Campbell Industries Sold

Campbell Industries Inc., San Diego’s second-largest shipyard, has been sold to an unidentified buyer who has agreed to keep the troubled ship-repair company open and operating. A spokesman for Campbell, a subsidiary of privately held Marine Construction Design Co. of Seattle, said the identity of the new owner will be revealed at a news conference this morning.

The once-thriving tuna boat builder employed 1,300 workers as recently as 1981. But its fortunes faded when the local tuna industry sank in 1982, idling much of San Diego’s fleet and eliminating the need for new fishing vessels, known as seiners. Campbell now has only about 100 workers for its continuing ship-repair business.

Located at the foot of Eighth Avenue on San Diego Bay, Campbell’s operation has become part of the city’s expanding “rust bowl” of empty tuna canneries and shipyards. The firm now uses just nine acres of the 23-acre site it leases from the Port District.