Gulf Shipper articles from February 2009

Gulf Shipper archives from February 2009

Tough times ahead.
February 2, 2009... From Big Oil to the Big Three, the year is starting off with a sagging economy headed down a slippery slope; it is Year Two of the worst recession since World War II. Analysts forecast earnings for major oil companies will plummet this year by...

Danger at sea.
February 2, 2009... BYLINE: ROBERT R. FRUMP Piracy threat likely to keep growing despite greater international response What's the 2009 outlook for piracy? Good - if you're a pirate. But it's not so hot if you are a shipping line, tanker owner, cargo...

When piracy pays:.
February 2, 2009... BYLINE: ROBERT R. FRUMP Weak government, strong warlords and few choices a recipe for lawlessness The pirates operating in the key trade lanes off the East Africa coast have a spokesman, but no known Web page with "Career...

Port Tracker: US container volume worst since 2004.
February 2, 2009... Last year, U.S. container ports closed out their worst year since 2004 with an estimated 6.4 percent drop in imports in December compared to December 2007. That marked the 17th straight month that container volume declined year-over-year,...

MOL names regional sales manager for southeast Gulf.
February 2, 2009... MOL has announced the appointment of Rebecca Yang to the position of regional import sales manager, Southeast Gulf Region. Yang joined MOL in 1994 as a sales representative in the Atlanta office. Since then she has held several positions...

CMA CGM (America) LLC appoints Messer.
February 2, 2009... Christopher Messer has joined CMA CGM (America) LLC as an account executive for the Florida market. Messer has 12 years of experience in sales and sales management, as well as an extensive background in shipping that includes prior work with...

Hart, Joly and Wilson join S&J Diving Inc.
February 2, 2009... S&J Diving Inc. has announced three additions to its staff. Gerald Hart will be manager of business development. Hart has 30 years of worldwide work experience in the oil and gas industry, an education in electronics engineering technology and...

Eldridge receives EDI award.
February 2, 2009... TOPAS founding member Jim Eldridge was presented with the Ed Guilbert EDI Founder Award last month. TOPAS, which stands for Terminal Operator and Port Authority Subcommittee for EDI Standards Development, formed to implement electronic data...

Texas ports group honors Hutchison.
February 2, 2009... The Texas Ports Association last month honored U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison R-Texas, as "Person of the Year." Through her position on the Senate Appropriations Committee and as the Ranking Member on the Senate Commerce, Science, and...

ICS Logistics buys Coastal Maritime Stevedoring.
February 2, 2009... ICS Logistics announced that it has executed a definitive agreement to purchase Coastal Maritime Stevedoring, a multi-user marine terminal operator and stevedore headquartered in Jacksonville, Fla. The company said Coastal and its...

About face.
February 2, 2009... BYLINE: WILLIAM HOFFMAN Commercial real estate developer ProLogis insists its retreat from China's warehousing markets is all about reducing its debt, not China's suddenly deteriorating economic performance.  "The decision to sell...

Swire upgrades Eastabout service.
February 2, 2009... Swire Shipping has upgraded capacity on its Eastabout round-the-world service connecting North America with the Middle East and India. The carrier is adding two 30,000-ton ships, the Pacific Dream and Pacific Destiny, to the four...

Liberty drops bid for ISC.
February 2, 2009... Dry bulk carrier Liberty Shipping Group LLC has withdrawn its proposal to acquire International Shipholding Corp. "We continue to believe that a transaction with Liberty would have delivered significant value to International Shipholding's...

Intermarine cuts surcharges.
February 2, 2009... Intermarine, the agent for Industrial Maritime Carriers and West Coast Industrial Express, announced that the carriers have reduced the bunker surcharges on all their services to and from South America, Mexico and the Caribbean, effective Feb....

Changing with the times.
February 9, 2009... The global economic climate has created an environment in which almost every industry - not just the shipping and transportation communities - must rethink business strategies. Key to this retrenching is changing the way a company used to do...

Heavy-lift holds firm: Gulf suppliers catching up with backlog.
February 9, 2009... BYLINE: DAVID BIEDERMAN Oil prices, mining slump will shape project cargo's near-term outlook As we begin a new year, the best that can be said for the state of the breakbulk and project cargo shipping industry is that it hasn't been...

Derrick barge Big John:.
February 9, 2009... BYLINE: JANET NODAR The pulse of the Houston Ship Channel The harbor service derrick barge Big John, capable of lifting up to 500 tons, is a familiar site on the Houston Ship Channel. The Big John has been moving project cargo pieces...

Beaumont receives new mobile harbor crane.
February 9, 2009... Longshoremen position the tower sections of the Port of Beaumont's $5.3 million Leibherr mobile harbor crane on flatbeds for transport to the construction site. The crane, received last month, has a maximum 154-ton capacity and at its full...

Napolitano refocuses security efforts.
February 9, 2009... BYLINE: ARI NATTER DHS will emphasize surface transportation modes, security at U.S. borders The woman who will be the first Democrat to head the Department of Homeland Security has surface transportation and supply chains in her...

Houston's Kornegay to retire.
February 9, 2009... H. Thomas Kornegay, the long-time executive director of the Port of Houston Authority, announced his intention to retire. At press time, he anticipated his retirement to become effective on Feb. 1. Kornegay's retirement brings to a close...

