C9-S-81d barge carrier

The C9-S-81d is a United States Maritime Administration design for a barge carrier of the lighter aboard ship type, known as LASH, that Avondale Industries built at its yard on the Mississippi River near New Orleans. Wikipedia records nine ships of about 41,000 deadweight tons built in 1974 and 1975, and the Military Periscope entry for the type gives Avondale Shipyard at Westwego, Louisiana as the builder and 1974 as the completion year of the example it lists. A LASH carrier takes barges, called lighters, aboard through the stern and carries them to the destination, where they are unloaded and the vessel is free to move on to the next shipment. Some of the C9-S-81d ships were used by the United States Navy, and the Green Valley was chartered from Central Gulf Lines and operated as a Navy barge carrier from 1996 to 2000. The type followed the earlier C8-S-81b LASH ships that Avondale built from 1970.