Posted on 08/16/2006 7:39:31 AM PDT by GATOR NAVY
NORFOLK - The Savannah, described by some as the most famous ship in the James River Reserve Fleet, arrived under tow Tuesday at Colonna's Shipyard for a sprucing up - and the start of a new life.
The sleek, white vessel was the world's first and the nation's only nuclear-powered cargo and passenger ship - the brainchild of President Eisenhower and part of his Atoms for Peace program in the 1950s.
The work at Colonna's - where the behemoth can be seen across the Elizabeth River from Harbor Park - is primarily preventive maintenance.
It launches a larger government plan to remove the inactive nuclear plant, clean out any remnant radiation and prepare the ship for a new mission as a museum.
Officials with the U.S. Maritime Administration, the caretaker of the reserve fleet and the Savannah's owner, said the ship could be put up for donation as a museum as early as 2010.
Hampton Roads could be in the running.
The federal agency has identified the region as one of three East Coast ports preferred to carry out the ship's nuclear decommissioning. That process, overseen by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, could take more than three years and pump $50 million of shipyard and engineering contracts into the community, officials with the administration said.
The agency is holding a public meeting from 6 to 9 p.m. Thursday at Nauticus to discuss "tentative plans" for bringing the work to Hampton Roads. It would involve pulling out the ship's nuclear plant facilities.
The other two ports being considered are Charleston, S.C., and Wilmington, N.C.
"There are a number of Hampton Roads shipyards and other companies interested in bidding," Erhard Koehler, the agency's project manager, said.
The site of the ship's nuclear dismantling "is in no way tied" to where it would become a museum, Koehler said.
However, he added: "Obviously there are some ports that would like to have the ship as a museum offering themselves" for the decommissioning work.
A decision on who removes the reactor should be made by the end of this year, Koehler said.
The $995,000 contract won by Colonna's Shipyard includes repairing leaks on the main deck, cleaning interior staterooms, repairing cargo wenches and upgrading the lighting, said Richard Sobocinski, the shipyard's vice president of contracts. The work will ready the ship for the next step - hiring a shipyard to blast and repaint the hull. A contract will be awarded this fall.
On Tuesday, under partly sunny skies, a steady breeze and 1 -foot seas, agency officials watched from a boat as three tugs muscled the Savannah into a shipping channel to begin the five-hour trip to Colonna's. The ship likely will never return to the reserve fleet, nicknamed the "ghost fleet," in waters off Fort Eustis in Newport News.
The 36-nautical-mile tow took it under the James River Bridge and over the Monitor-Merrimac Bridge-Tunnel. It paraded by the downtown waterfront before passing under the Berkley Bridge.
Its steel hull was pocked by rust-colored water stains and gray patches where the original primer paint was showing. Despite its faded beauty, the sweeping lines of the national historic landmark, resembling a yacht's, drew one enthusiast to make a four-hour drive.
Jim Lemon drove from Lynchburg to snap photos of the ship from Harbor Park as the tugs maneuvered it down the river's Eastern Branch and alongside a pier in Colonna's yard.
Lemon, 73, a retired mechanical engineer, worked for the company that designed and manufactured major components of the Savannah's nuclear plant.
"It made my heart stop," Lemon said. He last saw the ship in the 1980s, when it was moored near Charleston as a floating museum. "It's a beautiful ship."
# Reach Jon W. Glass at (757) 446-2318 or jon.glass@pilotonline.com.
By many measures, the ship was a success. She performed well at sea, her safety record was impressive, her fuel economy was unsurpassed, and her gleaming white paint was never smudged by exhaust smoke. Even her cargo handling equipment was designed to look good. From 1965 to 1971, the Maritime Administration leased Savannah to American Export-Isbrandtsen Lines in the revenue cargo service.
However, Savannah's cargo space was limited to 8,500 tons of freight in 652,000 cubic feet (18,000 m³). Many of her competitors could accommodate several times as much cargo. Her streamlined hull made loading the forward holds laborious, which became a significant disadvantage as ports became more and more automated. Her crew was a third larger than comparable oil-fired ships. Her operating budget included the maintenance of a separate shore organization for negotiating her port visits and a personalized shipyard facility for completing any needed repairs. The on-board crew received special training after completing all training requirements for conventional maritime licenses.
No ship with these disadvantages could hope to be commercially successful. Her passenger space was wasted while her cargo capacity was insufficient. As a result of her design handicaps, Savannah cost approximately US$2 million more per year in operating subsidies than a similarly sized Mariner-class ship with a conventional oil-fired steam plant. The Maritime Administration decommissioned her in 1972 to save costs, a decision that made sense when fuel oil cost US$20 per ton. In 1974, however, when fuel oil cost $80 per ton following an energy crisis, Savannah's operating costs would have been no greater than a conventional cargo ship. (Maintenance and eventual disposal are other issues, of course.)
Yes.
Instead, nuclear power was abandoned and ship design shortly thereafter was changed to accomodate containerized cargo. Still, it's a shame they're not going to repower the ship with a conventional boiler.
You have to go back up and reread the article
I seem to recall reading that it used cobalt hardened valves in the primary coolant loop. The cobalt leached out of the valves, was activated to Co60 in the core, and then was deposited outside of the core shielding. May have confused that with some other reactor with that problem though.
Still, What's a cargo wench?
Looks like you may well need a winch to hold up that wench's hooters.
A wench-winch.
You're quite right about RKABA but only half-right about Co60. The coolant isolation valves probably did use an alloy with Co. It doesn't 'leach', but escapes as macroscopic wear products large enough to be filtered.
Savannah's problems were entirely economic and political - not radiological. With sufficient funds, there are no RadCon problems.
Wow - what a brilliant statement, "with sufficient funds." There isn't ever a problem with anything if you can throw enough money at it. A genius like you should run for public office. Yours is the level of insight that most Kongressmen have.
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