Page 51: of Marine News Magazine (August 2017)

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FEATURE: VESSEL OPERATORS

Tidewater tug Captain Bob and barges

Credit: Stephen Cridland Crown Point

TIDEWATER TRANSPORTATION & TERMINALS feet,” explains CEO & President Bob Curcio. “There are

Over 46 million tons of international trade arrives an- times that the river is running very low, so we could get nually at the deep draft channel of the Columbia River. groundings if we don’t operate exactly in the channel area.”

That deep draft becomes the inland Columbia-Snake Riv- Wind is a challenge. The largest CSR reservoir is 76 er (CSR) navigation channel, heading east, transporting miles long, giving rise to wind speeds of 40 mph and high- more than 12 million tons of freight to ports in Oregon, er. “You can get up to 70 or 80 mph through the gorge,”

Washington and, eventually, 465 miles away to Lewiston, says Port Captain Brian Fletcher, “in that 76-mile pool, it’s

ID. Tidewater, established in 1932, is the largest barge not unheard of to have 10-foot rollers.” transportation company on the CSR system. The com- Marc Schwartz, Maintenance & Engineering Manager, pany owns and operates a ? eet of 16 towboats, 150 barges works with Tidewater’s boat captains and other experts to and four terminals providing liquids and solids terminal- develop customized vessels. These tugs “are not designed ing and transloading. for use on the Mississippi,” Curcio explains. “They can’t

This northwest passage presents numerous operational be used on blue water.” In fact, the specialty tugs are so challenges. Elevation increases almost 750 feet from the different from ocean and river-going vessels that Tidewater

Paci? c coast to Lewiston. The John Day lock, for example, struggles to retrain ocean and river tug captains new to lifts 105 feet. “The waterway is also fairly shallow, only 14 CSR operations.

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