Feed items
Source: Facing South
Source: Watchdog
Source: In These Times
Source: AFL-CIO
Port of Astoria Chief Executive Officer Hank Bynaker, who was chosen in June 2012, to replace Jack Crider, quit today after fewer than 14 months on the job.
Commissioner Bill Hunsinger reiterated Campbell’s comments that the issues facing the Port might have overwhelmed Bynaker.
The Port, meanwhile, has been dealing with bleak finances and deferred maintenance issues. It’s struggling to keep a $1 million grant from the Oregon Department of Transportation to improve the eastern side of Pier 2.
More at the Daily Astorian
This Wall Street Journal graphic shows the Arctic shipping route from China to Europe. For other perspectives on whether large scale Arctic shipping is viable, search for “Arctic Shipping” here on Longshore and Shipping News.
From Sinoship News:
The Yong Sheng, belonging to Cosco Shipping, has moored at Rotterdam today, becoming the first Chinese merchant ship to transit the Arctic. The ship left Dalian on August 8 and crossed around 3,000 nautical miles before reaching the Dutch port. The route is around two weeks than the traditional trip through Southeast and South Asia and through the Suez Canal.
“The Arctic route can cut 12 to 15 days from traditional routes, so the maritime industry calls it the Golden Waterway,” Cosco said when it announced the Yong Sheng’s voyage. The landmark event connects China, the world’s largest exporter with its largest customer base, Europe, albeit for just a few months of the year.
From the Columbian:
In the past several days, inspectors with the state Agriculture Department have returned to examining grain shipments at United Grain Corp.’s sprawling plant at the port, a spokesman for the Agriculture Department said Tuesday. Inspectors had recently been unable to reach United Grain because the department said that locked-out longshore workers picketing the entry point — a gate on the port’s east side — had increasingly made inspectors feel unsafe.
Now, agriculture officials will ask Vancouver police to send an officer to the gate to ensure inspectors are able to safely reach United Grain to go to work. … However, the closer working relationship between grain inspectors and the police is a temporary arrangement until a formal agreement can be worked out. Castro said officials are working on protocols that will cover grain inspectors’ access to United Grain, including what to do in case police are unable to send someone.
More at the Columbian
NOTE: Yesterday, Oregonian reporter Rich Read breathlessly reported that “someone apparently intentionally set adrift a loaded grain barge on the Columbia River Friday night that was to be unloaded at a terminal that has locked out longshoremen,” and that “the fact that Barge 550 was loaded with grain destined for the locked-out elevators is also significant.”
Dramatics aside, it turns out the Oregonian was wrong. Today, the Columbian — the Vancouver newspaper that’s been giving much more accurate coverage of the grain lockout, wrote:
An earlier report by The Oregonian said the barge was to be unloaded at a terminal that has locked out longshoremen. However, in an email to The Columbian today, Pat McCormick, spokesman for a group of grain-terminal operators that includes United Grain Corp. at the Port of Vancouver, said Barge 550 “was not scheduled for either United Grain or Columbia Grain.”
Read more at the Columbian
Source: Labor Video Project
Please log in to view content
To view the content on this page, please log in to your account.
