Southeast Alaska- Water Transportation of Equipment

[Contract Logger]

On the coasts of BC and Alaska, often your job tomorrow is on an island different than your job yesterday. Southeast Alaska is made up of over 1,000 islands covering a land area of around 22 million acres. Total population of that area is about 75,000 people. The 2 largest 'cities' are Juneau, the State Capital, at 30,000 people, and Ketchikan at 14,000 people. Everyone else is in small and isloated camps or villages on various other islands. Transportation to and from work is usually a helicopter or float plane. Machinery moves from job to job, island to island, via tug-and-barge, which every mid-size and up contractor owns, purely out of necessity.

Here are a few pics of moving contractors around from job to job...........

 

[Contract Logger]

Barges are loaded to the gills. Every useable piece of deck space is taken up with something- often several 600 gallon diesel tanks are topped-off and used to fill small areas- fuel isnt easy to come by and fuel barges are expensive. Usually a couple of full fuel trucks are on as part of the initial load. dump boxes on the trucks are loaded with necessary items suck as spare tires, hyd oil drums, etc. The 40' vans seen house hose shops/presses, parts and filters, and powder.Everything needed to work away from civilization. There is no such thing as running to town for a hose or filter.

 

[excav8r]

that would be an awesome job. puts my two favourite things together equipment and water

 

[Contract Logger]

that would be an awesome job. puts my two favourite things together equipment and water

Wel, couple of things to consider:

First, Southeast Alaska water is bad for the health factor- it will kill you fast, too cold.

Second, Southeast Alaska equipment is bad for the pride factor- it was usually worn out when it got here! Like a fat girl- fun to run as long as no one sees you.........

 

[Contract Logger]

The trouble with working remote.........

We usually had our fuel trucks and our powder vans come in on the same barge as we needed more powder or more fuel. You get pretty good at guestimating what you will need, and when. Anyway, fuel/powder barge came a day or two late because of weather, and we were cutting it too close. We needed fuel for the trucks, so here we are bringing it from Wrangell by boat some 60 miles away- in 55 gallon drums, then pumping into the trucks from the boat. Next, right of way hoe (he was packing a 600 gallon skid tank, so he was fine on fuel) kept rocking-out and needed stick-powder, so we had to fly that in from Ketchikan, some 120 miles awayin the opposite direction from the fuel

Anyway, I have pictures of both problems........
Dont try this at home please. And not the powder/fuel barge either, lol.

 

[Contract Logger]

That pilot wasnt overly thrilled with flying 1,000 lbs of stick-powder 120 miles to us that day either! Anyway he did it and I assured him that it all paid him the same anyway....

Never had I seen so much powder in a small aircraft. That is 1/3 of it on the dock there.

 

[willie59]

Very nice pics and details log man.

 

[tootalltimmy]

Great pictures. I have been into the Northwest Territories but never to Alaska. You have harsh working conditions up there. Keep sending pictures please.

 

[dayexco]

GREAT pics!

 

[topdigger]

Awesome pictures ! The mobilization cost has to be enormous.

 

[29twincity]

awsom pictures! amazing what it takes to keep going up there.:usa

 

[N.B.CONCRETE]

That pilot wasnt overly thrilled with flying 1,000 lbs of stick-powder 120 miles to us that day either! Anyway he did it and I assured him that it all paid him the same anyway....

Never had I seen so much powder in a small aircraft. That is 1/3 of it on the dock there.

Wow,thats insane . He might aswell be flying on a rocket .

 

[Contract Logger]

Just ran across a couple more barging equipment pics. First one is Channel Construction going past Juneau. Second is an AML Barge load of containers, trucks equipment etc headetoward a mine site near Bethel. Check out the Hitachi haul truck there under the tank.

 

[Contract Logger]

Heres another good one. Loaded railroad cars on lower deck, en route from Seattle to Anchorage to Alaska Railroad. One of the flatcars has a Cat scraper on it. On the upper decks, with the containers, are a couple of wheel loaders, looks like one Cat and one Volvo. Glacier in background. This is in Prince William Sound, barge is headed to Whittier, Alaska.

This is how we do it.

 

[jimmyjack]

thats crazy how they pack them things:notworthy

 

[MOUNTAIN MAN]

Wow, that pack job it amazing! I like how that dump truck fits neatly on top of a container!

 

[Colorado Digger]

wow

thanks for the pics, they are unbelievable. it must take weeks to load up and stage for a job. what is the work they use the iron for. fisheries? mines?mine reclamation? logging roads? anyways thanks agian C.L i know you are very busy in the logging section keep at it i enjoy everything.

 

[Dozerboy]

Wow I can only imagine whats thats like. I have done some work that required barges. It was an all day thing just to get a hoe and attachments out to where it needed to be. I think we spent 2hrs just getting the barges tied together.

 

[Turbo21835]

thanks for the pics, they are unbelievable. it must take weeks to load up and stage for a job.

Stage may take a while, but load out is done as fast as possible. It usually has to be done with the tide, so you usually have a narrow window to work. That narrow window means starting work at 2-3 am to load as much as you can before the water level gets to low and the barge is stranded on the rocks.

The work varies. I have family in the area, and they do all sorts of work. At one time it was building a lot of logging roads, then it was removing those logging roads they had put in previously. They also do work for villages, and state road work. In Southern Alaska you use a tug boat as your heavy haul tractor, and a barge as your lowboy. You also use a boat, seaplane, or helicopter as your pickup truck.

Contract Logger, any shots of Ketchikan Redi Mixs operation, equipment, or barges?