Topic starter
03/09/2011 2:44 pm
Just an FYI...ACL the parent company of Jeffboat has moved Jeffboat's big drydock from Jeffersonville and took it to Cairo. This means there are no drydocks within 300 miles in either direction large enough for the BELLE OF LOUISVILLE. The cost of repairs for the BELLE just skyrocketed.
03/09/2011 2:51 pm
Jim, what about Mt. Vernon? Or th emouth of Green River?
Topic starter
04/09/2011 2:11 pm
Bob, I've been out of it a few years since I retired, you could be right. Kenny Howe and I were discussing this the other day and Kenny is the one who said he didn't know of any drydock closer than Huntington or Paducah.
No matter if there are drydocks a little closer, you know there is a lot of things that go into the cost of repairs. Jeffboat always cut the BELLE some slack and the local inspectors knew the boat, the operations and the crew and they gave the BELLE the benefit of a doubt sometimes. I'm not sure another shipyard or inspection office will do the same.
04/09/2011 3:23 pm
Good points, Jim. I don't know about the dock at Mt. Vernon, but if the one at the mouth of the Green were big enough to handle the job, the inspectors would come out of Louisville.
10/09/2011 11:48 am
Jim Reising;27179 wrote: Jeffboat always cut the BELLE some slack and the local inspectors knew the boat, the operations and the crew and they gave the BELLE the benefit of a doubt sometimes. I'm not sure another shipyard or inspection office will do the same.
That may have been the case years ago, but as a member of the engineering crew on the Belle now, it has been my experience that the Inspectors, while they do know us and the boat, they do not let anything slide by. They have been cooperative in the recent past on inspections and repair, but to say they were any less strict on us would be an understatement. She's a fine boat and kept that way by a fine crew, I wouldn't doubt her ability to pass any inspectors test now.