NavCal Marine Services LLC 865-765-3407
"An Introduction to TOWBOATING and the Towing Industry" now on Amazon
by Captain John C. Farmer
Please also see TowboatTour.com
I wrote this book in hopes that it will encourage
more people to join this industry and provide needed information for others.
There are numerous books on Tugboats (see appendix 1) but I have not been
able to locate one on Towboats. Everyone loves and remembers the small yet
powerful Tugboats primarily because of the association with the much larger
vessels that they help maneuver in docking and undocking situations. The
Towboat in much less well known and appreciated. Towboats have been around
since the eighteen hundreds and are a major part of the United States
transportation infrastructure. Probably the reason they are not as well
known is that unless you live by a river or the Intracoastal Waterway you
may not have ever seen a towboat. They just do there job day after day with
very little recognition. Occasionally the news, if you live in a river area,
may report that a barge hit a bridge often with little damage. Without the
existing barge industry our highways would be even more congested than they
are now. There is a move underway to try to expand the use of barge
transportation for inland shipping of containers that arrive at our ports.
This would certainly be a move in the right direction as you will see by
reading this booklet. If you are involved with shipping, responsible for
legislation, interested in the “brown water” marine industry, are looking
for a rewarding job, or just plane curious I strongly encourage you to read
this book. Our book (ISBN 978-0-578-09330-7 is available for $21.00 plus
shipping.
The book
consists of the following:
To see some on the many boats I have seen as a Captain that prompted writing this book go to Towboats for a photo gallery of boat pictures.
