A SUMMER IN
MAINE Donors support extensive work on SSV Corwith Cramer By Doug Karlson
W
hether on shore or on the high seas, SEA likes to dream up challenges. Just ask members of the Marine Operations Department. This past year, the task before them was enormous: take a 30-year-old steel brigantine and perform major maintenance in every compartment, on every system, from stem to stern, from the bottom of the keel to the top of the main truck. Oh, and do it in just four months, in a shipyard nearly 300 miles away from the ship’s home port. It was a challenge that would never have been possible if other critical members of the SEA family, our donors, hadn’t supported the project every step of the way.
6 | SPRING 2018 · ANNUAL REPORT
The Corwith Cramer Major Maintenance Project began long before the Cramer arrived at Front Street Shipyard in Belfast, Maine on June 13. Months earlier, SEA staff were busy assessing, planning and designing updated systems, ordering parts, seeking bids, lining up crew, and arranging accommodations. Planning teams were assigned to specific areas, such as hull, rigging, engineering, science upgrades, and galley. (Visitors to the Marine Ops Department couldn’t help but notice the tape on the floor, put there to mock up the refurbished galley.) When the ship sailed to the shipyard, the planning teams went too. They were overseen by SEA Marine Operations Coordinator