Maritime Injury Blog

Proposed Jones Act changes worries offshore industry

The U.S. offshore sector is scrambling to replace foreign crews with Americans in light of proposed changes to the Jones Act.

The U.S. Customs and Borders Protection (CBP) announced in July plans to significantly amend interpretation of rules for vessels transporting offshore oil and gas equipment. This would revoke current Jones Act exemptions in areas including diving support work, cable and pipe-laying.

Presently, over 80-percent of this work is carried out on non U.S. flagged vessels.

According to the International Marine Carriers Association, at least five years would be required to provide an adequate number of U.S. vessels to meet the new CBP standards.

“Foreign crews are being shifted away from the US and replaced with American citizens, said Craig Johnson, President of Faststream's U.S. operations. "We think that around 70 vessels could be affected by these proposals, but there still remains a good deal of uncertainty as to how far these proposals will go."

Faststream is an international recruiting agency.

A public comment period expired on August 17th and a decision is pending.

Read more here.