Page 8: of Marine News Magazine (June 2015)

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BY THE NUMBERS

Inland Boat Building

Inland Boat Builders, by the numbers have experienced impressive, and runs well over 100 units. Most of those a pretty good run in the past ? ve years. Among those are based on Sneed’s own 87 x 32-ft., 2,000-to-2,600 HP builders, few (if any) have been as busy on the inland side vessel design, but Sneed will build based on a customer’s of the ledger as Sneed Shipbuilding. The U.S. Maritime design, as well. That said, Sneed maintains a robust in-

Administration in 2013 produced a report entitled, “The house custom design shop and can alter the layout to suit

Economic Importance of the U.S. Shipbuilding and Repair- the customer’s preferences.

ing Industry.” Within that report, chock full of statistics, The customer list is long and impressive and includes it became apparent that U.S. Shipbuilding today is, by such names as Enterprise, Buffalo Marine, Kirby, Blessey and large, inland shipbuilding. That’s hardly a surprise Marine, Lebeouf Towing, Settoon Towing, Golding given that all but a handful of the ~40,000 odd U.S.- Barge Lines, McDonough Marine and Central Boat ? agged Jones Act hulls in service today can be considered Rentals, just to name few. Indeed, the list of domestic brown water vessels or workboats. And the output of the inland operators not considered Sneed clients is quite reported 117 U.S. yards, as chronicled by Marad itself short. As a general rule, Sneed has produced about twice over a three year span, bears this out (see Table 1). as many tugs as barges in recent years, but the list of both

Since 1966, Sneed Shipbuilding has been a leading is no less impressive, as depicted in Table 2. provider of American-made marine vessels for both in- The volume of the Sneed production output is only ex- land and offshore applications. It engineers, designs and ceeded by the variety of the units produced. These include builds a wide variety of steel vessels, including tugboats, numerous inland and offshore deck and tank barges as large and small inland and offshore deck barges, tank well as specially barges and pressure barges, tugboats and barges, push boats, pressure barges and custom-designed Towboats – 2,000 to 10,000 HP, Push Boats, Lift Boats, dry-docks to ? t a wide variety of speci? c customer needs. Shift Boats, Inland and ABS Offshore Deck Barges, Inland

The pace of quality construction at the combined Sneed Tank Barges, Pressure Barges and Custom Dry Docks.

yards during the time frame 2009 – 2016 borders on pro- Sneed builds inland tow boats in two locations: the main li? c, with vessels being delivered at an astonishing rate of yard in Channelview, Texas and one other, in New Ibe- more than one per month during that eight-year span. ria, Louisiana. A wholly owned and operated facility in

That’s the quintessential de? nition of “series build” capa- Orange, Texas produces inland and offshore deck barges bilities, something the foreign yards have taken to anoth- as well as dry docks. At the Channelview Facility, Sneed er level and one which, apparently, Sneed also embraces. operates 4 ? oating dry docks and has full service repair

A list of the inland tugs and barges built by Sneed since capabilities for both inland boats and tank barges. Two 2009, along with the ones they are currently building is shifts for repair are maintained in Channelview.

The M/V Guaran Feeder was built at Sneed Shipyard in Channelview and exported to Paraguay.

June 2015 8 MN