Towboats Still in Demand

by Alan Haig-Brown
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Cummins Vessel Reference #610

The towboat Baffin Bay on the Tennessee River. Jeff L. Yates photo

In spite of the economic gloom of 2010, the demand for solid reliable towboats for the US Inland waterways has continued. An example of this is Higman Marine Services’ latest addition. The final month of 2010 saw yet another towboat added to the fleet of their subsidiary Higman Barge Lines. As with many earlier boats The M/V Baffin Bay was built by Hope Services of Dulac Louisiana. But this boat is one of the newly designed and larger 78 by 34-foot vessels. Hull number 174 from Hope’s yard is also the 36th vessel from Hope for Higman.

The boat continued the long established practice at Hope Services of installing a pair of 38-liter Cummins tier 2 compliant KTA38 engines each rated for 1000 HP at 1800 RPM. The engines turn into Twin Disc540 gears with 6.14:1 reduction. The two 85 kW generator sets are powered by Cummins 6BTA engines.

Paducah Kentucky-based photographer Jeff L. Yates took the attached photo ion January 7, 2011 as she was holding against the right descending bank of the Tennessee River, probably waiting for improved weather conditions on the Ohio River. Jeff reports that she was en-route from Decatur, Alabama to Houston Texas and pushing two barges at the time.


For further information:

Joe Gregory
Territory Sales Manager
Cummins Mid-South, Inc.
110 East Airline Hwy.
Kenner, LA 70062
USA
Phone: 504 465 3404
E-mail: joe.gregory@cummins.com

Rocky Henderson
President
Hope Services Inc.
8506 Shrimpers Row,
Dulac, LA 70353-2206
Phone: 985 563 7801
E-mail: Rocky@hopeservicesinc.com

Alan Haig-Brown

Alan Haig-Brown

Over 30 years as an author for global commercial marine and fishing publications backed with hands-on experience on commercial fishing boats and coastal freighters makes Alan Haig-Brown uniquely qualified to provide vessel reference articles for Cummins Marine. You can find him in shipyards around the world, and on his own website, www.haig-brown.com.

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