T&T Completes Argo Barge Salvage

Texas-based T&T Salvage has announced the completion of its remediation contract for the sunken barge Argo in Lake Erie, Ohio. The Argo went down in 1937 with a cargo of benzol, containing a high percentage of the known carcinogen benzene.

T&T is the only salvage company with a presence on the Great Lakes that is also officially registered as an Oil Spill Recovery Organization, and was chosen by the Coast Guard to lead the effort.

Benzol (similar to BTX) is a period-appropriate term for a mixture of benzene, toluene, and xylene. It was historically obtained from coal tar or coal gas and used as fuel. These compounds are hazardous, and T&T's response included the use of specially designed inert gas and vapor recovery sysems to ensure that toxic fumes would not endanger the safety of the public or the salvage team.

In conjunction with the Coast Guard, the federal and state-level Environmental Protection Agencies and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, T&T successfully achieved all response objectives, from around-the-clock contaminated water diving ops to sample collections.

The Argo was a high-priority recovery for environmental officials. Historical documents suggested that it went down with 100,000 gallons of crude oil and benzol, and NOAA had listed it as the most potentially hazardous shipwreck in the Great Lakes. 

In September, T&T responded to a tank barge collision in the Mississippi River, salvaging and lightering a damaged barge and managing a spill of 2,800 barrels of heavy clarified slurry oil. The slurry quickly sank to the river's bottom, and T&T designed a recovery system that included an environmental clam shell with a geo-referencing system to safely recover the sunken oil.

“These successful sub-surface pollution response operations demonstrate T&T’s unique combination of marine salvage and pollution response expertise,” said Jim Elliott, T&T’s Vice President.