Arctic Oil & Gas Directory: Crowley sends tug-barge to deliver fuel at base

Crowley Maritime Corp. said June 12 that its shipping services to Cuba reached another milestone over the weekend with the first delivery of petroleum products to the U.S. Naval Station in Guantanamo Bay via articulated tug-barge tank vessel. The cargo was loaded in San Diego, Calif., and transported to Cuba aboard Crowley’s ATB Coastal Reliance/550-4.

The fuel delivery was made in support of Crowley customer Military Sealift Command, which will continue utilizing the Coastal Reliance/550-4 under short-term contract to transport clean petroleum products between the Gulf and East Coasts for the next several months. Before serving MSC, the Coastal Reliance/550-4 operated on the West Coast for nearly a decade.

Crowley was the first U.S. carrier to obtain a license from the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the United States Department of the Treasury in Washington, D.C., to provide regularly scheduled common carrier services for licensed cargo from the United States to the Republic of Cuba. Crowley launched its Cuba shipping service in December 2001, becoming the first U.S. carrier to re-enter Cuba in nearly 40 years, and has maintained a regularly scheduled service ever since.