago and Duluth main
players in global commerce. Today, the Seaway operates at less than half its capacity.
That’s because only five percent of the world’s cargo fleet can fit through its locks and
channels. For decades, the shipping industry has wanted to make them bigger. David
Sommerstein reports:

Transcript

We’re continuing our series Ten Threats to the Great Lakes with a look at the idea of
letting bigger ships into the lakes. Lester Graham is our guide through the series.


One of the Ten Threats to the Great Lakes identified by many of the experts we surveyed
is dredging channels deeper and wider for larger ocean-going ships. In the 1950s, engineers
carved a shipping channel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes via the St. Lawrence
River. The St. Lawrence Seaway was to make ports in cities such as Chicago and Duluth main
players in global commerce. Today, the Seaway operates at less than half its capacity.
That’s because only five percent of the world’s cargo fleet can fit through its locks and
channels. For decades, the shipping industry has wanted to make them bigger. David
Sommerstein reports:


(Sound of rumbling noise of front-loaders)


The port of Ogdensburg sits on the St. Lawrence River in northern New York State.
When the Seaway was built, local residents were promised an economic boom. Today
what Ogdensburg mostly gets is road salt.


(Sound of crashing cargo)


Road salt and a white mineral called Wallastonite – the Dutch use it to make ceramic tile.
Front-loaders push around mountains of the stuff. In all, the port of Ogdensburg
welcomes six freighters a year and employs just six people.


Other Great Lakes ports are much bigger, but the story is similar. They handle low-value
bulk goods – grain, ore, coal – plus higher value steel. But few sexy electronic goods
from Japan come through the Seaway, or the gijillion of knick-knacks from China or
South Korea.


James Oberstar is a Congressman from Duluth. He says there’s a reason why. A
dastardly coincidence doomed the Seaway.


“Just as the Seaway was under construction, Malcolm McLean, a shipping genius, hit on
the idea of moving goods in containers.”


Containers that fit right on trains and trucks. The problem was the ships that carry those
containers were already too big for the Seaway’s locks and channels.


“That idea of container shipping gave a huge boost of energy to the East Coast, Gulf
Coast, and West Coast ports, and to the railroads.”


Leaving Great Lakes ports behind ever since the regional shipping industry has wanted to
make the Seaway bigger.


The latest effort came in 2002, when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers studied the
economic benefits of expansion. The study said squeezing container ships through the
Seaway would bring a billion and a half dollars a year to ports like Chicago, Toledo, and
Duluth. But if you build it, would they come?


“Highly doubtful that container ships would come in. Highly doubtful.”


John Taylor is a transportation expert at Grand Valley State University in Michigan.
He’s studied Seaway traffic patterns extensively. He says there would have to be “a sea
change” in global commerce.


“Rail is too competitive, too strong moving containers from the coast in and out say from
Montreal and Halifax and into Chicago and Detroit and so on, too cost-effective for it to
make sense for a ship to bring those same containers all the way to Chicago.”


The expansion study sparked a flurry of opposition across the Great Lakes. It failed to
mention the cost of replumbing the Seaway — an estimated 10 to 15 billion dollars. It
didn’t factor in invasive species that show up in foreign ships’ ballasts. Invasives already
cost the economy 5 billion dollars a year, and environmentalists said it glossed over the
ecological devastation of dredging and blasting a deeper channel.


Even the shipping industry has begun to distance itself from expansion. Steve Fisher
directs the American Great Lakes Ports Association.


“There was quite a bit of opposition expressed through the region, and in light of that
opposition we took stock of just how much and how strongly we felt on the issue and
quite frankly there just wasn’t a strong enough interest.”


Most experts now believe expansion won’t happen for at least another generation.
Environmentalists and other critics hope it won’t happen at all.


So instead, the Seaway is changing its tactics. Richard Corfe runs Canada’s side of the
waterway. He says the vast majority of Seaway traffic is actually between Great Lakes
ports, not overseas. So, the Seaway’s focus now is to lure more North American shippers
to use the locks and channels.


“Our efforts have to be towards maximizing the use of what we have now for the benefit
of both countries, the economic, environmental, and social benefit.”


Today, trucks and trains haul most goods from coastal ports to Great Lakes cities.
Shippers want to steal some of that cargo, take it off the roads and rails, and put it on
seaway ships headed for Great Lakes ports.


For the GLRC, I’m David Sommerstein.

Related Links

Debate Over Ballast Discharge Regs

A debate is developing over who has the authority to place
stricter rules on ocean freighters that bring cargo into the Great Lakes.
The ultimate goal is to keep these ships from discharging invasive species
when they dump ballast water into the lakes. But as the Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports, experts say the debate is overlooking a
key issue:

Transcript

A debate is developing over who has the authority to place stricter rules on ocean freighters that can bring cargo into the Great Lakes. The ultimate goal is to keep ships from discharging invasive species when they dump ballast water into the Lakes. But as the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports, experts say the debate is overlooking a key issue:


Some states want the EPA to be in charge of regulating ballast water discharges. Others want the Coast Guard to handle it. Whoever regulates the discharges, it won’t be enough, according to Allegra Cangelosi. She’s a policy analyst at the Northeast MidWest Institute.


“They can’t pump it all out with routine ballast pumps. So they often carry residual ballast into the Lakes which is teeming with organisms nonetheless.”


Cangelosi says freighters need to start treating their ballast water with technologies such as filtration and deoxygenation. She says the longer the government waits to require the treatment of ballast water, the more invasive species will make their way into the Great Lakes.


For the GLRC, I’m Tracy Samilton.

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Ice Delays Opening of Seaway

Despite warmer weather, the St. Lawrence Seaway will open six days late because there’s too much ice on the St. Lawrence River. Icebreakers will begin work clearing a shipping channel this week. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David Sommerstein reports:

Transcript

Despite warmer weather, the St. Lawrence Seaway will open 6 days late because there’s too much
ice on the St. Lawrence River. Icebreakers will begin work clearing a shipping channel this week.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David Sommerstein reports:


Ice fishermen on the St. Lawrence are drilling through more than three feet of ice in some places.


[drilling sound]


It’s the thickest ice buildup they’ve seen in decades. It’s causing the St. Lawrence Seaway to
postpone its opening from March 25th to March 31st this year. It’s the first time that’s happened in
the waterway’s 44 year history.


Seaway Administrator Albert Jacquez says the decision was made after consulting weather experts
and officials in Canada.


“If we can’t ensure to the best of our ability that a ship can get through without damage to either
our facilities or the ship itself and ultimately to the environment around us, we shouldn’t be
opening and so that’s what is the determination.”


When there’s too much ice on the river, a freighter’s wake can damage
vegetation, cause shoreline erosion, and disturb fisheries. Shippers say an
idle freighter can cost them 100,000 dollars a day.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m David Sommerstein.