U.S.-FLAG LINER OPERATIONS IN VISA PROGRAM PREPARE FOR MILITARY USE

U.S.-FLAG LINER OPERATIONS IN VISA PROGRAM PREPARE FOR MILITARY USE    U.S.-flag ocean carrier operations enrolled in the federal government’s Voluntary Intermodal Sealift Agreement are prepared to assist the military in the country’s war against global terrorism.
   “Our ships are available to the U.S. government,” said Niels W. Johnsen, chairman of International Shipholding Corp. “We stand ready to do what we have to do.”
   New Orleans-based International Shipholding, which operates U.S.-flag vessels in its carrier subsidiaries Waterman Steamship Corp. and Central Gulf, has about a dozen ships enrolled in the VISA program.
   VISA provides the Defense Department with “assured access” to commercial intermodal capacity to move sustainment cargo during time of war or national emergency. There are about 25 operators and 115 oceangoing vessels enrolled in the program, which constitutes about 90 percent of the U.S.-flag commercial, dry cargo, oceangoing fleet.
   The carriers of the VISA program expressed their readiness at a Sept. 19 Joint Planning Advisory Group meeting held by the U.S. Transportation Command.
   Bill Lucas, deputy commander of the U.S. Military Traffic Management Command told industry officials at a National Defense Transportation Association meeting Thursday in Washington to be ready.
   '”The call will come,” Lucas said. “But I can’t tell you where or when, and because of that, I ask for your understanding and flexibility. Obviously, we are into a less scripted and straightforward scenario than we were in the Cold War and Persian Gulf.”