Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from the line of John Tysseland - Citigroup
John Tysseland - Citigroup
Just a couple of quick questions on the market in general, if you look at, you had mentioned that your lightering was down 20% year over year volumes, where are those vessels, are those vessels participating in other markets in the US or are they getting essentially, put in drydock or just in layoff right now.
Miles Itkin
The, our vessels that service that lightering trade are used less efficiently so the three vessels are in operation but they’re not in operation at 100% capacity or 100% of the time.
John Tysseland - Citigroup
So they’re still participating in the same market, its just not as, the utilization is a little bit lower.
Miles Itkin
Exactly.
John Tysseland - Citigroup
Have you seen any other vessels in that market get laid up or is it just the, is the industry as a whole just running a little bit on less utilization.
Miles Itkin
We are the, by far the largest participant in that trade.
John Tysseland - Citigroup
And then when you look at, you gave us a good indication what you expected for the market in the fourth quarter with 72 vessels, up from 68, what about in 2010. What kind of deliveries do you expect coming into the market. Are any of those in question in your mind and how many do you think actually come out of the market as a result of just can’t find work.
Miles Itkin
There’s been a greater tendency to enjoy optionality so to the extent that a vessel can be on a cost effective basis put into lay up, there’s a tendency on the part of an owner to put those vessels in the lay up in the hope that at some point in the future they can justify the next drydock expenditure which as you know is sizable within this. Eric, do you happen to have available the delivery schedule on the newbuilds.
Eric Smith
Yes, if you look at it from a fleet perspective, the entire Jones Act fleet, it’ll take delivery of two large ATB’s, it’ll take delivery of our new tankers coming our of Aker, two of which will go into shuttle tankers, two of which will go into Tesoro’s program and that constitutes basically the deliveries.
John Tysseland - Citigroup
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