Railroads, ports close due to Katrina, but rivers could rise

New York (Platts)--30Aug2005

Hurricane Katrina made landfall Monday morning, just southeast of New Orleans.
The Category 4 storm brought high winds and torrential rains all along the
Gulf Coast, from points west of New Orleans, through the city and east through
Biloxi and Gulfport, Miss., and along the bayfront of Pensacola, Fla.

CSX and Norfolk Southern railroads suspended service to the affected area on
Sunday, shutting down coal shipments to utilities in the area and to export
ports.

CSX suspended service from Montgomery, Ala., south, and from Chattahoochee,
Fla., west to New Orleans Sunday morning, while NS discontinued operations
south of Meridian, Miss., to New Orleans, and south of Selma, Ala., to Mobile
early Sunday afternoon. Operations south of Birmingham were curtailed, then
later discontinued.

By mid-morning Monday, CSX's Montgomery and Birmingham, Ala., locations
remained unaffected by the storm and were handling rail traffic.

However, both railroads issued an embargo on all traffic traveling to, from,
or through the area between New Orleans and Mobile.

CSX staged ballast, generators and equipment outside the Gulf Coast to aid in
restoration of rail service as the storm passed, while NS pulled rolling
equipment on its lines near coastal areas and low-lying areas in southern
Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama inland to higher ground. 

NS spokesman Rudy Husband told Platts Coal Trader that the railroad was still
not servicing the affected areas and the embargo remained in place Monday
afternoon. He said crews had not been able to get out and start inspecting the
line and could not estimate when they would be able to get out. "It all
depends on the weather."

CSX spokesman Gary Sease echoed Husband's comments. CSX lines in Florida where
affected when Katrina first hit the Florida peninsula late Thursday. However,
Sease said most of the problems were from the loss of electricity for crossing
signals and that operations are "virtually all restored."

PORTS IN MOBILE, NEW ORLEANS CLOSE

The Port of New Orleans and the Port of Mobile both closed to traffic Sunday
in preparation of the hurricane.

Judith Adams of the Alabama Port Authority, which operates the Port of Mobile,
told Platts Coal Trader Monday afternoon that the port, including its
20-mil-ton/year McDuffie Coal Terminal, closed at 2 a.m. Sunday. All
deep-draft vessels except for three cargo ships and two dredges departed.

She said that as of 11:30 a.m. CDT Monday, the crew of the one ship that
remained at McDuffie reported that it was secured safely in its berth and had
taken no damage. However, she said a drilling rig at a neighboring shipyard
broke free of its mooring and floated up the river with the storm serve. Tugs
were able to get it under control, but it was wedged between Mobile's Pier E
and its bulk-material-handling terminal, where most coal imports are handled.
The rig had caused damage to the bulk-material facility, but port personnel
had not been able to determine the extent of it.

Adams said the Coast Guard will give the port its first assessment about 10
a.m. Tuesday morning, but it will likely take throughout Tuesday and possibly
into Wednesday morning before a complete assessment of the ship channel can be
completed.

She said truck and rail shipments out of the port could resume fairly quickly
once electricity is restored, but it could take days to reopen the channel to
shipments depending on how much dredging the Coast Guard must do to repair
shoaling. It took a few days to do that after Hurricane Ivan struck the port
last September.

The Coast Guard shut down New Orleans at noon Sunday. A Coast Guard spokesman
said both ports were still closed late Monday afternoon. 

BARGE SHIPPING COULD BENEFIT FROM RAIN

But there was one bright spot in the hurricane. Stephen Strum, president and
lead meteorologist at Frontier Weather Inc., said the rain brought by Katrina
could ease drought conditions that have lowered the Mississippi, Missouri,
Ohio and Illinois rivers.

Katrina was near Hattiesburg, Miss., on Monday afternoon, heading north at 18
mph. Winds were down to 95 mph with higher gusts.

Katrina was expected to slowly weaken throughout the afternoon, becoming a
tropical storm sometime Monday evening. Besides the wind and storm surge
flooding, flooding from rainfall will also be a problem across parts of the
South, Tennessee Valley, Ohio Valley and Northeast over the next few days,
Strum said.

"Drought conditions across much of the Ohio Valley and Northeast will limit
the flooding potential there as the ground will be able to absorb significant
amounts of water reducing runoff somewhat," Strum said. 

That will be good news for coal suppliers, power plants and barge companies
along the inland water ways, who have seen portions of the rivers close over
the last month while the Coast Guard dredged to open channels due to low water
levels.

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