Tristan da Cunha Shipping News

MFV Edinburgh's November-December Voyage

Departure from Tristan
Report from Sean Burns and Peter Millington, who also took the photographs

Peter Millington's photo shows MFV Edinburgh loading passengers on Friday 6th December.
The Box packed with passengers being lifted from the raft onto the ship.

After backloading until 21.00 on Friday 6th December, the MFV Edinburgh got away at around 22.00. The raft crews and others worked hard to achieve this and did a brilliant job. On board were: islanders Ken and Judy Green, Sandra and Deanna Rogers; Lamont Ferreira, Clinton Le Bod, Joe and Vicky Tyrell and two of the contractors.

People gathering on the Harbour Road at the harbour to see passengers off.
	Visitor Dr Joe Tyrell and his wife Vicky kitted up and being seen off by their hosts Mark and Paula Swain.
Contractors Jerome Cupido (left) and Egsaan Louw arriving in style with their baggage.
The raft ready to depart for the Edinburgh with the passengers "snug" in The Box.

Peter Millington's photos shows MFV Edinburgh in front
and MFV Geo Searcher being offloaded at the Tristan anchorage
on 29th November 2019

 

Arrival Update from Cynthia Green and Dawn Repetto

MFV Edinburgh arrived at Tristan at 15.00 GMT on Monday 25th November and anchored off the Settlement, but the weather was poor so no chance of passengers coming ashore or cargo being offloaded. Conditions remained poor on Tuesday 26th, but improved on Wednesday 27th to enable passengers to get ashore by 10.30 am GMT.  

Report and photos from our own correspondent
Webmaster Peter Millington

MFV Edinburgh at the quay in Cape Town

The departure of the MFV Edinburgh was delayed from the scheduled date on Thursday 14th November  because of high winds and refuelling issues. Passengers went aboard about 9:00am on Friday 15th, but mechanical difficulties with the crane and with the wind picking up again delayed departure. Passengers were able to go ashore for respite until 4:00pm on Saturday. Problems solved, the ship finally left Cape Town at about 11:30pm on Saturday 16th November.

Passengers on board are: Islanders Darren & Randall Repetto; Visitors: Joe & Vicky Tyrell, and Peter Millington.  

Peter's cabin - as there are only 5 passengers this will be single occupancy.	Edinburgh's main accommodation deck corridor
Above: Edinburgh's dining room featuring compartments for conduiments etc in a swell!       Right: MFV Edinburgh looking spruce after all these years (the ship made its maiden Tristan voyage in May 1985)
Panoramic view from MFV Edinburgh towards Signal Hill. MV Baltic Trader is the diminuitive vessel in the far back right of the dock. The Baltic Trader has been chartered by the Tristan Government and is being prepared to bring out materials soon for the next stage of repairs and development of Calshot Harbour.

MV Baltic Trader's cargo voyage

Report from Cynthia Green and Sean Burns

Peter Millington's photo taken on 15th November
shows the MV Baltic Trader in the corner of a
Cape Town dock as the ship was loaded
with supplies for work on Calshot Harbour.

MV Baltic Trader has been chartered by the Tristan Government to transport 1000 tonnes of materials to carry our further work on Tristan's Calshot Harbour during the 2019-2020 summer season. The former Ovenstones ship, used for several years to carry out scheduled Cape Town - Tristan cargo and passenger voyages, is now owned by another company. The ship's last trip to Tristan was in November 2017.

MV Baltic Trader left Cape Town on Tuesday 19th November and has been progressing at a gentle pace towards Tristan, and eventually arrived at Tristan on Friday 6th December at 04.00. We are checking if this is the slowest passage from Cape Town to Tristan in modern times. A passage of 16.5 days would work out at an average speed of 3.8 knots.  

There are were passengers on this MV Baltic Trader voyage. There was oo much swell for offloading on Friday but on Saturday 7th vehicles were taken off the ship.  The newly refurbished Wave Dancer is also on board, but the weather forecast is not good for offloading from Saturday afternoon.

 

Bernard Pronost's photo shows the MV Baltic Trader
being offloaded at Tristan in November 2017.

 

 

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