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Norlolkline moves to allay vessel safety fears
Page 15
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CROSS-CHANNEL freight operator Norfolkline has moved swiftly to reassure hauliers that there are no problems over vessel safety after it locked the bow doors on one of its ferries.
The 35,000-tonne DunkirkDover ferry Maersk Delft is only allowing LGVs to enter and leave via its stern doors after experiencing problems with the hinges on the bow doors. The decision led to one driver claiming that no reason had been given for this and expressing concerns over the safety of the vessel.
"You have to drive in and then spin around in the hold so you are lined up ready to drive straight back out through the stern, rather than the bows." he told CM. "It's not a great problem, but I thought we stopped doing that 30 years ago when we got RO-RO."
N orfolkline's head of operations, Russell Challenor, says: "The bow doors are working. There's a problem with one of the hinges. If we keep using them they will break.There's nothing wrong with them, they are locked shut. They will he repaired very shortly."
Wayne Sullen, the ferry service's general manager on the Dunkirk-Dover route, adds: "We would never compromise safety; there's no issue of risk. Safety is of paramount importance to us."
The Maersk Delft is a RO-PAX (RO-RO/passenger) vessel built in 2005 at the Samsung Heavy Industries shipyard in South Korea.