The James River Ghost Fleet Disappearing

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After close to a decade worth of work, it appears as if the James River Ghost Fleet is slowly but surely disappearing.

The fleet of ships, part of the the National Defense Reserve Fleet (NDRF), was originally intended as a naval reserve in case of national emergency. In the post-WWII era, the number of ships anchored in the James River, just north of Newport News and Norfolk, has numbered in the hundreds.

Environmental concerns about the fleet did not receive much attention prior to a 2001 report detailing many of the ships' hazardous contents, including lead, asbestos and PCB's. The reported concluded that the hazardous material could be released into the river in the event of a weather disaster such as a strong hurricane. Legislation followed, with funding to support four different means of ship disposal: Domestic Recycling; Artificial Reefing; Ship Donations; SINKEX (program to use the ships for naval training exercises).

In the past eight years, approximately 75% of the remaining one hundred James River Reserve Fleet has been removed or sold to private enterprises for scrap recycling. The April 30, 2009 inventory listed a total of thirty one ships at the James River Reserve Facility, six of which are designated for retention, two contracted for sale and disposal and twenty four remaining for sale.

The ship removal story is not without some complicating environmental asides. For example, federal law requires that the hulls be clean of invasive species prior to ship removal, and hull cleaning also often translates into the removal of hazardous paints.

Concerns about the environmental impacts related to paint removal have slowed ship removal at the Suisun Bay National Defense Reserve Fleet, where a recent NOAA study concluded that "sediments from the SBRF study area and the rest of Suisun Bay have a low to moderately low potential for toxicity to benthic invertebrates." The research did not speculate on the potential environmental effects associated with hull cleaning.

The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality allowed hull cleaning without additional permits, and to date no substantive studies on the environmental effects of hull cleaning activities on local waters has been produced.

© 2009. Patricia A. Michaels