Steam Packet Apologises, but More Disruption to Come

The Steam Packet is apologising to customers for recent disruptions and explained how a combination of works in Douglas harbour and tides have conspired against sailings.

Primarily, the cause for the changes to schedules has been around time and tide.

The DoI’s project to upgrade mooring facilities on the King Edward VIII pier coincides with low tides at the same time as scheduled arrivals and departures.

A spokesperson said: ‘Ordinarily this would not cause a problem. However, operating from the shallower berth on the Queen Victoria linkspan creates a risk due to the presence of concrete reinforcement on the seabed designed to protect the infrastructure from Manannan’s powerful water-jet propulsion system.

‘Both of the company’s conventional vessels, Ben-my-Chree and Manxman, are exposed to the risk of damaging their vulnerable propellers and rudders in such circumstances.

‘The coincidence of the low tides and arrival times was the primary cause of rescheduled sailings last week. Again, unfortunately the recent storms have led to added siltation in Heysham Port. This has now coincided with low tides around scheduled arrival and departure times.’

While tidal conditions and scheduled arrival or departure times have been the primary cause of the disruptions to schedules other factors have also been at play.

Thursday’s 8.45am sailing was cancelled due to predicted weather conditions at Heysham Port exceeding the safe entry limits. This limit is still under review but while it is in place the Company is fully supportive of masters employing maximum precaution in their decisions about making safe approaches to Heysham.

The disruption to Wednesday’s 7.45pm departure from Douglas to Heysham was due to a combination of silting at Heysham Port and knock-on effects from the cancellation of Thursday’s 8.45am sailing to Heysham.

The company, therefore, felt it had to load the maximum number of freight trailers on Wednesday’s evening departure in order to clear the harbour freight area, which has been temporarily reduced as a result of the ongoing harbour improvement work.

Steam Packet MD Brian Thomson apologised to customers, saying: ‘We’re all very aware of the role the Company plays in Manx life and being punctual and reliable is at the core of what we do. We know that people have busy lives and need to be able to make plans around our sailings. We are sorry that the service has fallen below what we aim for.

‘Of course, we can’t control every factor that affects our services, and sometimes we are forced to make choices about rescheduling services that we’d really rather not make, but that is the reality of working on and around the sea. In situations where there’s a choice between being reliable or punctual, we’d always choose reliability and maintaining the island’s lifeline.

‘I would also add that in hindsight the decision to try to clear as much freight as possible from the Port last night was the wrong one. I would like to apologise on behalf of the company to everyone affected. We try to make the best decisions to ensure the best service, not just for passengers but the whole of the communities we serve. We did this with the best of intentions but it didn’t work out for the best yesterday.’