BC Ferries is still calculating all the expenses it incurred after the Queen of Burnaby, the regular vessel on the Powell River-Comox route, was out of service for 15 days.
The company pulled the ship from service on February 6 because of a mechanical problem with the port propeller. The vessel returned to the route on February 21, following repairs to the propeller and hydraulic control system.
While it was off the route, the North Island Princess, which carries about one quarter of the number of passengers and vehicles, was redeployed from the Powell River-Texada Island route to the Powell River-Comox route and the Tachek and a water taxi provided service to the Texada route. Service between Powell River and Comox was augmented by charter flights and supplemental sailings by the Tachek.
According to Deborah Marshall, BC Ferries’ director of media relations, the company provided 25 flights that carried a total of 511 passengers. While the flights cost passengers the price of a walk-on ticket, the cost to BC Ferries was $78,000.
Marshall said the company won’t know the total cost of other services it provided until a few weeks from now.
From February 5 to 20, eight sailings (on February 6) were cancelled due to mechanical problems and 10 sailings on February 16 and 17 were cancelled due to high winds on the Powell River-Comox route.
During this period, there were 140 sailings between Powell River and Comox. There were over 8,900 passengers and over 3,100 vehicles of all types on those sailings. Approximately 180 under-height passenger vehicles, 20 over-height vehicles, four commercial vehicles, one semi-trailer and approximately 70 passengers were left behind, said Marshall. She added that the statistics don’t include customers who turned out of the terminals and decided not to travel. “It’s my understanding too that we didn’t leave anybody behind at the end of the day,” Marshall said. “But certainly I would imagine that some customers just decided not to travel.”
With regard to the repairs to the Burnaby, the propeller hub was replaced and adjustments were made to the hydraulic controls.
The ship had returned to service in December 2011 after undergoing a $12-million major refit. Marshall said the propeller hub was inspected but not worked on during the refit. “Inspection was fine and there was no work scheduled to be done,” she said.
In other news, BC Ferries released its third quarter results on February 24, showing losses almost double compared to the same period the year before.
The company reported a net loss of $23.1 million for the three months ending December 31, 2011, compared to a net loss of $12.5 million in the same quarter last year.
In the third quarter of fiscal 2011-2012, vehicle traffic dropped by 3.6 per cent compared to the same period the year before, while the number of passengers fell by three per cent.
“The traffic decline has been relatively consistent throughout all three quarters of fiscal 2012 and is the largest year-over-year traffic decline that BC Ferries has experienced in recent years,” stated a news release announcing the third-quarter results.
Net earnings for the nine-month period ending December 31, 2011 were $28.7 million, down from $42.8 million for the same period in the previous year.
