SERVS staff christen barge Allison Creek, coming soon to PWS
Emergency Preparedness and Response Manager Mike Day evoked his family’s history in Valdez on Feb. 12 when he and other SERVS staff celebrated the launch of the new barge Allison Creek in Anacortes, Wash.
“The Allison Creek is where my family got their drinking water,” he said of the Valdez landmark that is the namesake of the new barge. Mike’s family homesteaded on the land that eventually became the Valdez Marine Terminal. Allison Creek now provides hydroelectric power for the community as well as drinking and process water to the VMT.
The new barge Allison Creek will be moored off of Berth 5 and would store recovered oil during a response. It replaces a barge built in 1956, in service on TAPS as long anyone can remember.
“Our goal for this barge is that we never actually use it for the purpose that we built it for,” said Mike at the ceremony.
Mike was joined by SERVS personnel who were critical to the barge’s successful design and construction. SERVS Senior Operations Coordinator, Betty Hoffman, did the honors of christening the vessel.
See more photos and read an article about the vessel and its christening in the Anacortes American.
