U.S. Merchant Marine Training Ship Empire State (courtesy MARAD)
The era of dedicated merchant marine/navy cadet training ships has long since gone the way of the Dodo bird in most countries, however in the case of the United States, the tradition survives. The new build training ship Empire State was last month delivered to the Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration (MARAD) by Philly Shipyard and TOTE Services, which is overseeing the program of constructing five new training ships to be distributed across the country. Empire State has been assigned to the State University of New York (SUNY) Maritime College which has a 150 year history in the training of future U.S. mariners.