NEWPORT NEWS - The U.S. Maritime Administration conceded Wednesday that
it will not meet a congressional deadline later this year for removing
all junk ships from the James River Reserve Fleet, also known as the
"Ghost Fleet." But officials said they are making good progress.
John Jamian , acting director of the agency, said two more
unwanted vessels soon will be towed away and scrapped at salvage yards
in Chesapeake and Baltimore - the 50th and 51st ships to be extracted
from the reserve fleet since January 2001 .
"This is an important milestone, an important day," said U.S.
Rep. Jo Ann Davis , R-1st District , who joined Jamian at a news
conference at Fort Eustis, just off the James River, with silhouettes
of the aging steel hulks in the background.
Davis has been a champion for allocating money to get rid of
the obsolete ships. Most of them contain waste fuels, heavy oils,
asbestos, lead, toxic PCBs and other contaminants that, if spilled,
could devastate the historic James. Congress approved spending $21
million on the disposal program this year, and President Bush has asked
for $26 million next year.
One of the vessels soon to leave the fleet, an experimental
Navy barge known as the UEB , is being sold for $76,000 to North
American Ship Recycling in Baltimore. The deal marks the first time in
years that the government will be paid for a junk ship, instead of
paying others to accept and scrap its toxic dinosaurs.
The other ship expected to go, the Howard W. Gilmore , a
submarine tender active during World War II, will be disposed of the
old way. Bay Bridge Enterprises , a salvage yard in Chesapeake, won a
recycling contract from the government worth $742,265 .
One of the few World War II-era ships left in the fleet, the
Gilmore is scheduled to be towed down the James to the Chesapeake yard
today , the Maritime Administration said.
Once those two vessels are gone, 47 ships will be left in the
Ghost Fleet awaiting the scrap heap. Another 12 ships, which could
still be of use in the future, also will remain moored in the middle of
the James, but they are not in line for dismantling, officials said.
Under a congressional mandate, the Maritime Administration was
supposed to have safely disposed of all unwanted, obsolete ships by
September . Jamian and others said they cannot meet this deadline,
given past funding constraints, but expected more ships to leave in the
months ahead.
There is no penalty for missing the deadline, Jamian said.
So many vessels have left since 2001 that the fleet has been
reshuffled to secure lines and moorings. In addition, no more ships are
located on the east side of the navigational channel in the James
River; all ships now are technically located in Isle of Wight County
waters, and not in Newport News, officials said.
Davis stressed that not all ships will vacate the fleet, which
has been a fixture in local waters since World War I and a favorite
spot for history buffs. She said newer vessels that have been drained
of any remnant bunker fuels will continue to anchor off Fort Eustis, as
well as crafts that the Navy or Army believe might be useful in future
missions.
Reserve fleets also can be found near Beaumont, Texas, and in
Suisan Bay, Calif. In all, the Maritime Administration cares for about
120 junk vessels, but the James River has hosted the oldest and most
environmentally risky among the three storage sites, officials said.
Jamian stressed that the flimsiest ships with the most chance
of leaking have all been removed from the James. He hoped that future
disposal contracts will be helped by high steel prices, driven largely
by China's appetite for cheap scrap steel.
He also did not rule out sending other ships to overseas scrap
yards. One such deal, to export as many as 13 junk vessels to Britain,
backfired in litigation and controversy two years ago and still has not
been consummated.