Commercial shipping on the Great Lakes is moving again, after the industry slowed due to COVID-19. As mining and manufacturing slowed down in late spring companies had far fewer orders than normal, so many ships ended up staying in dock.
Eric Peace is the director of operations and communications for the Lake Carriers Association. He said more than a quarter of the ships in the fleets the association represent were docked in the middle of the season. Lately though, they’ve been heading back out on the lakes.
“The majority of those that are at the dock are probably gonna come back out. We’ve got a full book of orders for almost all of our companies so there’s a push right now for the blast furnaces and places like that that need to get cargo put to their dock so they can manage throughout the winter. There’s gonna be a huge push towards the end here and we’re gonna see a lot of movement,” said Peace.
Peace said now companies are hurrying to get all their orders in before the season ends in less than three months.
“We’re on the rebound here so it’s really gonna be critical for us to continue to be able to ship up until the locks close on January 15th, which is gonna require that the marine transportation system be resilient and continue to be open as designed,” Peace said.
He said Coronavirus is one concern as they move into the winter months, but a bigger one might be ice formation on the lakes which could slow down shipments and put crews in danger. He said even in low ice coverage years coast guard icebreakers aren’t always able to keep up.