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12 MARITIME REPORTER & ENGINEERING NEWS ? JANUARY 2013 FIVE MINUTES WITH RICHARD BLUDWORTH, BLUDWORTH MARINE Please give our readers an overview of Bludworth Marine. When I started in 1998 we were strictly topside repairs, but since then we have branched out to start yards, and today we have two spots in Galveston, a spot in Channelview and Orange (all in Texas), which is the largest location. Actually we have two spots in Orange, but they are very close, only about a ½-mile apart. Our primary business is repair, but in the last two years 50% of our business has been new construction. We offer in-house engineering, and in total we have about 170 people.In general, how has business been? Well we?re done now with our new construction projects, but overall business has been good. Per- sonally I believe it is tied to general economic activity. When we started coming out of the recession, business activity started building again. I think all of that activity feeds our business.Houston has emerged as an offshore and maritime hub. Do you agree? It?s never slowed down here, really. There have been times when it has not grown a fast When the rest of the country is having a recession, it simply means we are not growing as fast. Except of course from 1983 to 1985; that was a different story ? we all jumped off the cliff then. What projects have kept your crews busy in the past year? We picked up a contract for 24 MarAd SeaBee barges, which en- tailed complete maintenance, repair and overhaul. It?s about a 12 month project and we are about half-way through it. Today we do about 3 to 4 barges at a time in Houston and in Galveston, refurbishing the SeaBee barges ? which includes steelwork, blast, paint and clean ? so that they can last another 20 years.We also have two 297-ft. petroleum barges that we?re converting into con- veyor barges for a new NUCOR Steel mill going in on the Mississippi River. They are going to have iron ore con-veyors on them, basically dock barges carrying iron ore from the vessel to the land. We cleaned the decks off, com- pleted all of the understructure for the conveyor system, and completed the engineering and the construction. We also do a steady stream of mo- bilizations and demobilizations on offshore construction vessels ? pipe- line, dive, etc., and also on ocean deck barges. Can you tell us about the recently completed new vessel construction projects? We built a pair of stainless steel acid barges in 2012; we built three Olin caustic potash barges; and we also built a couple of chemi-cal barges. All of the barges were in the 195 ft. range, except for the acid barge which was 260 ft. The offshore business is obviously a driver in your region. How has it fared of late? In a historical perspective, today?s business would just be OK. Hurricane Ike took out 100 percent of our waterfront capacity in 2008; in 2009 we had the recession; in 2010 we had the BP oil spill. On this side of the Gulf (the oil spill) really killed the business. So for the offshore industry, 2011 and 2012 have been a recovery from the steep drop off in 2008-2010. Comparatively, between 2003 and Richard Bludworth Bludworth Marine LLCRunning a ship repair business in the U.S. is anything but simple, with the unexpected being the norm and a cavalcade of new regulations. But Richard Bludworth has a penchant for turning the difficult simple. A sta- ple in the Gulf of Mexico, Bludworth Marine LLC was founded by Richard Bludworth in 1998, strictly as a top- side repair facility. Today the Bludworth Marine reach stretches to four waterfront facilities on the 103 mile run between Orange to Galveston, TX, with its HQ in Houston. Company founder Richard Bludworth recently spent some time with Maritime Reporter & Engineer- ing News to discuss the company?s past and promising future. By Greg Trauthwein, Editor MR #1 (10-17).indd 12MR #1 (10-17).indd 121/2/2013 10:13:25 AM1/2/2013 10:13:25 AM
