construction activities utah construction company and its subsidiary and affiliated com panies are engaged in general construction activities throughout the world operations are spreod over five continents and eleven countries the type of work currently being performed includes commercial and governmental building industrial construction tunnels contract stripping mining mill construction earth moving dredging airport construction highways and bridges harbor installations military and naval installations dams and power houses and nuclear facilities both domestic and foreign construction volume was well sustained gross income improved substantially from the preceding year because of better results achieved on company projects and some success in containing previously established loss trends reported by several long term joint ventures in which your company is a participant in three of the four joint ventures on the st lawrence seaway in which your company has an interest additional losses are anticipated before final completion in all these cases claims against the owners appear justified and are being prepared for presentation but the ultimate outcome cannot be anticipated at this time our policy of diversification by types of work and geographical areas continues to prove its soundness improved results from domestic construction more than offset declines in the earnings of foreign construction subsidiaries while in 1956 the converse was the situation on november 21 1957 the bare hull of the alameda a second 30 inch hydraulic dredge for our operations was launched in the estuary adjacent to the builder's yard at alameda california filting out including installation of a self-contained power plant will be completed early in 1958 at which time it will join its sister dredge franciscan in commercial dredging operations