DATE: Saturday, October 4, 1997             TAG: 9710040578

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY CHRISTOPHER DINSMORE, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:   55 lines

TWO CONTRACTS, TWO WEEKS METRO AWARDED LARGE NAVY DEALS, MAY REHIRE 200 LAID-OFF WORKERS

Metro Machine Corp. landed a lifeline in the form of two Navy contracts in the past two weeks.

The Norfolk shipyard, which has been empty since late last winter except for a week-long repair job in August, has won a phased maintenance contract that could be worth more than $100 million in the next five years, said Ken Newman, the shipyard's senior vice president.

It also won a $13.7 million research and development contract from the Navy for its curved-plate hull technology.

The two contracts will help sustain Norfolk-based Metro Machine for the next few years. The company has been suffering from a lack of Navy ship repair work since earlier this year.

The five-year phased maintenance contract calls for up to 12 overhauls of five amphibious warships homeported in Norfolk. The ships include the Ponce, Shreveport, Nashville, Trenton and La Moure County.

When the first of the ships arrives in January, Metro Machine will rehire about 200 of the 500 workers it laid off earlier this year, Newman said.

Metro will do two, four-month overhauls in the coming year on the Ponce and the Shreveport, with the second one starting in June, Newman said.

``We're really excited,'' Newman said.

Nearly all of the work on the curved-hull research and development contract will be done at Metro Machine's shipyards in Chester, Pa., and Erie, Pa. The Erie yard will assemble hull modules weighing as much as 800 tons.

Metro Machine had developed and patented a hull design based on the use of curved steel plates on the theory that it would be stronger than a traditional hull. Originally, the shipyard wanted to break into commercial ship construction by selling tankers with curved-plate hulls, but it was unable to secure an order.

The Navy made the contract award based on an unsolicited proposal from Metro Machine.

Metro also will develop an improved paint formulation for ballast tank preservation under the contract.

Work on the research contract is scheduled to be completed by Sept. 30, 1999.

Officials with the union that represents Metro's production employees, the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers' Local 2000, could not be reached for comment. ILLUSTRATION: Color staff file photo

Metro machine Corp....[workers leaving the shipyard]...

Side Bar

Contracts

For complete copy, see microfilm KEYWORDS: CONTRACT SHIPYARD

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu