Condor Ferries apologises for failing to dock in St Peter Port

The lack of a berth was caused by a cruise ship sheltering in St Peter Port

Condor Ferries has apologised to passengers who were delayed by a day when a ferry bound for Guernsey was unable to dock.

The Condor Liberation from Jersey to Poole via Guernsey on Monday did not dock in St Peter Port due to strong winds and no berth, the company said.

It was forced to travel direct to Poole and Guernsey-bound passengers arrived in the island on Tuesday.

Condor Ferries said it would be talking to Guernsey Harbours.

The lack of a berth was caused by a cruise ship sheltering in St Peter Port, meaning the ferry could not dock safely, said the firm.

Passenger 'traumatised'

Fran Collins, the executive director of operations for Condor Ferries, said: "I'd like to apologise to all the passengers who were affected.

"We haven't done a full wash-up on exactly what went wrong but clearly it did not happen as we would have hoped and we will work together to make sure that does not happen again."

Helen Clackett's daughter Rebecca was on board with her horse - one of seven horses travelling to compete in the island's Horse of the Year show.

She said: "It has been horrific. [Rebecca] was traumatised, frightened, crying, really worried about the horses."

She said they had two hours sleep before they had to get up and drive to Portsmouth to get Condor's Commodore Clipper back to Guernsey.