The Waverley’s sailings from Helensburgh next month now look set to go ahead, after being thrown into doubt amid concerns over the safety of the town’s pier.
A strongly worded report by the Helensburgh Seafront Development Project has accused Argyll and Bute Council of putting the public at risk because of ‘substantial degradation’ of the pier.
Waverley Excursions Ltd this week insisted that no sailings had been cancelled, but on Wednesday their website showed tickets for the sailing from Helensburgh on October 13 were ‘sold out’ – even though tickets were available for passengers getting aboard at Greenock and Kilcreggan.
By yesterday the website had been changed so that Helensburgh tickets were available again.
The HSDP report said there was liable to be a ‘high severity of risk’, drawing particular attention to weakened bollards.
It added that the Queen’s harbourmaster at Faslane has stopped naval vessels using the pier because of its condition.
Drawn up by a former deputy Queen’s harbour master and facility manager for jetties, it states: “It can be seen from a cursory inspection of the bollards alone that with some hold-down bolts missing and misalignment of some of the bollards along with the evidence of loss of structural strength in the supporting structure i.e. loss of timber thickness, missing or fallen timbers, evidence of marine borer, loss of bolts, timber rot etc., that these elements of the structure do not, in all probability, meet the (unknown) original design specification.
“The extent of that degradation cannot be known for certain but the forces exerted on it by vessels such as the Waverley are still the same as when it was designed… it is not possible to establish whether the current operations, such as the berthing/unberthing of Waverley at the pier exceed safe limits for the bollards and the underlying structure in their current state.
“It would, therefore, appear that the pier has been (and is currently being) operated without a full appreciation of the current structural integrity of the overall structure and its key components.
“Consequently, the organisation responsible for its operation is – and has been for a considerable time – operating at risk.
It is not unreasonable to postulate that a foreseeable incident could involve the Waverley attempting to ‘spring off’ the pier by coming ahead on its forespring in order to bring the stern out and the resultant forces on the bollard used for springing off causing it to fail catastrophically thus presenting a significant hazard to members of the public on the pier-head from the ship’s berthing hawser whipping back along the pier”
The condition of the pier itself ha been the centre of concern for several years; it is not included in the council’s £18.6m project to redevelop the Helensburgh waterfront.
A council spokesperson said of the pier this week: “We are awaiting the publication of a report based on the most recent independent, structural inspection of the pier.
“Once we are possession of the report, a decision will be taken on the appropriate next course of action.”
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