Master Boat Builders, Coden, Ala., recently launched the first in a series of eight harbor tugs being built for Maritime Partners LLC, with delivery targeted for May. The eight-vessel program is expected to see the yard deliver a tug approximately every six weeks through 2027.
According to Master Boat Builders president Garrett Rice, the new tug was designed from the outset to be highly versatile, capable of performing escort work in major ports while still handling traditional harbor-assist duties in smaller ports.
“We tried to design this as an extremely versatile tug,” Rice said. “It could do escort work in Houston or ship assist in Norfolk or Miami or San Diego, wherever it needed to go. The balance of the stability and escort performance meets in the middle of all the requirements that any customer could have.”
The design allows flexibility in outfitting, including the option to install either a 75-hp or 100-hp winch. Ultimately, Maritime Partners selected 75-hp winches for the series, and all vessels will also be equipped with firefighting systems.
The tug will feature bollard pull exceeding 90 metric tons, making it one of the highest bollard-pull tugs built by the yard to date.
The 88'x43'x16.5' tug Marauder, with a 19.5' draft, is a Robert Allan Ltd. RApport 2700-MP ship-assist and escort tug designed to handle large vessels during docking, undocking, and harbor maneuvers.
Main propulsion is provided by twin Caterpillar 3516E engines with an intermittent “D” rating of 3,500 hp at 1,800 rpm. The tug is equipped with Steerprop Z-drives supplied by Karl Senner LLC, with 3,000-mm fixed-pitch monoblock four-bladed propellers constructed of CF3 stainless steel. A Markey Machine DEPCF-52 75-hp electric Class II hawser winch is installed, with the option for a Markey DESF-48A 100-hp electric Class III escort winch.
Ship’s service power and onboard systems include Beier Integrated Systems electronics and control integration. The tug has a top speed of approximately 13 knots and accommodations for a crew of six. Tank capacities include approximately 24,000 gals. of fuel, 2,000 gals. of fresh water, and 1,500 gals. of diesel exhaust fluid.
The vessel is classed by ABS with A1 Escort Tug, Towing Vessel, AMS, UWILD, FFV1, BP, and LEV (US) notations and complies with applicable U.S. Coast Guard Subchapter M regulations and international standards. Delivery is scheduled for May 2026.
Rice emphasized that early collaboration between the shipyard, designer, and Maritime Partners played a major role in keeping the project on schedule and refining the design before construction began.
“That early collaboration between the shipyard, the design agent, and the customer gives you the best result — the best quality boat and the smoothest timeline,” he said. “We worked together early on to eliminate a lot of the potential problems we’ve seen in the past.”
The first vessel was launched on schedule, and the yard expects delivery within a week of the original contract delivery date set two years earlier. In March, the shipyard began construction on the seventh boat in the series.
One of the more unique aspects of the Maritime Partners tug series is how the vessel specification was developed. Because Maritime Partners is primarily a vessel leasing company rather than a tug operator, the company relied on the shipyard’s experience building vessels for multiple tug operators across the U.S.
Rice said the yard drew on lessons learned from building tugs for operators such as G&H Towing, Moran Towing, Seabulk, and others, incorporating features and preferences from different operators into a single design.
“Every tug operator has their own preferences and their own way of doing things,” Rice said. “We’ve built for a lot of different operators over the years, and we’ve learned a ton from all of them. So with this project, we were able to take the things that made sense from different operators and blend them into one specification.”
This approach allowed the vessel to avoid being tailored to a single operator’s preferences and instead resulted in a more flexible design that could be chartered to operators in different ports and service profiles.
“We look at this as having the best of other operators that we’ve built for all blended into one package,” Rice said.
Because the Maritime Partners project involves a series of eight vessels rather than a one-off build, Master Boat Builders invested heavily in engineering early in the project to improve production efficiency and reduce surprises during construction.
“We did a lot of engineering early to make sure efficiencies are recognized throughout the project and to move decision-making earlier in the process so there are fewer surprises during fabrication and commissioning,” Rice said.
Rice believes the Maritime Partners design could influence future harbor tug construction due to its combination of power, versatility, and standardized design.
“I think that this is going to be one of the best, most technologically advanced, highest powered bollard pull tugs in the country. We think this will set the new standard of what a harbor tug is going to look like going forward,” he said. “It’s extremely versatile. And I think that’s the key. It can do almost any job that’s required — it’s got the power to do it, but it’s not so large that it can’t work in smaller ports.”
