VT Halter Marine

Last updated
VT Halter Marine, Inc.
Type Shipbuilding, defense contractor
Industry Shipbuilding, arms industry
Founded1956;67 years ago (1956) in New Orleans, Louisiana
Founder
  • Harold Halter
  • Jimmy Dubuisson
DefunctNovember 14, 2022 (2022-11-14)
FateMerged into Bollinger Shipyards
Headquarters
Pascagoula, Mississippi [1]
,
United States
Parent Trinity Industries (1983-1996)

Friede Goldman International (1999-2003)

ST Engineering (2003-2022)
Website www.vthaltermarine.com

VT Halter Marine, Inc. was a shipbuilding company and an American subsidiary of ST Engineering. It was located in Pascagoula, Mississippi. It specializes in ship design and construction and serves both public and private clients, including the United States Department of Defense.

Contents

History

Harold Halter and Jimmy Dubuisson started the original company known as Halter Marine in 1956 in New Orleans; their first built vessel was a 26-foot pleasure boat. The original company would grow to employ more than 4,000 people at its height, but the decline of the offshore oil industry led Halter to sell the company to Trinity Industries in 1983, where it became part of Trinity Marine Group. In September 1996, Trinity spun off several bluewater shipyard assets as a separate company using the name Halter Marine Group, Inc. Friede Goldman International bought Halter Marine Group in 1999. The company was sold again to ST Engineering (Singapore Technologies Engineering Ltd) in 2003, where it began operating under the name VT Halter Marine Inc. [2]

In 2019, VT Halter was awarded a $1.9 billion contract by the United States Coast Guard for the design and construction of new Polar Security Cutter heavy icebreakers. [3] [4]

In November 2022, Bollinger Shipyards agreed to buy Halter Marine and the adjacent ST Engineering Halter Marine Offshore for $15 million from parent ST Engineering North America. The newly acquired shipyards was renamed to Bollinger Mississippi Shipbuilding and Bollinger Mississippi Repair respectively. [5] [6]

Safety

While working on an $87 million contract with the United States Navy to build a 350-foot ship in 2009, unsafe working conditions led to an explosion that killed two employees and injured five others. [7] [8] The company was fined $1.32 million by the United States Department of Labor for 17 willful and 11 serious violations, including willfully exposing workers to toxic fumes in a confined space. [9] According to Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis, the explosion "was a horrific and preventable situation. VT Halter Marine was aware of the hazards and knowingly and willfully sent workers into a confined space with an explosive and toxic atmosphere." [9]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Damen Group</span> Dutch shipbuilding company

The Damen Group is a Dutch defence, shipbuilding, and engineering conglomerate company based in Gorinchem, Netherlands.

Sentinel-class cutter United States Coast Guard cutter class

The Sentinel-class cutter, also known as the Fast Response Cutter due to its program name, is part of the United States Coast Guard's Deepwater program. At 154 feet (46.8 m), it is similar to, but larger than, the 123-foot (37 m) lengthened 1980s-era Island-class patrol boats that it replaces. Up to 58 vessels are to be built by the Louisiana-based firm Bollinger Shipyards, using a design from the Netherlands-based Damen Group, with the Sentinel design based on the company's Damen Stan 4708 patrol vessel. The Department of Homeland Security's budget proposal to Congress, for the Coast Guard, for 2021, stated that, in addition to 58 vessels to serve the Continental US, they requested an additional six vessels for its portion of Patrol Forces Southwest Asia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United States Coast Guard Cutter</span> Commissioned vessel of the U.S. Coast Guard

United States Coast Guard Cutter is the term used by the U.S. Coast Guard for its commissioned vessels. They are 65 feet (19.8 m) or greater in length and have a permanently assigned crew with accommodations aboard. They carry the ship prefix USCGC.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Davie Shipbuilding</span>

Davie Shipbuilding is a shipbuilding company located in Lauzon, Quebec, Canada. The facility is now operating as Chantier Davie Canada Inc. and is the oldest continually operating shipbuilder in North America.

Heritage-class cutter United States Coast Guard ship class

The Heritage-class cutter, also known as the Offshore Patrol Cutter and the Maritime Security Cutter, Medium, is a cutter class of the United States Coast Guard (USCG), developed as part of the Integrated Deepwater System Program and built by Eastern Shipbuilding and Austal USA. Construction of the first vessel in the class began in January 2019. As they are completed, it is expected that they will replace 270-foot (82 m) Famous- and 210-foot (64 m) Reliance-class Medium Endurance Cutters.

CCGS <i>John G. Diefenbaker</i> Canadian Heavy Polar Icebreaker

CCGS John G. Diefenbaker is the name for a Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker that had been expected to join the fleet by 2017 but has been significantly delayed. Her namesake, John G. Diefenbaker, was Canada's 13th prime minister. It was Diefenbaker's government that founded the Canadian Coast Guard in 1962.

