(JACKSONVILLE, Fla.; May 6, 2010) Crowley Maritime Corporation and its employees this week donated $80,000 to the American Red Cross in support of Haiti relief efforts.

Bill Pennella, Crowley vice chairman and executive vice president; Francheska Acevedo, Crowley human resources representative and John Hourihan, senior vice president and general manager of Crowley’s Latin America service, presented the check to Jack Morgan, CEO of the Northeast Florida Chapter of the American Red Cross.

Shortly after the massive earthquake, Crowley, who offers weekly scheduled commercial cargo service to Haiti, announced to its employees that the company would match all donations dollar-for-dollar made specifically to the American Red Cross Haiti relief fund. Crowley employees and crewmembers throughout the U.S. and abroad participated in the charity drive.

“The gift from Crowley employees and Crowley Maritime to the American Red Cross International Response Fund in support of Haiti relief efforts will have a significant impact on those lives devastated by this disaster,” said Morgan. “Crowley and its employees contributions will touch many lives as they rebuild.”

In addition to making this monetary donation, Crowley worked closely with the U.S. Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM) after the disaster to reopen direct cargo operations in Haiti, allowing humanitarian relief from multiple shippers to enter the country. Crowley successfully completed the largest post-disaster lightering operation to date on Jan. 28 when the company successfully discharged 202 20-foot containers of relief supplies across a beach in Port-au-Prince. Crowley also mobilized two 400-foot-long, 100-foot-wide flat deck barges, along with two Manitowoc 230-ton crawler cranes that are still serving as a makeshift dock for cargo operations, as the port is rebuilt.

About the American Red Cross, Northeast Florida Chapter: www.nefloridaredcross.org

About Crowley: www.crowley.com

See also:

• Professional Mariner’s Special Report: U.S. mariners do the heavy lifting at quake-ravaged Haitian capital
• gCaptain’s full coverage of Haiti Earthquake

By Steve Sternberg, USA TODAY

The U.S. Navy hospital ship Comfort pulled up anchor Tuesday in Port-au-Prince and began the long trip home to Baltimore, ending its role in Operation Unified Response-Haiti.

The ship’s departure brings to a close a dramatic naval mission launched three days after the Haitian earthquake Jan. 12, when the ship’s crew ended scheduled maintenance midway and set sail to provide medical relief to a nation whose hospitals and clinics lay in ruins.

From Jan. 19 to Feb. 27, doctors treated nearly 1,000 patients, performed 843 surgeries, carried out 37 amputations, repaired dozens of bone fractures and delivered nine babies, says Capt. James Ware, the ship’s commanding officer. By late February, Ware says in an e-mail, the Haitian government began working with the Pan American Health Organization and other groups to improve the medical care on shore “with the ambition of building back to pre-earthquake medical levels.”

White House spokesman Tommy Vietor says the time has come to call the Comfort home. “The doctors on the USNS Comfort did a heroic job treating patients following the earthquake in Haiti and provided essential short-term support, but the Comfort is not a long-term solution,” he says.

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• gCaptain’s full coverage of Haiti Earthquake

Crowley Liner Services Inc. has received a contract worth up to $22 million from the U.S. military to provide emergency port services in Haiti.

The Jacksonville-based shipping company will repair Port-au-Prince’s piers and beaches, provide warehousing, cargo consolidation, and transport cargo, according to the U.S. Transportation Command contract. The contract runs until April 15.

Crowley has been able to bring in containers into Port-au-Prince despite the city’s piers still being under repair. The company used a process called lightering, where smaller vessels with roll-on/roll-off capabilities unload cargo from a large container ship and bring it ashore without using a traditional dock.

Crowley has also shipped containers to the Dominican Republic, from where they were trucked into Haiti. Under the contract, Crowley will also build a temporary pier at Port-au-Prince and use a crane to unload cargo onto the shore.

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By Peter Slevin; Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, February 1, 2010

PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI — International relief organizations backed by American soldiers delivered hundreds of tons of rice to homeless residents of the Haitian capital Sunday, laboring to ease a food shortage that has left countless thousands struggling to find enough to eat.

But even as food-aid workers enjoyed their most successful day since the Jan. 12 earthquake, the increasingly prominent role of U.S. troops and civilians in the capital is creating high expectations that the Obama administration is struggling to contain.

The needs are extraordinary, and the common refrain is that the Americans will provide.

"I want the Americans to take over the country. The Haitian government can’t do anything for us," said Jean-Louis Geffrard, a laborer who lives under a tarp in the crowded square. "When we tell the government we’re hungry, the government says, ‘We’re hungry, too.’ "

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From hurricanes to tsunami’s earthquakes, today’s levels of population growth coupled with global climate change is putting an increasing number of people at risk. What is not changing rapidly is the development and implementation of ideas to mitigate crisis.

What seems most promising is the idea that, rather than create new plans for new problems, borrow the ideas and resources from others. A good example of this is technology. Nearly two years ago we mentioned the use of Twitter to help locate victims and coordinate response efforts during crisis. Twitter already worked great for locating friends at nearby bars, so it was just a matter of rethinking it’s use as an emergency tool.