Journal of Commerce, Traffic World and Shipper Group magazines to merge.
February 9, 2009... The Journal of Commerce and Traffic World will be merged into a weekly newsmagazine effective with the March 2 issue. Also merging into the JoC will be the editorial content of UBM Global Trade's regional Shipper Group publications - Gulf...

Business slows, slamming rails.
February 9, 2009... Shippers, watching demand evaporate from their own industrial and retail customers alike, are booking far fewer trains as they close plants and lay off workers, and the impact is reverberating across rail networks that had been carefully...

Farming for compliance.
February 9, 2009... BYLINE: R.G. EDMONSON Shipping agricultural products complicates filing  Companies that export agricultural products are as willing as any other exporter to comply with the law, but the rules are working against them, according to...

Al Speight, formerly with Port of Corpus Christi, dies.
February 9, 2009... After a four-year battle with cancer, Al Speight, 55, passed away on Jan. 20. Prior to his illness, Speight was the port's head of industrial development. According to Corpus Christi newspaper the Caller-Times, Speight was key to several...

Celtic Marine founder Brendan O'Connor dies.
February 9, 2009... Brendan O'Connor, entrepreneur and founder of Celtic Marine, died in New Orleans on Jan. 22. He was 64. O'Connor, a native of Ireland, first worked in the maritime industry in New York, according to Baton Rouge newspaper The Advocate. He came...

Don Welch, long-time SC port director, dies at 78.(Obituary)
February 9, 2009... W. Don Welch, who transformed the Port of Charleston into a modern container port during 26 years as head of the South Carolina State Ports Authority, died on Jan. 20 in Vero Beach, Fla. He was 78. Mr. Welch joined the port authority in...

The threat of protectionism.
February 16, 2009... The accelerating freefall of the global economy in recent months has led to talk that we might be headed for a repeat of the Great Depression of the 1930s. The dynamics that led to that dark period in U.S. history, and how the shipping industry...

Grim times for steel imports.
February 16, 2009... BYLINE: JANET NODAR Excess capacity and dismal demand spell trouble It's pretty grim out there right now," said John Foster, chief operating officer and executive vice president of commercial for Coutinho & Ferrostaal Inc., the Houston...

Southeastern steel mills slowing plans, renegotiating in face of downturn.
February 16, 2009... Because of a sharp drop in demand, stainless steel production at ThyssenKrupp's new $4.5 billion steel mill will be delayed until late 2010. However, carbon steel production is expected to be under way by early 2010 and construction continues...

Houston appoints Battles as interim port chief.
February 16, 2009... The Houston Port Commission recently named Wade M. Battles as the interim executive director of the Houston Port Authority. Battles will serve as port chief while the commission looks for a permanent replacement for H. Thomas Kornegay, who...

Survival of the quickest.
February 16, 2009... BYLINE: JOHN GALLAGHER The fastest segment of the trucking industry is working even faster as the economy slows down and shippers seek less costly alternatives to move their freight. It's suddenly OK to move heavy freight that shippers...

Hoegh Autoliners to launch Galveston-to-Mideast service.
February 16, 2009... Port income exceeds expectations The Port of Galveston this month will become a load port for Hoegh Autoliners' U.S.-Middle East service calling at Abu Dhabi, Aqaba, Bahrain, Beirut, Dammam, Doha, Jebel Ali, Jeddah, Kuwait, Musqat, Iraq...

Melon season under way at Port of Tampa.
February 16, 2009... Port of Tampa longshoremen offload cases of Central American cantaloupes and honeydew melons from the Green Nova. Norway-based Green Reefers will continue the weekly service through April. Fresh Quest is the grower, shipper and marketer of the...

Work under way to block MR-GO.
February 16, 2009... The Army Corps of Engineers last month began to build a massive 430,000-ton rock barrier that will block the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet shipping channel, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune. For 45 years, the MR-GO was a 60-mile...

Associated Terminals christens new derrick barge.
February 16, 2009... The new Associated Terminals derrick barge T. Lange was transported to the christening site at the foot of Canal Street in New Orleans. The barge is named in honor of Senior Vice President Thomas Lange. It will be home based at St. Bernard. In...

Goodbye to all that.
February 23, 2009... This is the final printed issue of Gulf Shipper, and the writers who have been bringing you the latest Gulf shipping and transportation industry news, along with the copy editors and production staff, join me in bidding adieu to the print...

Goodbye, Gulf Shipper.
February 23, 2009... A look over the past 18 years That's all she wrote, folks. This is the last issue of Gulf Shipper. Subscribers will hereafter receive The Journal of Commerce, whose veteran editorial staff guarantee that the shipping and logistics...

Capt. A.J. Gibbs elected chairman of Port of New Orleans Commissioners.
February 23, 2009... The board of commissioners of the Port of New Orleans this month elected Capt. A.J. Gibbs as its chairman, succeeding James Campbell, whose term had expired. Campbell will continue to serve as a commissioner. Capt. Gibbs is president of...

Freedom from assets keeps middlemen viable.
February 23, 2009... BYLINE: PETER T. LEACH NVOs see opportunity to expand market share Like container carriers, ocean freight intermediaries are seeing their cargo volumes drop. But unlike the carriers, their bottom lines are not dragged into the red by...