Owners of the damaged Walter J. McCarthy Jr. met Tuesday with the American Bureau of Shipping and the U.S. Coast Guard to develop a plan to permanently repair the laker's hull.
Workers have found a hole about 7 feet by 4 feet in the bottom of the ship.
"Once that's approved we'll get started on repairing the hull," said Rhonda S. Johnson, spokeswoman for GATX, the parent company of the McCarthy's owner, the American Steamship Company. "The repair of the engines is ongoing."
The McCarthy's engine rooms flooded Jan. 14 after the ship's hull was pierced by a submerged object as the ship was backing into a slip at Superior's Hallett No. 8 Dock. The McCarthy's crew closed the engine rooms' watertight doors and evacuated the flooding rooms as the ship's stern settled to the bottom in 20 feet of water. The water covered the ship's four 3,500-horsepower General Motors Electro Motive Division diesel engines.
Salvage efforts began that week, with workers pumping water from the ship's ballast tanks. That brought the ship's stern up in the water, until only about 5 feet of water remained in the engine rooms.
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Workers installed a cofferdam over the hole in the ship's bottom Friday, and the two engine rooms were pumped dry Friday and over the weekend. The water and oil was pumped into trucks on the dock and taken away to be treated.
It's not known how long it will take to repair the ship.
"Both engine rooms have been steam-cleaned," Johnson said. "We're still looking at taking apart the engines and all of the equipment, working on the parts and seeing what we can do. At this point, we don't know for sure how long it will take. It could take several months, but we want to get it out sailing as soon as possible."
"It appears that there was a piece of concrete sitting on the bottom," Johnson said. "It's sealed off, so there is no more threat of pollution. We'll be able to repair it from the inside, so we won't have to dry-dock it."
The McCarthy is 1,000 feet long,105 feet wide and has a deadweight capacity of 62,100 gross tons at a draft of 27.5 feet. The ship transports low-sulfur western coal from Superior to Detroit Edison's St. Clair and Monroe, Mich., power plants. Built as the Belle River by the Bay Shipbuilding Corp at Sturgeon Bay, Wis., the ship entered service in 1977. It was renamed the McCarthy in 1990 to honor the former chairman of the Detroit Edison Company.
