Barge Carriers Bid for Lost Sea Trade

RISING labor costs over the past two decades have virtually driven American shipping from the seas. Because American crews are the best paid in the world—$444 a month for the average able-bodied seaman, for instance —even the most efficient U.S. cargo ships cannot match the lower costs of foreign operators. To recapture a share of seagoing trade, the Government and the domestic shipping industry have placed a $400 million bet on a technological innovation: huge ships that carry fully loaded barges—known as lighters—across the oceans.

This week the first U.S.-built LASH (for "lighter aboard ship") vessel is scheduled to dock near Philadelphia, completing a maiden voyage to the Mediterranean. Officers of Prudential-Grace Lines note that the Lash Italia 's round trip is taking only 34 days, compared with the normal 54 for a conventional carrier. By saving that much time—and, consequently, a good deal of money —U.S. shipowners expect to overcome their cost handicap.

The 820-ft., $21 million Lash Italia achieved its speed record not by moving at a superfast clip but by swiftly loading and unloading in ports. Most cargo ships spend half their time in port, including considerable waiting for dock space. The new ship can stay offshore, outside the port, while tugs deliver barges to it or pick up barges from it. The Lash Italia has a 500-ton capacity crane that hoists the vessel's 63 lighters (each 61 ft. long) over the stern and stows them in the open holds. Bypassing the crowded docks, the ship stopped at Barcelona for only eight hours instead of the usual 24, at Genoa for nine hours instead of two days.

Prudential-Grace's second barge-carrier, the Lash Turkiye, sailed two weeks ago on the same route as the Italia, and nine more LASH ships are under construction in the U.S. The vessels are designed to operate with a 31-man crew, but maritime unions forced Prudential to hire 38. Fearful of losing jobs because the barges can be unloaded in mid-harbor and towed to distant river points, longshoremen wrested a promise from shipowners to load only at dockside in the U.S. Despite such make-work arrangements, shipping men expect the LASH vessels to open a new era in ocean cargo transportation. If so, the Lash Italia could be the most important new American ship since the first Yankee clipper.