The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

5. Marine News - cont'd. The summer of 1994 saw some unusual repair work being done by PASCOL En gineering at Thunder Bay, Ontario. On June 26th, the United States Coast Guard cutter SUNDEW (50 years old in 1994) arrived at the yard for $200, 000 worth of repair and refurbishing. The work was completed by July 23rd, on which date SUNDEW returned to her home port of Duluth, Minnesota. Meanwhile, however, there were protests about the fact that a U . S. government vessel was being repaired at a foreign facility. The decision to send SUNDEW to Thunder Bay was, no doubt, made because of the favourable exchange rate on the dollar, although the actual cost of the the work was increased as a re sult of the expense of billetting SUNDEW's crew in Thunder Bay during the refit. Shortly after SUNDEW's arrival at the PASCOL yard, she was joined there by her Canadian Coast Guard counterpart, GRIFFON, which arrived for a major refit expected to increase GRIFFON'S life expectancy by 20 years. Bids for the construction of the new 114-foot, 24-vehicle ferry for the Sugar Island crossing of Little Rapids Cut were due to be opened by the Eas tern Upper Peninsula Transportation Authority on September 14th. Although we have not received word on which bid for the $2 million contract was success ful, E. U . P. T. A. was expecting as many as nine bids. The Authority has fa voured the construction of the ferry at as nearby a shipyard as possible, so that it may closely monitor the work and attempt to avoid the problems that were encountered with the DeTour ferry DRUMMOND ISLANDER III, which was built at Pascagoula, Mississippi, in 1989. It is hoped that the new Sugar Island ferry can be in operation by June of 1995, thus permitting E. U . P. T. A. to transfer the present SUGAR ISLANDER downriver to the Neebish Island cros sing currently "handled" by the smaller NEEBISH ISLANDER. The Authority is also beginning work on the planning of a new boat to replace the second ferry on the DeTour service, the 1947-built DRUMMOND ISLANDER. Concerned about safety, the Munising City Commission in August ordered the Alger Underwater Preserve Committee to remove from the Munising, Michigan, city dock, by September 1st, its tug STEVEN M. SELVICK. The Alger Committee had acquired the tug from the Selvick Marine Towing Corporation, and had her moored at Munising in preparation for her planned sinking in 1995 as a diving attraction in the underwater preserve that is located on the south shore of Lake Superior between Au Train and Au Sable Point. The 70-foot tug was built in 1915 at Cleveland as (a) LORAIN, and was rebuilt in 1969. The city's action in asking that the tug be removed from the Munising dock resulted from the sighting of children diving off the tug's superstructure, and fears of liability suits that might result if injuries should be suffered. The tug was operating under the name of CABOT back in the 1950s when she was used in the construction of the Mackinac Bridge. It was reported during the summer that the venerable U . S. east coast towing firm, Moran Towing Corp., was acquired by the owners of Mormac Marine Trans port Inc., namely James R. Barker and Paul R. Tregurtha, who also are prin cipals of the Interlake Steamship Company and its affiliates. The transfer of all Moran stock, approved by shareholders of the Connecticut firm and also by the U. S. Maritime Administration, was only the second major change in stock ownership for the 134-year-old towing firm. Moran tugs, although common on the east and Gulf coats of the U . S., have only infrequently ven tured into the Great Lakes. The last of the four former Star Line excursion boats which had in 1991-1993 been lying idle at Port Lambton, Ontario, departed this summer. STAR OF CHI CAGO II, which had been there since April 16, 1991, left for Port Huron, and then for the Michigan Soo, where the Twin City yard drydocked her. She then proceeded to Douglas (Saugatuck) on Lake Michigan, where she was to operate dinner cruises for Roland J. Petersen, who also, of course, owns the former Canadian Pacific Railway passenger steamer KEEWATIN. STAR OF DETROIT cleared Port Lambton on May 23, 1992, STAR OF CHICAGO III on August 16, 1992, and STAR OF CHICAGO (I) on June 22, 1993. * * * * *