<i>Harry DeWolf</i>-class offshore patrol vessel Class of Offshore Patrol Vessels

Harry DeWolf-class offshore patrol vessels are warships of the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) built within the Government of Canada Arctic and Offshore Patrol Ship (AOPS) procurement project, part of the National Shipbuilding Strategy. In July 2007 the federal government announced plans for acquiring six to eight icebreaking warships for the RCN.

Bollinger Shipyards is an American constructor of ships, workboats and patrol vessels. Its thirteen shipyards and forty drydocks are located in Louisiana and Texas. Its drydocks range in capacity from vessels of 100 tons displacement to 22,000 tons displacement. The firm was founded in 1946.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Huntington Ingalls Industries</span> American shipbuilding company

HII Corporate, formerly Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc., is the largest military shipbuilding company in the United States as well as a provider of professional services to partners in government and industry. HII, ranked No. 371 on the Fortune 500, was formed on 31 March 2011, as a spin-off of Northrop Grumman.

The National Shipbuilding Strategy (NSS), formerly the National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy (NSPS), is a Government of Canada program operated by the Department of Public Works and Government Services. The NSS was developed under the Stephen Harper Government in an effort to renew the fleets of the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) and the Canadian Coast Guard (CCG). The strategy was broken into three sections; the combat package, the non-combat package and the smaller vessel package. The companies who won the bids for the larger ships were not permitted to bid on the smaller vessel package. In 2019 the Trudeau Government decided to add a third shipyard to the NSS specializing in the construction of icebreakers for the Coast Guard. The agreement to incorporate Davie as a third shipyard within the NSS was finally signed in April 2023.

Eastern Shipbuilding Group is a shipbuilder based in Panama City, Florida that operates facilities in the Florida Panhandle in Panama City, Allanton, and Port St. Joe.

Polar Security Cutter program United States Coast Guard program

The Polar Security Cutter Program is a program to recapitalize the United States Coast Guard's aging fleet of icebreakers, currently consisting of the heavy icebreaker USCGC Polar Star and the medium icebreaker USCGC Healy, with three new multi-mission vessels referred to as Polar Security Cutters (PSC). These heavy polar icebreakers will allow the USCG to perform its statutory missions in the Arctic as well as support the United States Antarctic Program with Operation Deep Freeze.

75-foot patrol boat American Coast Guard patrol craft

The United States Coast Guard wooden-hulled 75-foot patrol boats were built during Prohibition to help interdict alcohol smugglers. Their nickname was derived from the slang term "six bits" meaning 75 U.S. cents.

USCGC Argus (WMSM-915) is the lead ship of the Heritage-class cutters of the United States Coast Guard (USCG), and a part of the OPC Ship Type. She is the second ship to be named after Argus Panoptes, the first being USRC Argus, a Revenue Cutter Service ship which was decommissioned and sold in 1804.

USCGC Chase (WMSM-916) is the second Heritage-class cutter of the United States Coast Guard (USCG).

USCGC Ingham (WMSM-917) is the third Heritage-class cutter of the United States Coast Guard (USCG).

USCGC Rush (WMSM-918) is the fourth Heritage-class cutter of the United States Coast Guard (USCG).

References

  1. ↑ "Facilities". VT Halter Marine, Inc. Retrieved 3 February 2020.
  2. ↑ "History - VT Halter Marine". VT Halter Marine, Inc. Retrieved 3 February 2020.
  3. ↑ LaGrone, Sam (24 April 2019). "VT Halter Marine to Build New Coast Guard Icebreaker". US Naval Institute News. Retrieved 25 April 2019.
  4. ↑ Kaur, Karamjit (25 April 2019). "ST Engineering lands $2.6 billion US Navy contract". The New Paper. Retrieved 25 April 2019.
  5. ↑ LaGrone, Sam (6 November 2022). "UPDATED: Bollinger to Buy Halter Marine Shipyard, Oversee Coast Guard Polar Security Cutter Program". US Naval Institute News. Retrieved 7 November 2022.
  6. ↑ "Bollinger acquires VT Halter Marine". www.workboat.com. Retrieved 2023-07-20.
  7. ↑ Gollan, Jennifer (11 February 2017). "The Deadly Danger of Trump's Naval Buildup". POLITICO. Retrieved 11 February 2017.
  8. ↑ VT Halter articles 2017-2020 from Reveal (podcast) by Center for Investigative Reporting. Retrieved 26 December 2020.
  9. 1 2 Zeveloff, Julie. "VT Halter Fined $1.3M After Fatal Boat Explosion". Law360. LexisNexis. Retrieved 11 February 2017.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.