THE vulnerability of New Zealand’s Cook Strait ferry services has again been underlined this week when bad weather forced the withdrawal of the only remaining Interisland Line ropax currently in service.
KiwiRail announced on Sunday night [30 June] that all sailings between Wellington and Picton would be cancelled between Tuesday night and Thursday morning due to heavy swells and rough weather.
However, ‘all sailings’ only involved Kaitaki, as Kaiarahi undergoing a month-long ‘wet docking’ in Picton while Aratere is still under detention and repair following its steering failure and grounding outside Picton on 21 June.
Rival Cook Strait operator BlueBridge was able to continue sailings in freight-only mode but NZ media reports Kaitaki’s return to full freight and passenger loadings has been hampered by a missing fin stabiliser that substantially reduces traveller comfort.
The stabiliser has been missing for 18 months, when the damaged unit was found to be ‘missing’ during a drydocking in Sydney. It can only be replaced when Kaitaki is out of the water, which will happen during a scheduled docking in Singapore next month. In the interim KiwiRail has been unable to sail the vessel in swells greater than four metres.
KiwiRail has advised that Kaiarahi will return to Cook Strait this Saturday – in time for NZ school holidays – and with Kaitaki will operate modified schedules to clear the backlog of freight. As Aratere is the only rail-capable of the three, rail freight is being mode-switched at each port.
The NZ Government is yet to reveal the ferry replacement recommendations of the independent Ministerial Advisory Group, which were handed up at the end of June. The MAG was appointed to find replacements for the ships of the iReX project which was cancelled by the incoming Nationals last December, due to substantial cost overruns on land-based infrastructure.
