53.1.1 Mission

The forest products industry relies on the use of ship transport to move raw materials (logs) to distant installations for primary processing. Further transportation by sea is then often used in the moving of these materials to secondary or even tertiary processing facilities, and finally, in the form of lumber or paper products to the consuming markets. Forest products have been transported by sea for hundreds of years. The British Royal Navy needed large quantities of wood for its shipbuilding and as it was not available in Britain it had to be imported from the Baltic and North America.

As countries have developed over the past 200 years the demand for forest products has dramatically increased. The transport of logs in the Puget Sound/British Columbia area has developed into a complete infrastructure. In the early days the famous 4- and 5-masted schooners moved the processed lumber from the Puget Sound to California.

It was quickly found that the most effective way to transport the logs from the forests to the local mills or to loading points for transport for larger deliveries, was by water, not on ships but by man-assembled log rafts (Figure 53.1).

Figure 53.1: Log Raft (4 Boom) Tow (Copyright West Isle)

The logs are transported to the water either by skidding them down the hill from where they are felled, to the water's edge, if they are close enough, or today, more so, by special trucking and handling equipment when...