"Ghost Ship" Reefing Idea Resurrected in Louisiana
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As first reported in the MarEx 1st Quarter 2003 print edition (Scary Disposal Solutions tested by Wary Skeptics), Louisiana officials are revisiting the idea of sinking obsolete vessels in the waters immediately adjacent to the Louisiana coastline. The concept was first floated by MARAD back in 2003 at the Breaux Task Force and would have consisted of a one-ship pilot program. Working in concert with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the program was designed to see if the sunken vessel could assist Louisiana in addressing its barrier island erosion problems.
The unique idea had merit, at least as a conceptual model, following similar guidelines and procedures for already established artificial reefing program. Unfortunately, because the plan was poorly explained to the public, it was virtually “dead on arrival” in Louisiana. MARAD Administrator William Schubert, long since gone from that position, had no intention of sinking toxic, contaminated or unclean vessels in the swamps of the Sportsman’s Paradise. Local residents, however, couldn’t get by the visions of a watery junkyard off the coastline.
Fast forward to 2006 where Louisiana residents and the Corps of Engineers desperately search for solutions to not only an eroding coastline, but also the threat of a repeat of KATRINA’s destruction.
Louisiana State Senator Walter Boasso has recently been promoting the idea again. Boasso represents St. Bernard Parish, a sprawling mostly rural area situated southeast of New Orleans. The devastating floods which ravaged the parish, officials claim, were due mostly to a navigation channel that runs through the parish. Boasso proposes to sink the vessels in the channel in an effort to shore up and eliminate what has been dubbed the "hurricane superhighway."
MARAD spokespersons say that there are about 125 ships on the government disposal list. The conventional disposal route for most of these vessels has been to deliver them to scrap metal companies for recycling. The recent, intentional sinking of the former USS ORISKANY off the coast of Florida has opened the eyes of many to other possibilities. Although the ORISKANY was a naval vessel, MARAD once proposed sinking as many as 100 obsolete merchant vessels as a way to slow or stop the erosion of Louisiana’s coastline.
Then and now, some environmentalists believe that littering the coast with potentially dirty ships for any reason is a bad idea. In the wake of KATRINA’s destruction and the huge pollution problem which it spawned (the worst spill in Louisiana history occurred because of the storm), some are wondering which situation would have been the worst case scenario for Louisiana. Meanwhile, MARAD has ships to give, and Louisiana continues ponder how to best prepare for the next hurricane while save its eroding coastline.
