A Covington-based offshore transport service company was awarded a contract to continue work on Navy-owned vessels.
Hornbeck Offshore Services will operate and maintain four Navy-owned ships in a $291 million contract that extends a previous contract with the military to work on the vessels. Hornbeck began work on the vessels in Kings Bay, Georgia, and Bangor, Washington, earlier this month.
The ships are owned by the Navy’s Military Sealift Command, the Department of Defense’s sea transportation provider comprised of 125 civilian-crewed vessels that assist the Navy by transporting supplies, conducting surveillance and data missions and maintaining combat cargo near ships for quick deployment.
The contract covers four Navy vessels: USNS Black Powder, USNS Westwind, USNS Eagleview and USNS Arrowhead, which are Transportation Auxiliary General Submarine Escort ships, all part of the Military Sealift Command’s Submarine and Special Warfare Support. The four ships help move military equipment and personnel on submarines and special operations.
They’re a part of the Military Sealift Command’s Special Mission program, a group of 20 vessels that perform missile tracking, oceanographic and hydrographic surveys, acoustic surveys, underwater surveillance, submarine support and special warfare support. They serve various military and government players, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Air Force and the U.S. Fleet Forces Command.
Jennings-based Leevac Industries built the four vessels in 2008 and 2009 for Hornbeck, which chartered them to the Navy. Congress required the military branch to acquire the vessels in order to keep using them, and Hornbeck sold the four ships to the Navy for $152 million in 2015.
The Navy awarded Hornbeck a 10-year operations and maintenance contract with the acquisition that expired last year. The company was previously awarded a $48 million contract in February 2025 to operate and maintain the four vessels that expired last month.
Hornbeck operates a fleet of offshore supply vessels to support the oil and gas industry, the U.S. military and offshore construction, mainly in the Gulf. They’re headquartered in Covington and have offices in Houston, Brazil and Mexico.
The continuation of the contract builds on Louisiana’s role in the Navy, being home to the Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base and Naval Support Activity base, both in New Orleans. The state is also home to other defense contractors including Thoma-Sea Marine Constructors, a marine construction company based in Houma, and Swiftships, a shipbuilding and engineering company with three offices in south Louisiana.
Hornbeck was founded in 1997 and operates a fleet of nearly 75 offshore supply vessels and multipurpose support vessels that operate primarily the Gulf of Mexico, the East Coast and West Coast, Brazil and the Caribbean.