Hoga hung up in Houston

Transport legality slows WWII tugboat’s journey to NLR

The USS Hoga sits on the deck of a transport ship just outside of Houston on Friday.
The USS Hoga sits on the deck of a transport ship just outside of Houston on Friday.

After surviving Pearl Harbor 74 years ago, the historic Hoga tugboat has sailed into a battle of another sort on its way to North Little Rock.

The Hoga, which fought battleship fires and saved lives during the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, will likely miss getting to North Little Rock in time for a Pearl Harbor anniversary observance at the Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum.

But for the past week, the historic boat was in jeopardy of even making it to North Little Rock, where it is to become part of the Maritime Museum.

An issue involving an alleged violation of maritime law was resolved Monday afternoon after days of negotiations among museum board members, federal officials and shipping company executives, said Bob Major, executive director of the North Little Rock Convention and Visitors Bureau, acting as spokesman for the museum board.

The Hoga, on board the moored Thorco Isadora cargo ship for the past week, will be offloaded at Houston today and await a new transport to New Orleans, Major said. The museum has tried to get the Hoga to North Little Rock since the city took title to the boat in July 2005.

"We've truly saved the Hoga and we can deal with anything else after that point," said Major, also a museum board member. "It will be kept in Houston and could be there for a couple of days, or it could be longer. It is still possible for it to be here by Dec. 7, but I don't want to be the one to say it will be here on Dec. 7 right now."

The Hoga, designated as a National Landmark in 1989 for its crew's actions at Pearl Harbor, has been on its way from California for the past month to join the Maritime Museum in North Little Rock. Early last week, the Thorco Isadora, which was transporting the Hoga, was turned away from offloading the boat at New Orleans.

The cargo ship then proceeded to Houston, where it has remained for the past week, with the possibility of the ship needing to continue with other cargo toward the western seas with the Hoga still on board, Major said.

If that had happened, "there's no way, realistically," to get it back, Major said.

Board members of the Maritime Museum, including former U.S. Rep. Vic Snyder, spent the past week in negotiations with shipping companies, U.S. Customs, U.S. Border Patrol and the Customs and Border Protection Agency -- an arm of Homeland Security -- to try to rescue the Hoga, Major said. Office staff members of U.S. Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark., were also involved, he added.

Because the city is the owner, instead of the museum, the city also became involved, City Attorney Jason Carter said Monday.

"Our interest at this point has been to stay abreast of the issue and to ensure the Hoga is safeguarded," Carter said. "It's in our interest to make sure the boat is safe."

The issue concerned the Jones Act, officially the federal statute Title 46, Appendix U.S.C., Section 883. The Jones Act states that merchandise transported between ports located within the United States must be carried by a vessel under the U.S. flag, prohibiting a foreign ship to be involved in coastwide trade between two U.S. points. The Thorco Isadora sails under the flag of the Republic of the Marshall Islands.

The Hoga was towed in late September from Mare Island Naval Shipyard at Vallejo, Calif., where it had been since July 2012, to San Diego to acquire transport on an carrier trip already scheduled to carry cargo from the West Coast to New Orleans, Major said.

The Hoga left San Diego Oct. 10 towed by a tugboat under a U.S. flag and stopped in Ensenada, Mexico, on the Pacific Coast. There, the Thorco Isadora, owned by the Thorco Shipping Co., uplifted the Hoga onto a cradle to carry it through the Panama Canal to New Orleans, Major said. From New Orleans, two Arkansas companies are to tow the Hoga up the Mississippi and Arkansas rivers.

Thorco Shipping is based in Copenhagen, Denmark, with offices in Houston. It was contracted through Raven Offshore Yacht Shipping of Seattle, which was hired by Peters & May, Major said, an English shipping company with a Florida office. Peters & May provides worldwide boat transport services, including for "super yachts."

By picking up the boat at a Mexican port, the cargo ship could then deliver the Hoga to New Orleans. It made stops to pick up and deliver yachts in Costa Rica and then Fort Lauderdale, Fla., where the Hoga was unloaded briefly to disperse other cargo, Major said. The way the Hoga was to be transported is done "all the time" by shippers, Major said the board had been assured.

"Obviously, there had been a notice given to the Border Patrol that there may be a Jones Act violation," Major said. "We don't know where it came from or who it came from. We have no idea.

"We've always been aware of the Jones Act," Major said. "We would never have contracted to do this if we had been told this may be a potential violation of the Jones Act. We would have backed off."

The Maritime Museum has worked for 10 years trying to arrange a "tow of opportunity" to save as much as $1 million, Major said, to get the Hoga to North Little Rock. The museum board has been raising donations to pay for the Hoga's berthing and maintenance while at Mare Island since the city took physical possession in July 2012.

With Navy restrictions on how the nearly 75-year-old boat could be transported, U.S. shipping companies wanted $1 million to $2 million for the job, Major said. That led to the board seeking help from professional shippers to significantly reduce the cost, he said. The tow from San Diego to Ensenada was $40,000 and the transport to New Orleans about $230,000, Major said.

The addition of the Hoga to the Maritime Museum, museum Executive Director Greg Zonner has said, will pair the Pearl Harbor-surviving Hoga with the Razorback submarine, which was present at Tokyo Bay for the official Japanese surrender Sept. 2, 1945, giving the museum vessels from both the first and last days of World War II.

The Hoga's pairing with the Razorback submarine has been counted on to help tourism and draw large veterans conferences, Major said. The board plans to expand the museum, with or without the Hoga, Major said. The museum had 21,664 visitors in 2014, according to museum figures.

"Not by any means would this mean the end of the museum," if the Hoga didn't come, Major said. "We are continually working to expand and make it better. We want to focus on students and the educational side of the museum. It needs to be expanded. It needs to be more of a modern facility and it needs to be larger. Have the things people expect at a museum."

During the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Hoga fought fires, rescued sailors from the waters and and gave assistance to damaged ships. The Hoga also helped to move the heavily damaged Battleship Nevada that had run aground while attempting to get out to sea. If the Nevada hadn't been moved, it could have sunk and blocked the harbor entrance and exit, according to historical accounts.

Metro on 11/10/2015

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