Operators · Gulf Intracoastal Waterway

Kirby Inland Marine: where its towboats locked through

119 boats made 1,667 lockages, 877 of them on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway.

Lock Wait · Lockages from 2 September to 4 October 2026 · Published 5 October 2026

Kirby Inland Marine towboats made 1,667 lockages between 2 September and 4 October 2026. The 119 boats worked 87 locks and pushed 5,463 barges, about three per lockage. That is the second-highest lockage count of the 436 operators in our archive, and about 14 lockages per boat. The ten locks these boats used most account for 834 of the 1,667 lockages, 50%.

Where the boats ran

The Gulf Intracoastal Waterway accounted for 877 lockages, just over half. The Ohio River had 392, the Mississippi 167 and the Monongahela 105. Old River had 32, the Illinois Waterway 30, the Tennessee 26 and the Ouachita and Black Rivers 12. Half the lockages were upbound. 45% carried a hazardous-cargo flag.

Waits

The median lockage followed a 58-minute wait. One in ten followed a wait longer than 8.4 hours. Across all 1,667 lockages the boats waited 6,191 hours, about 258 days, or 3.7 hours per lockage on average.

The largest single total is at Kentucky Lock on the Tennessee River: 1,162 hours over 10 lockages, 19% of the total and about 116 hours per lockage. On the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, Calcasieu Lock added 940 hours over 137 lockages, Brazos West Gate 580 over 52, Brazos East Gate 551 over 57 and Leland Bowman 485 over 142. Waiting time is set by each lock and the queue ahead of it. Our Kentucky Lock article covers why waits there run longest.

How the numbers are counted

Wait runs from a tow's arrival at the lock to the start of its lockage. Tows still waiting when we collected the data have no lockage yet, so these totals leave out waits in progress. Operators are matched from the Corps' 2022 vessel file and FCC licences, so a boat sold since may be listed under a previous operator.

Related

• Belleville Locks and Dam: big tows, short waits Kirby Inland Marine is a top operator here
• Calcasieu Lock: five-hour waits for two-barge tows Kirby Inland Marine is a top operator here
• Kentucky Lock: why tows wait four days Kirby Inland Marine is a top operator here
• Mel Price Lock and Dam: 44% of tows wait over an hour Kirby Inland Marine is a top operator here
• Olmsted Locks and Dam: more barges than any other lock Kirby Inland Marine is a top operator here

Sources: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Lock Performance Monitoring System, archived by Lock Wait; chamber dimensions and opening year from the BTS National Transportation Atlas; operators from the USACE Waterborne Transportation Lines (2022) and FCC ship licences. Wait is measured from arrival to start of lockage. How every number is defined.