New Carissa’s removal slated to start in May

COOS BAY, Ore. – The equipment is in place, and Round One of the removal of the New Carissa will begin May 15.

Titan Maritime’s two jack-up barges, which will serve as the work platforms for the removal of the shipwreck of the New Carissa, recently arrived from the Dominican Republic.

Phil Reed, Titan’s director of engineering, aims to have the imposing barges with their gargantuan cranes and beach staging site ready by May 1.

Reed said Titan needs calm seas to take the barges out to the New Carissa stern, preferably swells of no more than 3 feet.

The barges, once ready, will be docked at Sause Brothers Ocean Towing Facility in Empire to wait for perfect conditions.

The huge steel tubes out at Central Dock in Coos Bay are the legs of the barges. Each leg will be jammed 30 feet into the sand to stabilize the barges near the wreck. Putting the legs back together again is the biggest project on Titan’s to-do list in the next couple of weeks.

The staging area construction won’t begin until near the end of this month, after the last of the required temporary permits are issued.

Once work starts, the New Carissa will be taken apart a little bit at a time.

Crews will start working on the top of the wreck. Reed said that will be the easy part and may give onlookers the impression the job will be done fairly quickly.

Dealing with what is underneath, including the 250-ton main engine, will present the real challenge and take the most time. Still, Reed anticipates the work will be done well before the October deadline.

As crews work on the top portion, six pulling machines connected to the New Carissa by bulky anchor chains will pull on the wreck. Reed said the New Carissa may move right away under the pulling power or stay put until some of its bulk is hauled off. Pullers will progressively lift the New Carissa out of the sand.

“We are actually going to bring the bottom to us, rather than go down and work in conditions that are near impossible to work with,” Reed said.

Titans contract with the state stipulates crews can leave the portion under the sand line, but Reed said Titan is aiming at leaving no portion behind.

Titan has been following the attempts to haul off the New Carissa from when it first ran aground. He thinks using the stable jack-up barges may be the answer to the stuck stern. Titan crews have had experience with large wrecks and have worked in surf zones, but the question remains as to how quickly crews can work with both challenges.

“We’ve cut up wrecks bigger than this,” Reed said. “But not one sitting in the surf zone.”

The New Carissa ran aground Feb. 4, 1999, after the ship dragged its anchor during a storm. With the ship leaking fuel oil, a dramatic salvage effort was mounted.

The U.S. Navy and Coast Guard set the wreck on fire to try to burn the fuel oil onboard, but the ship broke in two and leaked an estimated 70,000 gallons of oil into the surf.

The bow was hauled off the beach in two tries and towed to international waters, where a Navy submarine finally sank it with a torpedo on March 11, 1999.