By Steve Wilhelm From Puget Sound Business Journal

Saltchuk Resources Inc., best known as a powerhouse in the West Coast and Arctic maritime industries, is going Caribbean.

The Seattle-based holding company this week finalized purchase of Florida-based Tropical Shipping and Construction Co., LTD. The sale, which included the Seven Seas insurance business, closed on Tuesday for $220 million after taxes and other adjustments. The seller was AGL Resources, an Atlanta, Georgia, energy company.

The purchase complements one of Saltchuk’s best-known operations, Tacoma-based Totem Ocean Trailer Express, or TOTE, which runs regular cargo ship service between Tacoma and Anchorage, Alaska.

By comparison Tropical is an ocean carrier that operates 13 smaller container ships in the Caribbean, connecting islands including Puerto Rico, the Cayman Islands, the Bahamas, and Trinidad.

Saltchuk is now a $3 billion company with 7,730 employees worldwide, and 2,160 in Washington state. Saltchuk also operates Foss Maritime, which owns the familiar green-and-white tugboats often seen assisting cargo ships in Seattle’s Elliott Bay.

For this region, the Tropical acquisition will strengthen and diversify Saltchuk, which has become one of the region’s most powerful maritime companies.

“We have had high regard and interest in the Tropical organization for many years and now it is a done deal,” wrote Saltchuk President Tim Engle, in a statement. “We believe Tropical is a perfect match. They possess all of the values and traits that make our other companies so strong, and they are a leader in the transportation and logistics industry.”

The purchase also balances Saltchuk’s geographical investment. While the company is expanding to the south it’s also preparing to develop its business in the Arctic, and is building three large ice-hardened ocean-going tugs for that purpose.

The sale took a decade to consummate, after Tropical President Rick Murrell first visited Saltchuk in 2004.

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