Massive military cargo ship gets makeover in Philly
The Pfc. Eugene A. Obregon is the latest military ship to arrive at Dry Dock No. 3 at the Philadelphia Navy Yard for a routine inspection and repairs.
The Pfc. Eugene A. Obregon is the latest military ship to arrive at Dry Dock No. 3 at the Philadelphia Navy Yard for a routine inspection and repairs.
The 50,000-ton Obregon is longer than two football fields and vast enough for military vehicles to drive on and off. It's part of the U.S. military fleet that quickly transports tanks, trucks, humvees, and helicopters - and even ammunition - to troops around the world.
Northeast Ship Repair, owner of Philadelphia Ship Repair and a second dock in Boston, won the bid to do the work.
The Obregon, which arrived just before Christmas from Newport News, Va., will keep 100 welders, laborers, fitters, machinists, riggers, and electricians busy through early February, said Edward Snyder, president and CEO of Northeast Ship Repair.
Dry Dock No. 3 at the old Philadelphia Naval Shipyard is one of half a dozen repair yards on the East and Gulf Coasts that are big enough to handle "roll on/roll off" cargo vessels longer than 750 feet.
The ample Obregon is 821 feet long.
The Philadelphia yard had a banner year in 2014, a tougher time last year, and expects more work in 2016. Pending bids will determine that.
The Philadelphia and Boston ship yards each do one large ship at a time in dry dock and together might do six to eight in an average-to-good year, Snyder said. Contracts range from $2 million to $12 million, depending on the job's scope, he said.
Government and commercial ships that sail in U.S. waters are required by the Coast Guard to be "dry-docked" - taken out of the water - every three to five years for inspection.
"Even if a ship sat at a pier for four years, it is still required to do all the maintenance," including propeller, valve, and machinery inspections, paintwork, and blasting and coating the outside hull, Snyder said.
Keystone Shipping Co., in Bala Cynwyd, operates the Obregon and two sister ships, the Stephen Pless and Matej Kocak, for the government under contracts. The three ships, when operating, must be ready to sail within 72 hours of being notified by the Military Sealift Command to carry machinery to U.S. military anywhere in the world.
"The Philadelphia facility is a great facility. We've had several ships there," said Mitch Koslow, vice president of engineering at Keystone Shipping, which operates 24 ships, including the Obregon. It also runs nine commercial ships that transport iron ore, limestone, and coal on the Great Lakes.
"Size is one thing; you can put almost any ship in the American merchant marine on" the dry dock, Koslow said.
The Philadelphia yard "is in a good central location for labor and support industry," Koslow said. "And, of course, we're from Philadelphia, so where we can, we want to support the local economy."
The federal government pays for the inspections and maintenance. Keystone Shipping decides who will work on its ships.
In 2008, the owners of Boston Ship Repair decided to expand and come to Philadelphia. Dry Dock No. 3 was available for lease from the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corp.
The first ship, the USNS Pollux, arrived in January 2009. Since then, 31 others, including the USNS Bob Hope, have come for repairs, parts, or paintwork.
In 2013, Northeast Ship Repair was sold to NewSpring Capital of Radnor and Plexus Capital of Raleigh, N.C., for about $18.5 million.
In 2014, the company landed an $8.5 million government contract to strip five aged Navy guided-missile frigates at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. The ships were salvaged for parts and equipment that the Navy wanted for possible use on other active Navy vessels.
"About 75 percent to 80 percent of our work is government-contracted," Snyder said.
Now John Gazzola, Northeast Ship Repair's director of marine sales, is focused on getting more commercial business from container cargo shipping lines and tugboat and barge operators.
That work "will pretty much all be done in Philadelphia," Snyder said. "There's just more commercial traffic on the Delaware River than we have in Boston."
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