The U.S. Maritime Administration will activate the SUNY Maritime College training ship Empire State for temporary federal service beginning on or about Sept. 1, college President Rear Adm. John Okon said on Friday.
In a letter to the college community, Okon wrote he received a decision memorandum from Maritime Administrator Stephen M. Carmel outlining the activation. He did not identify the mission the ship will support, and said the college has been given few details.
"There is still much that we do not know," Okon wrote, adding that the college's task over the next week is to prepare the vessel for federal use.
The ship will reportedly be deployed to Diego Garcia, a joint U.S.-U.K. military base in the Indian Ocean. The ship will be activated for about 170 days, Okon said.
Marad has not publicly detailed the mission, its duration, or the contracting arrangements for activating and crewing the ship. The agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The 525'x89' Empire State is owned by Marad and operated by SUNY Maritime under the National Security Multi-Mission Vessel (NSMV) program — the first of five purpose-built training ships ordered for the state maritime academies. Philly Shipyard delivered the vessel in September 2023, replacing the 1962-built Empire State VI, which was scrapped.
The NSMV class was designed for dual use. Along with eight classrooms, a training bridge, laboratories and berthing for roughly 600 cadets and 100 crew, the ships have a helicopter deck, ro/ro and container capacity, hospital spaces, and berthing for as many as 1,000 responders to support national emergency and disaster response efforts.
In September 2017, Marad activated Empire State VI along with Massachusetts Maritime Academy's Kennedy and Texas A&M's General Rudder for a FEMA mission after Hurricane Harvey; that tasking was set at 30 days with a 30-day option. In the Harvey activation, Marad contracted for the crewing of the vessels and no cadets sailed.
A 170-day mission beginning Sept. 1 would run through most of the academic year and into late February. The college's summer sea term typically begins in May.
Empire State returned to Fort Schuyler in mid-July from the 2026 sea term, an eight-week deployment with more than 500 cadets that included calls at Charleston, S.C.; Málaga, Spain; the U.K.; New York City; and Albany, N.Y. When moored at Fort Schuyler, the ship also serves as instructional and berthing space during the school year.
Okon did not say how the college will replace that capacity, or whether the activation will affect cadets' accrual of the sea time required for U.S. Coast Guard licensing. He said the college would work to limit disruption to students and pointed faculty, staff, and cadets to counseling and employee-assistance resources.