So what other systems are already in place to provide rapid support on a global scale? Specific to this blog… What maritime systems are already in place to provide rapid support on a global scale? In a post titled Urgent Solutions ~ Fast, Flexible, Scalable, Now, Joost Bonsen suggests the use of continerized solutions to support relief efforts in Haiti. He writes:

I’ve written before about the usefulness of containerized infrastructure and floating infrastructure – e.g. hospital ships, power generation barges, containerized health clinics, and more. Devastation in post-quake Port-au-Prince — and, btw, in other disaster-struck or war-ravaged recovery zones — demands that we invest heavily in ramping up and deploying many more of these urgent solutions, certainly as an essential part of rebuilding Haiti properly. Here’s further examples of fast, flexible, scalable, and re-deployable container-systems which are all needed now. First of all, water desalination and purification, for instance this HOH-USA unit…

While the idea has merit you must also consider the logistics involved in locating and transporting highly specialized containers. First, ships do not move at great speed and it takes time to load them. Second, finding containers designed for special missions and relocating them to a single port is a time consuming task regardless of the availability of a ship to put them on.

But the truth is that this idea is already being effectively implemented on a global scale by the US military in the form of prepositioned ships. For those unfamiliar with the program, propositioned vessels are commercial ships contracted by the military to sit idle at locations throughout the world. Although these ships rarely move, they are crewed with a full compliment of mariners and loaded down with all the items needed by troops engaged in conflict (Trucks, generators, food, desalination plants, medical supplies…) The thought being that, if a war breaks out, ships will be nearby and ready to supply the military at a moments notice.

If the idea works for the military, why couldn’t it work for humanitarian missions? I propose that, along with the Army and Navy, that the US Coast Guard be given a budget for prepositioning ships throughout the world. The cargo aboard these ships, however similar, would have a distinctly different mission… to be always ready so others might live.

On the ground in Haiti, search-and-rescue teams and aid workers have used collaborative tools, text messaging and GPS technology to map out and coordinate relief efforts. Out in Port-au-Prince harbor, U.S. Coast Guard teams are using similar tools to restore Haiti’s shattered main seaport.

The Coast Guard cutter USCGC Oak is currently at anchor near the port terminal in downtown Port-au-Prince. Among other things, the Oak deployed a Maritime Transportation System Recovery Unit, a team that is helping the Haitian Port authority get things up and running at the port. In some respects, it’s the maritime equivalent of the Air Force special operations team that helped restore air traffic control at Haiti’s main airport.

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See The Cargo Letter: Jan. 21 2010 — Marine Engineers Bring Strength from the Sea »

Also:

• Jan. 15 2010 — Rescue — U.S. Coast Guard First On Scene
• Jan. 17-18 2010 — Rescue Continues

The second phase of earthquake relief for Haiti is under way as 200 tons of heavy equipment and building materials are being loaded onto a cargo ship Monday at the Port of Fort Pierce.

Monday at the Fort Pierce Harbor, Samaritan’s Purse International Relief load the 235 foot Caribe Star 1 for Haiti. Atlantic Caribbean Line owns the 235 foot long landing craft barge that is design for ocean going. They are taking over $3 million dollars worth of equipment and supplies to Haiti. Click here to see 16 more photos of the operation » 

Fort Pierce, Florida

Once full of supplies for Samaritan’s Purse International Relief, the Caribe Star 1 is expected to set sail Monday night and arrive Friday morning at the dock of a former cement factory near Port-au-Prince.

As the supplies and equipment were being positioned at the port Monday morning, Luther Harrison, director of North American projects for Samaritan’s Purse, said the Boone, N.C.-based charity already had a team of 60 in Haiti when the earthquake hit.

Since then, he said, 19 medical personnel at the Baptist Haiti Mission Hospital in Fermathe southeast of Port-au-Prince have been treating wounds, performing surgery and caring for the sick. Also, 40 Samaritan’s Purse staffers are distributing rolls of plastic for temporary shelter, solar flashlights, blankets, community water filters and water purification packets.

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January 25, 2010 / New Albany Tribune

A New Albany company continued its relief service in Haiti last week when Hornblower Marine Services activated its second high-speed boat to help with rescue efforts.

Hornblower sent one vessel, as instructed by the Maritime Administration, to Haiti after the country was struck Jan. 12 by an earthquake. Now the Alakai will join its sister ship — the Huakai — in Haiti to carry humanitarian supplies.

The Alakai is a high-speed boat, formerly known as the Hawaii Superferry. It’s a 352-foot ship that can carry more than 800 passengers and has a cargo deck capacity of 25,000 square feet.

With the ability to travel at speeds of more than 30 knots, or more than 35 miles per hour, the Alakai will be useful for transferring people away from the impacted areas of the country.

Hornblower Marine Services “has mobilized its team and is bringing in resources to bear from all of its operations world-wide,” stated the company’s president and CEO, John Waggoner in a news release.

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photos from http://macprohawaii.blogspot.com

JACKSONVILLE, Fla.; Jan. 22, 2010 – Crowley Maritime Corporation, working under contract with the U.S. Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM), successfully discharged 12 20-foot containers of relief supplies across a beach in Port-au-Prince, Haiti today in an experimental lightering operation. The success of this operation, which involved lifting the containers from a Crowley container ship anchored in the harbor to a smaller, shallow-draft landing vessel for transport and discharge over the beach, paves the way for container shipments directly into Port-au-Prince next week.

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