>Such extended tugboat escorts aren’t required or even customary in Baltimore or at many other U.S. ports, mostly because of the costs they would add for shippers. But with the increasing size of cargo ships and the threat they pose to bridges and other critical infrastructure, some are questioning whether they should be.
>“I’m a big fan of tug escorts,” said Joseph Ahlstrom, a member of the Board of Commissioners of Pilots of the State of New York, which regulates the state’s harbor pilots. “If applied early enough and effectively, yes, a tug escort could prevent a collision with the bridge or with another ship, or going aground.”
Cheap transportation propels globalization. Add risking vital infrastructure like the Key bridge to the use of inferior grades of bunker fuel (which is the likely cause of the power failure that led to this “accident”). The risk is borne by all of us, and Maersk’s losses will be reimbursed by insurance.
The incentive is for this to happen again, just as it happened when one of these vast container carrier ships, the [Ever Given blocked the Suez Canal in 2021](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Suez_Canal_obstruction). (It was finally nudged loose by tugboats.)
1 comment
>Such extended tugboat escorts aren’t required or even customary in Baltimore or at many other U.S. ports, mostly because of the costs they would add for shippers. But with the increasing size of cargo ships and the threat they pose to bridges and other critical infrastructure, some are questioning whether they should be.
>“I’m a big fan of tug escorts,” said Joseph Ahlstrom, a member of the Board of Commissioners of Pilots of the State of New York, which regulates the state’s harbor pilots. “If applied early enough and effectively, yes, a tug escort could prevent a collision with the bridge or with another ship, or going aground.”
Cheap transportation propels globalization. Add risking vital infrastructure like the Key bridge to the use of inferior grades of bunker fuel (which is the likely cause of the power failure that led to this “accident”). The risk is borne by all of us, and Maersk’s losses will be reimbursed by insurance.
The incentive is for this to happen again, just as it happened when one of these vast container carrier ships, the [Ever Given blocked the Suez Canal in 2021](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Suez_Canal_obstruction). (It was finally nudged loose by tugboats.)