Good Times for Merchant Mariners? Newbuild Statistics Might Tell.

(Originally published June 2007)

The title of one story in this week’s MarEx Newsletter proclaims “Maritime Academy Graduation Heralds the Continuation of Good Times” and nothing affirms this better than a look into the order books of the world’s largest shipyards.

The information the following links comes from the Colton Company: “a small firm of specialized management consultants. Its principal consultant is Tim Colton, an industrial engineer, maritime economist and naval architect, with 49 years of experience in the shipbuilding industry, both in the U.S. and worldwide. Our business is helping your business to grow and to prosper”.

MarineLog tells us:

Tim Colton opens new maritime consultancy
Tim Colton, formerly president of international shipbuilding consultants Colton & Company, has returned to the consultancy biz after three years with Halter Marine. Colton, the perennial moderator of Marine Log’s “Shipbuilding Decisions” conference and a frequent contributor to Marine Log magazine”

Here are the pages of greatest interest:

Shipyard Activity in 2007. It seems that the Overseas Houston (in Aker’s Philadelphia Shipyard) is the only Unlimited tonnage being built this year.
Large Cruise Ships on Order. The largest of the large are two more Royal Caribbean’s “Freedom of the Seas” class, the world’s largest (by Gross Tons) cruise ships. They are being built by Aker Turku in Finland and are scheduled to launch in 2009 and 2010.
Offshore is seeing perhaps the largest growth with 13 Drillships and 39 Semi-Submersibles and 79 Jack-ups on order. View the list here.
And what is seemingly the Topic of the Day… LNG orders. With an impressive 143 ships ordered we understand the push to build terminals across the U.S.

Of great interest to U.S. Mariners; The U.S. Shipping Fleet. With seemingly every ship under the U.S. flag listed this (along with our own Merchant Fleet Chart) makes for an interesting read. Many thanks to Tim Colton for maintaining this resource. Visit the Colton Company’s Homepage for more valuable statistics.