Page 50: of Marine News Magazine (August 2020)

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DK: We have 14 active push tugs and more than 150 look at what the state is offering. It’s hard for me to say, ‘I barges. By and large, the tugs are all twin screw river push want you to go work out in the weather, no matter what it tugs with horsepower ranging from 3,000-5,000 hp. We is, for 12 hours a day on steel decks, days, nights weekends. don’t have anything on order at the moment, but that’s And I doubt that I’ll be able to pay you as much as you’re not to say that we wouldn’t build if the right opportunity making on unemployment.’ came along. DK: We knew we had a duty to the nation to keep com- merce ? owing on the waterways. We were able to keep go-

How has the coronavirus pandemic materi- ing, but it did come with major changes. Obviously, we ally impacted your company to date, both weren’t going to do it without keeping our mariners and from a business and operational standpoint? other employees safe. Probably like a lot of other business,

LN: Certainly, COVID-19 has impacted the adminis- we had to stand up a COVID-19 response plan. We acti- trative side of the business. I’ve been the only one work- vated out internal incident management system, and we ing in the of? ce since March 17 as everyone else is work- used an incident command system, or ICS. We had to put ing from home. But as far as the real work – the work on everything that came with that, from medical screening to the water – that hasn’t changed a great deal. We’ve had to daily wellness checks. And then plan what we were going change some protocols to encourage people to socially dis- to do if we had an outbreak on board or at one of our fa- tance, and we’ve crewed our boats a bit differently where cilities. And then anyone that didn’t have to be at the site – we’re trying to keep the same people working together all mostly in our admin group – we switched to teleworking. the time. But the river keeps on rolling. It was a big challenge, and I would say it’s still a challenge

One of greatest impacts of this event has been trying to because we can’t get complacent when it comes to CO- hire people. We’re all looking for entry level position such VID-19. All the science shows it’s still out there. as deckhands and barge cleaners. But with what’s going on But I want to emphasize the resiliency of the maritime with unemployment and the amounts that are being paid industry, including inland barging. It just demonstrates for unemployment, it’s nearly impossible to ? nd people. what we’ve been saying for so many years that this infra-

It’s a one-size-? ts-all ? x, but $600 a week here is not the structure is so essential to the nation. It was really tested same as $600 in New York or L.A. And then you have to during this, but the importance of our industry is playing

UPPERRIVERSERVICES

Credit: Upper River Services

August 2020 50 MN