Missouri Dry Dock & Repair sells dry docks to Ohio company

Missouri Dry Dock & Repair Co. is no longer in the dry dock business.

"We determined it was not profitable for us to continue to own and operate our floating assets," explained Missouri Dry Dock president Robert W. "Rob" Erlbacher II. Those assets included a pair of 2,200-ton capacity dry docks and various support vessels.

Erlbacher, who has served as company president since 1970, confirmed Tuesday the "floating assets" have been sold to a larger dry dock operation based in Ohio. Terms of the private sale have not been disclosed.

"We were looking for a number of months and found an individual who was in the same business that we were in," Erlbacher said. "We had one location, he has six, so it just made sense."

That individual was Bruce McGinnis, CEO of McNational Inc., which has corporate headquarters in South Point, Ohio. McNational operates dry dock facilities along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers.

"He does what I do, and he's growing his business," Erlbacher said.

McNational took possession of the dry docks and support barges earlier this month.

"We made a deal and they sent one of their riverboats in, picked them (the dry docks) up and moved them out," Erlbacher said.

Although the company will no longer do dry dock work, Erlbacher said it will still be known as "Missouri Dry Dock & Repair."

"We kept the name, kept the machine shop and we're keeping our propeller repair shop," Erlbacher said, adding that McNational will be sending some of its propeller, shaft and rudder repair work to Cape Girardeau.

"We still consider ourselves to be very much in business and will continue to be for years to come," he said. "We just don't pick boats up out of the water any more via the dry docks. It was time for us not to do that anymore."

McNational owns and operates shipyards in Huntington, West Virginia; Cincinnati; Paducah, Kentucky; Cairo, Illinois; Alton, Illinois; and New Orleans.

Although he did not offer specific numbers, Erlbacher said "our employment went down just a little after we sold the river assets."

Missouri Dry Dock & Repair was founded in the early 1950s by Erlbacher's father, Robert W. Erlbacher, and was an outgrowth of Erlbacher Brothers Barge Line, which the senior Erlbacher started in the 1930s with his brother, Eddie Erlbacher. Eddie left the business shortly after World War II and the barge company became Missouri Barge Line. Today, Robert W. "Robbie" Erlbacher III, representing a third generation of the Erlbacher family, is also involved in Missouri Dry Dock & Repair, overseeing the machine shop and propeller repair shop.

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