Vessel Traffic Overview

Updated:October 9, 2009 14:51

Tug Traffic in the Aleutians Subarea

 

Table 1 indicates that the typical fuel capacity of an ocean-going tug is about 100,000 gallons of non-persistent oil. Table 3 shows that 102 port calls were made at Dutch Harbor/Unalaska in 2004. Figure 13 shows the known locations and routes of tugs in the Aleutians Subarea. Dutch Harbor is the only location in the Aleutians Subarea where tugs are resident. Other tugs transit the subarea in trade with freight or tank barges. The major tug and barge operators in the Aleutians Subarea were contacted for this study. Table 7 contains a listing of tugs that were found to trade in the Aleutians Subarea.

There are four resident tugs in the region with sufficient horsepower and sea-keeping ability to potentially respond as a rescue/assist tug for a ship in distress. Additionally, there are about 200 voyages of other tugs through the region each year by tugs in trade. These transient tugs range from 1,200 to 7,000 horsepower. Many of the tug operators we interviewed stressed that tugs in trade usually have a barge in tow, which hampers their ability to respond to calls for emergency assistance.