Tsawwassen-Swartz Bay BC Ferries route back to normal service
Posted July 9, 2018 5:41 am.
Last Updated July 9, 2018 11:40 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
TSAWWASSEN (NEWS 1130) – Weekend problems at BC Ferries continued into the work week, with two cancellations early this morning.
However, service returned to normal by 10 a.m.
Repairs on the Queen of New Westminster weren’t completed in time for service early Monday morning. The 6 a.m. sailing from Tsawwassen was cancelled, as was the 8 a.m. return sailing from Swartz Bay.
“Our engineers and technicians have been working very hard overnight,” says Deborah Marshall with BC Ferries. “The vessel went out for sea trials first thing this morning. [They] have been deemed successful. The repairs are complete, and the Queen of New Westminster will resume service on the Tsawwassen-Swartz Bay run at 10 a.m.”
“We certainly apologize to our customers who were affected yesterday,” she adds.
Three island-bound sailings and two heading to Tsawwassen were cancelled yesterday. Passengers were angry, saying there was a lack of communication.
Warren was trying to get to the 8 a.m. sailing leaving Tsawwassen, and says he was shocked to learn it was cancelled. He tells us around 7:15 a.m., he got off the bus and hadn’t heard anything about cancellations.
“I had to literally dig on the website to look for that information. I just think BC Ferries dropped the ball and think that their method of communication was okay when clearly the message didn’t get out.”
Others took to social media to vent their frustration.
“The other three vessels remained in operation on the Tsawwassen-Swartz Bay run and we actually provided even late-night service. But I know some customers were affected, and we certainly apologize,” says Marshall.
“After any incident, we do a post debrief to see if there are things that we can do better. But I know that our team was actively on social media yesterday. I know that our operations centre was posting notices on our website in ‘current conditions’ and certainly, taking media calls,” she adds.
Yesterday, Tessa Humphries with BC Ferries said people should follow the organization on Twitter for the latest information. However, a notice about the cancellations wasn’t issued on that platform until 11:51 a.m. on Sunday — well after their website listed a number of cancellations.
