‘Isle of Lewis’ out of action for three months
Barra is facing a grim few months of ferry uncertainty after Caledonian MacBrayne revealed that the 31 year-old MV Isle of Lewis is likely to be out of service for a further three months., following annual maintenance.
The news came after almost a week in which Castlebay had not seen a CalMac ferry with traffic carried by the MV Lord of the Isles diverted via Mallaig and Lochboisdale. The MV ‘Isle of Mull’ has now taken over both routes until March 11th.
A statement is awaited from CalMac about vessel deployment thereafter with the uncertainty extending to other routes in the network.
Instead of the ‘Isle of Lewis’ coming back into service on the Oban-Castlebay route as expected, the company has now revealed that “the need for additional steelwork has been identified on MV Isle of Lewis during her overhaul”.
The notification from CalMac continues: “During a Class survey, steel wastage was discovered on top of a fuel tank. This will need to be repaired to get the necessary approvals to return to service, and we’ve established a temporary repair is unlikely to be possible.
“The drydock operator has advised that the timeline for the work could be up to three months”.
The statement continues: “Fuel has been drained from the tank, and there is equipment including the sewage treatment plant, ballast pumps, fire pumps and associated pipework that needs to be removed to complete the steel renewal. The removal, reinstatement and commissioning of this equipment contributes to the timeline.
“This means MV Isle of Lewis will not be available for the start of the summer timetable, and her overhaul is going to run through MV Hebrides’ (27 Feb – 13 Apr), MV Loch Frisa’s (16 Mar – 07 Apr) and MV Finlaggan’s (20 Apr – 08 May) planned overhauls”.
CalMac say: “We are urgently reviewing vessel deployment from March through to May, to ensure we can provide a service to Barra whilst maintaining services across the wider network. We will be in touch with more information early (this) week”.