Arran ferry cancellations blamed on Covid and poor weather
- Published
MV Caledonian Isles vessel usually crosses from Adrossan to Brodick several times a day
A number of ferry sailings have been cancelled to and from the Isle of Arran following poor weather and staff shortages because of Covid.
On Sunday, there were understood to be 13 cancelled sailings on the main Ardrossan to Brodick route with no sailings off the island.
The Arran Ferry Action Group said the island economy was facing "serious challenges".
CalMac apologised for the disruption during "this exceptional period".
It has already introduced a temporary timetable , externalin a bid to keep sufficient crew and vessels operating.
Sam Bourne, chairman of the Arran Ferry Action Group, said Sunday was "complete chaos" with "passengers abandoned on both sides of the Firth of Clyde".
"Between Covid, weather and infrastructure issues we are facing a perfect storm of disruption," he said.
"Islanders travelling for healthcare or work are facing significant disruption. It's going to be a very challenging few weeks for all of the island communities up and down the west coast."
He added that there were also problems in Islay, Harris and the Uists.
Mr Bourne said people on Arran were also concerned at the switch from a proposed two-boat service to a single-boat service while the principal vessel was being refitted from 5 January to at least 21 January.
'Very best efforts'
A spokeswoman for CalMac said the company apologised for the disruption to scheduled services.
"In spite of our very best efforts to maintain services, the unprecedented speed of the spread of Covid cases at this time is resulting in the need to cancel services at very short notice," she said.
"Although we re-crewed and deep cleaned the MV Caledonian Isles after confirmed Covid cases were identified, poor weather then prevented any further sailings from going ahead.
"MV Caledonian Isles returned to service on the Ardrossan-Brodick route yesterday [Monday] and MV Loch Tarbert operated three return sailings to Lochranza from Tarbert.
"MV Hebridean Isles has now also returned to service however due to continuing adverse weather, all sailings between Ardrossan-Brodick are now cancelled for the remainder of the day."
She added that MV Loch Alainn would operate additional sailings between Lochranza and Tarbert to help provide additional capacity to Arran.
Deep clean protocol 'bamboozling'
CalMac's current policy if a crew member tests positive for Covid is to hire a company to deep clean the vessel before it can sail again.
Sheila Gilmore, chief executive of VisitArran, said she found the process "frustrating" because it meant ferries were tied up for "hours and hours".
She told the BBC's Good Morning Scotland programme: "It's a kind of unbelievable situation because if somebody has Covid in the Co-op they don't close the Co-op for hours and hours. We're very much at the mercy of the masters whether they feel vessels are fit to sail or not.
"You still have crew members going off with Covid - I'm bamboozled by it, I think I'd be speaking for other islanders when I say that. Why is the situation so different for a vessel at sea than it is for a bus, or a shop or a hotel?"
However Tommy Gore, the Clyde area operations manager for CalMac, said the deep clean was a "sensible" measure to take, particularly given the older population travelling on ferries and living on islands.
"The deep cleaning companies are actually responding pretty quickly - the case on Sunday, they were there within a couple of hours of us requesting them.
"The challenge was getting the replacement crew. Ardrossan is an easy place to get to - when we're talking about Ullapool or the outer isles it's much more challenging and it takes much longer."
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