Manitowoc to Build Additional Buoy Tenders for USCG

The Manitowoc Company, Inc. today announced that its Marinette Marine subsidiary was awarded options to build two additional seagoing buoy tenders for the U.S. Coast Guard. The options, valued at approximately $60 million, are extensions to an existing series of contracts awarded by the Coast Guard in 1993 and 1998 to build up to 16 Juniper-class buoy tenders.

"These options mark nearly $350 million in new shipbuilding contracts won this year alone, and they further enhance our position as the U.S. Coast Guard's largest supplier of shipbuilding and ship-repair work," said Terry D. Growcock, Manitowoc's president and chief executive officer. "We're pleased to continue the strong partnership between the U.S. Coast Guard, Manitowoc Marine Group, and Marinette Marine."

The two new Juniper-class (WLB) buoy tenders - numbers 15 and 16 in the series - will be 225 feet in length and will operate with a crew of six officers and 34 enlisted personnel. These technically advanced, multi-mission vessels will be equipped to perform search and rescue, law enforcement, pollution response, and domestic icebreaking missions, as well as servicing aids to navigation.

Scheduled for delivery in April and September of 2004, it is proposed that at least one of the additional cutters will be homeported on the Great Lakes. Earlier this year, Manitowoc Marine Group was also awarded multiple contracts to build three 310-foot passenger ferries for the City of New York, two 127-ft. oceangoing tugs and two double-hull tank barges for a commercial customer, and an $82.4 million Great Lakes icebreaker to replace the USCGC Mackinaw.