Ports & Waterways

A top House Republican is pushing for a massive increase in Navy shipbuilding that would bump spending to levels last seen in the mid-1980s.

Rep Randy Forbes (R-Va.), who is chairman of the sea power subpanel of the House Armed Services Committee, said his goal in the 2014 budget deliberations is to rebuild the Navy’s fleet, not just preserve it.

"We are entering the decade of sea power ... [so] what is the risk to the United States" if naval power continues to fall by the wayside, Forbes asked during a hearing.

Forbes’s move sets the stage for a battle over the Armed Services panel’s spending plan for fiscal year 2014.

A substance on a suspicious letter tested negative for hazardous material and the Arlington, Va., building reopened, the Navy said.

House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Rep. Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) said Thursday that the lower chamber would unveil its version of a bill to boost waterways by late spring or early summer.

The Senate version of a new Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) has already cleared a committee vote.

Shuster said Thursday that the House would dip its toes in the WRDA waters soon too.

“Late spring, summer, we’ll start to move something through committee,” he said. 

Carnival Cruise Lines announced Wednesday that it was spending $300 million to improve the reliability of its ships after a spate of recent incidents.

The announcement follows a pair of high-profile insistence of Carnival’s Triumph cruise ship ending up adrift without power. The vessel was stranded in the Gulf of Mexico for four days during a cruise in February and it also broke loose from a port in Mobile, Ala., where it is being repaired, earlier this month.

The Doral, Fla.-based company said on Wednesday the money it is spending will be used for fleetwide improvements. 

Lawmakers in the House and Senate will take up a bevy of transportation issues this week as hearings are scheduled on topics ranging from water to rail to aviation.

In the Senate, the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee will hold hearings Tuesday and Thursday on the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) progress on implementing safety initiatives and proposed budget for the 2014 fiscal year.

The panel will also hold a hearing on Wednesday about Amtrak service in the northeast United States.

Nearly all of the Navy's shipbuilding priorities, from new aircraft carriers and submarines to the next-generation Littoral Combat Ship, all receiving funding increases in the Pentagon's new spending blueprint. 

Lawmakers in the House will begin working in earnest this week on the two largest pieces of transportation legislation that are expected to be approved this year.

The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee has scheduled hearings on water resources development and Amtrak's budget for the 2014 fiscal year.

The hearings, on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively, are being cast as the first steps toward the passage of new bills to boost waterways and long-distance rail service in the United States.

Carnival Cruise Lines says its Triumph ship has been recovered after it broke free from a repair station dock this week.

The company, which faced sharp criticism for the ship becoming stranded at sea earlier this year, said the damage to the vessel was minimal.

However, the company said that two workers who were on board the ship at the time of its dislodging fell into the water near the Mobile, Ala., port. 

A Carnival cruise ship that was stranded at sea for nearly a week is adrift again after breaking free from a dock in Mobile, Ala.

The Carnival Triumph broke loose from the city's port, where it was towed to in February after listing in the Gulf of Mexico for a week, the company confirmed Wednesday afternoon.

The company attributed the incident to weather.

"Due to strong winds in Mobile, Carnival Triumph, which was docked [at] Mobile shipyard, broke away from its moorings," the company tweeted. "U.S. Coast Guard is on site."

“Let's get this done. Let's rebuild this country we love," Obama told a Miami crowd.