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AMO endures turbulent ride on industry's endless cycle of gain, loss
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By MICHAEL R. McKAY
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Like all U.S. merchant marine officers' unions, American Maritime Officers rides an endless cycle of gain and loss in a steadily shrinking and ever-shifting industry. But, as the largest, strongest, most stable and secure union of its kind, AMO is best able to endure the disappointments this cycle can produce.
For example, our union was notified recently that the U.S.-built double-hulled oil product tankers Seabulk Mariner, Seabulk Courage and Seabulk Energy--operated under AMO contract by Seabulk International--would be chartered to Chevron USA's Chevron Shipping Co. for Jones Act service on the West Coast for at least nine years. The Seabulk tankers will replace three aging single-skinned Chevron tankers as the Chevron ships are retired under OPA '90, the Oil Pollution Act of 1990.
Under the agreement between Chevron and Seacor Holdings--which acquired the Seabulk International tanker and tug fleets in 2005--Chevron can charter a fourth Seabulk tanker for domestic service, but Chevron must exercise that option by Autumn 2006.
The Chevron-Seacor agreement-- a topic discussed at recent AMO membership meetings--provides for turnover of the Seabulk tankers to Chevron one at a time at 18-month intervals, beginning in the first quarter of 2007.
Because the agreement calls for "bareboat" charter of the Seabulk tankers, the AMO engine and deck officers aboard the Seabulk Mariner, Seabulk Courage and Seabulk Energy will have to leave their jobs to members of Chevron Shipping's contracted officers' union, the Marine Engineers Beneficial Association (MEBA gets no new employment under the bareboat charter agreement). In a deal driven exclusively by business considerations and negotiated without participation by any of the unions involved, AMO loses jobs on three ships. It's a tough turn for our union, but there is plenty of good news to offset it.
AMO holds its advantageous position, despite the Seabulk setback. Last year alone, 19 ships were added to our union's deep-sea fleet roster for service in commercial and government trades. This new tonnage represents long-term employment for AMO members and additional employer contributions to the AMO Pension, Medical, Vacation and Safety and Education Plans.
In addition, AMO members fill most of the licensed jobs aboard vessels providing specific and diverse defense services under Military Sealift Command and Maritime Administration charter.
Under these favorable circumstances, we are confident that officers displaced from the Seabulk tankers in the next 3 to 4 years will move smoothly and quickly into other deep-sea jobs in our union.
There are other AMO opportunities ahead, some certain and others flowing through the potential-and-promise pipeline:
- AMO members are aboard the new Z-drive tug Bulldog, operated by Crescent Towing of New Orleans. The vessel assists and escorts liquefied natural gas tankers arriving at and departing from the Elba Island re-gasification terminal in Savannah, Ga.
- U.S. Shipping Partners, which employs AMO through its subsidiaries, will take delivery of three articulated tug-barges in the next three years. AMO engine and deck officers already man the integrated tug-barges Baltimore, Groton, Jacksonville, Mobile, New York and Philadelphia and the tankers Chemical Pioneer, Charleston, Houston and Sea Venture in the U.S. Shipping Partners fleet.
- Three more articulated tug-barges will be delivered in the next three years to Maritrans Operating Partners LP, which has collective bargaining agreements with our union. AMO members now fill the licensed jobs on the Maritrans tankers Allegiance, Diligence, Integrity, Perseverance and Seabrook.
- U.S. Shipping Partners is negotiating with General Dynamics NASSCO in San Diego for the series construction of 45,000-deadweight-ton double-hulled product tankers for service in domestic markets. The talks could lead to as many as 10 new ships that would be manned by AMO.
- Maritrans, Seacor Holdings and Crowley Maritime Corp. are also said to be considering tanker construction projects with General Dynamics NASSCO, formerly National Steel and Shipbuilding Co. Crowley owns the tankers Blue Ridge and Coast Range, which are operated under AMO contract by Intrepid Personnel and Provisioning Inc.
- An agreement between the Alaska Gas Pipeline Authority and Totem Ocean Trailer Express, or TOTE, could lead to jobs for AMO members aboard liquefied natural gas tankers carrying LNG from Alaska to the West Coast of the Lower 48. TOTE is a unit of American Shipping Group. American Shipping Group also includes Interocean American Shipping, which has collective bargaining agreements with AMO. Interocean American Shipping now operates the TOTE roll-on/roll-off ships Westward Venture, Great Land, North Star and Midnight Sun, as well as the roll-on/roll-off El Morro, El Yunque and El Faro (formerly Northern Lights) for Sea Star Line, another unit of American Shipping Group. The TOTE LNG tanker project rests upon settlement of a dispute between the Alaska Gas Pipeline Authority and the oil companies that own natural gas reserves beneath Alaska's North Slope, source of the crude oil that feeds through the Trans-Alaska Pipeline south to the U.S.-flagged tanker terminal in Valdez. In December 2005, the gas pipeline authority filed an antitrust suit charging two oil majors with conspiring to refuse to sell the North Slope gas.
- Pasha Hawaii Transport Lines is so pleased with the success of the car carrier Jean Anne--operated under AMO contract between California and Hawaii--that it is in the market for a second ship for the trade. Interocean American Shipping operates the Jean Anne.
These developments ease AMO's passage through the occasionally rough twists experienced by all licensed seagoing unions. They portend continued growth for our union, and we will do everything we can politically, professionally and practically to make all of them materialize in the interest of even greater job and benefit security for AMO members everywhere.
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