Crosby Marine Transportation, LLC and its affiliated debtors—Crosby Tugs, Crosby Dredging, and Bertucci Contracting—are roughly three months into a Chapter 11 case in the Eastern District of Louisiana (Judge Meredith S. Grabill) and have moved from first-day stabilization to an expedited section 363 sale track, with stalking-horse bidding procedures set for evidentiary hearing on July 17, 2026 and an auction targeted for mid-August.
The March 23, 2026 filing was precipitated by a liquidity crisis rooted in high-cost merchant cash advance funding, after MCA providers began contacting the debtors' customers to intercept receivables (Chief Restructuring Officer DeclarationDkt. 30). The Golden Meadow, Louisiana marine transportation and dredging operator entered bankruptcy with approximately 205 vessels, 850 employees, and roughly $162.8 million of funded debt spread across a $30 million Hancock Whitney receivables facility and fourteen vessel-secured fleet lenders (Cash Collateral MotionDkt. 28). Three days before the petition, JMB Capital Partners Lending, LLC acquired the Hancock Whitney debt and stepped in as DIP lender: the debtors sought an up-to-$60 million senior secured, priming, superpriority term loan—$30 million of new money plus a dollar-for-dollar roll-up of the prepetition receivables facility at 12.0% (DIP Financing MotionDkt. 29). A Raymond James process that contacted 73 lenders and produced only three indications of interest grounded the debtor's showing that no unsecured or junior financing was available ().
The debtors secured final cash-collateral authority on April 24, 2026, which also fixed the sale-track milestones—indications of interest by May 29, 2026, a bidding procedures order by July 24, 2026, an auction by August 14, 2026, and closing thirty days post-auction (Final Cash Collateral OrderDkt. 294). That order granted existing secured parties adequate-protection superpriority claims and replacement liens behind the DIP liens and carve-out, and bound the debtors to a stipulation on prepetition lien validity subject to a committee challenge window and investigation budget.
The case is now centered on the sale. On June 30, 2026 the debtors moved to expedite hearing on stalking-horse bidding procedures, bid protections, and contract assumption-and-assignment protocols (Motion to ExpediteDkt. 572); the court granted expedition the next day and set the evidentiary hearing for July 17, 2026, with objections due July 15 (Order Granting ExpeditionDkt. 573; Notice of HearingDkt. 574). Creditor friction is running in parallel: the debtors objected to MC Bank & Trust's stay-relief motion targeting two vessels central to the sale process (Objection to Stay ReliefDkt. 578), and by consent continued Arba Credit Investors III's motion to enforce cash-collateral reporting obligations to the next omnibus hearing (Motion to ContinueDkt. 575). An official transcript of the June 18, 2026 hearing has been lodged (Transcript NoticeDkt. 577). The next omnibus hearing is scheduled for July 9, 2026, ahead of the July 17 sale hearing.
