Saltie shortage

[Guest]

Here's the Miedwie framed by the Duluth lift bridge on Friday night, 8-5-11.

[hausen]

You're not wrong, mike. There've only been three saltie visits to Duluth-Superior this July; Federal Nakagawa and BBC Arizona for grain in the early part of the month, and Koningsborg for bentonite clay during mid-month. There is often a mid-summer lull in saltie traffic at the head of the lake, but this one seems especially long and slow. A few factors are contributing to this; flooding in western MN and the Dakotas has been wreaking havoc on rail transportation there, so almost no grain from the Twin Ports' hinterland has been flowing in to replace what was loaded out during a fairly busy spring. Twin Ports elevators are down to their last few million bushels of spring wheat and durum wheat, the two major exports from the port these days. At the same time several countries around the Black Sea have returned to the grain export business after more than a year of drought-induced absence; Black Sea wheat is one of Duluth-Superior's biggest competitors in the global grain export trade.

All that has meant a drought of salties at Duluth-Superior. In July alone around 15 salties that finished unloading at Lakes/Seaway ports and would've been available to take cargo out of the Twin Ports instead left the system in ballast and loaded elsewhere on the lower St. Lawrence or East Coast, or returned to Europe in ballast for another load.

[Denny]

Miedwie from the Polish Steamship Lines "Polsteam" is due into Duluth during the afternoon of August 4 to load "spring wheat" at the Peavey Elevator according to Duluth Shipping News' website.

[mike329]

I havent seen any salties in Duluth for a while. Am I wrong?