Matson Navigation Co. said it was difficult to tell today when normal service would resume. And an official with wholesaler Armstrong Produce said the order to reopen the docks will hurt the Islands.

"Simply put, it's more complicated to fix something than to break it," said John Pachtner, a spokesman for the Pacific Maritime Association, which represents shipping companies and terminal operators.

The 10,500 members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union were expected to begin reporting to work tonight, ending a lockout that shut down 29 ports from San Diego to Seattle and cost the nation's fragile economy up to $2 billion a day by holding up exports and imports.

President Bush intervened yesterday, obtaining an injunction to end the shutdown.

PMA estimated it could take 8 to 10 weeks to clear the backlog caused by the 11-day lockout of longshoremen.

Hawai'i had received an exemption last week that allowed ships to be loaded over the weekend. But the increasingly bitter labor dispute prompted President Bush yesterday to enact the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, which allowed him to ask a federal judge to order the end of the lockout. That means ships that have been waiting for days will be worked first instead of ships that would have been loaded under the exemption.

Hawai'i is not out of the woods yet, said Kelvin Shigemura, vice president of Hawai'i wholesaler Armstrong Produce.

"This is actually hurting Hawai'i. If the lockout was going on, at least Hawai'i would have priority," Shigemura said.

Shigemura, whose company began flying in produce last week, figures that any future Armstrong shipment will be delayed by a week. It is causing him to increase the amount he orders for each cargo ship, he said.

"We ordered what we need for the beginning of next week so our customers should be OK," he said. "But now we don't know what the situation is. On each boat, we have to bring in a little more because we don't know when the next boat will be coming."

Instead of three to four days of inventory he is planning on seven to 10 days worth of inventory.

"I don't think they will be back on schedule for weeks," Shigemura said.

Three cargo ships owned by Matson were able to leave under the exemption, with the first scheduled to arrive Saturday and the rest possibly late Sunday, said Jeff Hull, company spokesman.

"We are moving the vessels at a faster speed than normal to catch up," he said.

Three other ships are sitting off ports in Oakland, Los Angeles and Seattle, but they do not have scheduled departure dates, Hull said.

"It is likely not going to be any sooner than the weekend," Hull said.

Matson and CSX Lines are responsible for bringing in nearly 90 percent of Hawai'i's goods. Before the lockout last month, Matson had four Hawai'i arrivals per week.

"Clearly, the exemption did help," Hull said. "To have some work done this week and get three ships is significant. But long-term, it is difficult to say when we will go back to normal service."

Officials at CSX were unavailable for comment today.

Longshore workers and shipping lines have a mammoth task of heaving billions of dollars worth of idle cargo – from auto parts to bananas – back into the nation's economy.

Signs suggest the transition won't be smooth.

The maritime association said it would order workers to report to shifts that start at 6 p.m. today in most ports.

The announcement came hours after Bush became the first president in a quarter-century to use the Taft-Hartley Act.

Judge William Alsup then issued a temporary restraining order that expires Oct. 16. Lawyers for both sides said they expect Alsup to impose the 80-day cooling-off period as mandated by Taft-Hartley at that time.

A court-ordered truce would keep ports open during the crucial Christmas season, when retailers rely on imported goods to stock their shelves.

"This nation simply cannot afford to have hundreds of billions of dollars a year in potential manufacturing and agricultural trade sitting idle," Bush said. "We can't afford it."

White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said today that the two sides cannot count on Bush to settle their dispute.

"Nobody should be under any illusions that at the end of 80 days the federal government will step in and solve the problem," Fleischer said. "This is a worker-management dispute at a very fundamental level."

West Coast ports were closed late last month amid a bitter contract dispute that centers on the implementation of waterfront technology that unionized dock workers believe would cause job losses. Since then, about 200 ships laden with tons of cargo have backed up at docks or at anchor.

The judge's order required dock workers to resume work "at a normal pace," a phrase that is sure to be contentious in coming days.

Working too fast could compromise safety on congested docks, and that's not something dock workers are willing to do, union officials said. The union leaders said yesterday that they expect the association will wield Alsup's order as a stick to whack workers with charges that they are not meeting previous productivity levels.