The maritime logistics industry is large and complex. Vessel crews, supported by shoreside teams, work tirelessly to keep ships on schedule. However, they face numerous challenges, including weather conditions, mechanical failures, scheduling delays, labor shortages, and port-specific regulations. Maintaining a ship involves many individuals and factors, but one crucial role in ensuring operational efficiency is that of the ship’s husbandry diver. These divers play a key part in keeping the industry running smoothly in the face of its many challenges.
Divers who keep ships moving are stationed throughout the world in every major port. They perform common routine tasks such as class inspections, hull cleanings, anode replacements and propellor polishings. This specialized group of divers are recognized by shipping registries and certified by shipping classification societies.
Divers who keep ships moving are stationed at major ports worldwide, performing essential tasks such as class inspections, hull cleanings, anode replacements, and propeller polishings. This specialized group is recognized by shipping registries and certified by shipping classification societies.
A true ship’s husbandry diver may swim 1-2 miles during a hull inspection, perform class-approved welding in low-visibility conditions, or clean the hull of a 900' tanker — at any time of day or year. The depth and scope of this work are among the reasons why many entry-level divers eventually transition to other sectors of commercial diving. These divers face intense physical and mental challenges, making them both unique and indispensable to the maritime industry.
Seaward Marine Services, LLC
To the ship’s husbandry diver, Seaward Marine Services LLC is best known for servicing the U.S. Navy. Founded in 1972 to provide deep-sea search and recovery, Seaward Marine Services soon found their niche in cleaning hulls, specifically U.S. Navy hulls. Seaward Marine Services was awarded an initial NAVSEA contract for hull cleaning and maintenance and has held it almost continuously for four decades.
“We’ve always been proud of our employees and their ability to provide a valuable service to the U.S. Navy,” said Seaward Marine Services Norfolk location manager David Spruill. “That is our proudest achievement and our goal as a company. Assistance, anytime, anyplace, anywhere, underwater. That’s what we do, and we’re proud of our people and the work they do.”
Seaward Marine Services understands that the end goal mission for NAVSEA is to maximize ship availability and extend drydock cycles. This is accomplished by divers utilizing advanced techniques and technologies that can provide the necessary data for assessing hull conditions, which will then be used for both drydock planning and trend analysis.
One of Seaward Marine Services' specialties is connected to the level of detail that the divers are required to provide to the U.S. Navy and Military Sealift Command (MSC) when reporting the condition of the underwater hull. This skill set demands significant experience. It takes approximately 1,000 diving hours before divers are deemed competent in basic aspects of the NAVSEA ships husbandry program. At Seaward Marine Services, divers average about 300 diving hours per year. Therefore, their biggest and most important challenge is focusing on training and continuing development of the current cadre of divers.
Randive Inc.
On call 24/7 and ready to provide emergency repairs as well as hull cleanings and propellor polishings, Randive, Inc. was established in 1959 as a small business operated out of founder Randor Erlandson’s basement in Brooklyn, N.Y. At the time, the company was a regional “one man band” servicing small vessels in New York Harbor. The jobs would include gritty tasks such as removing fouling from propellers, salvage of small (not requiring heavy lift cranes) items and barnacle removal utilizing hand tools. Initially, much of this was performed utilizing SCUBA.
One generation later, Kurt Erlandor, the founder’s son, is now the president and owner of Randive, Inc. The divers operate out of Clifford, N.J., and they can be seen responding to vessels throughout Northeast ports. As the company has grown, Randive has participated in several notable non ship husbandry projects. These projects include providing dive support to Donjon Marine Co., Inc. during the response to the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse.
“We proudly assisted Donjon with the salvage diving related to clearing the main channel of the FSK Bridge casualty in Baltimore,” said Kurt Erlandor. “Our main area has always been ship’s husbandry and the specialty services related to it.”
That focus has seen everyone at the company working to continuously develop their skill set. This translates to class approved welding, nondestructive testing and a team with over a century of total subsea ship husbandry experience.
Texas Commercial Divers
Some of the top domestic ship husbandry divers provide service within localized regions. Texas Commercial Divers (TCD) is one of the best in this category. Based out of the Port of Houston/Galveston, TCD is owned and operated by Randy Gagnon and Wesly Guntharp. The two business partners leveraged their extensive backgrounds in welding, fabrication, and ship repair to become the first call for ship owners and their agents throughout the busy Texas ports.
When it comes to ship husbandry, tasks such as hull cleanings and propellor polishing are the general maintenance musts of the industry. The sophisticated shipowner understands this and fully appreciates the dive contractors that can complete the job in the designated time frame. TCD is just such a contractor.
Phoenix International
While Texas Commercial Divers and Randive, Inc. are regional contractors, Phoenix International Ltd. works to service the shipping industry on a global scale. Phoenix has provided underwater ship repair services to the U.S. Navy since its founding in 1997.
As prime contractor for the diving and diving related services contract, which are administered by the Navy’s Supervisor of Salvage and Diving, they perform underwater wet welding, dry welding, burning, non-destructive testing, non-welding repairs, rigging and handling, underwater inspection, underwater recovery, and salvage assistance. Their emergent worldwide response capabilities were demonstrated during their deployment of personnel to Japan to conduct 24-hour repair operations on USS John S. McCain following her collision, and immediate redeployment to Singapore to repair USS Fitzgerald after a separate collision.
The skills Phoenix has developed working for the U.S. Navy are also a benefit to commercial clients. Phoenix has performed hull and rudder shell plate inserts (in one case using their ABS-approved Class A wet groove weld procedure), stern tube seal renewals, waterborne thruster maintenance and change-outs, propeller repairs including cropping and dynamic balancing, complex ballast tank repairs, and exhaust gas scrubber installations. This work has been performed on bulkers, containerships, vehicle carriers, tankers, ferries, yachts, and cruise ships in ports around the world.
