Granuaile - All in a day's work
Capt. Shay Hickey, Head of Marine
Each year my contribution to Beam tries to inform readers of
the work of the Marine Department. The day to day tasks of ILV
Granuaile include placing, checking and maintaining buoys on
station, delivering fuel, water and supplies to lighthouses,
refuelling lightfloats and lanbys and overhauling their moorings,
landing building materials and heavy equipment offshore in
ship-helicopter operations, checking the performance and accuracy
of aids to navigation, hydrographic surveys ….
For a change this year I thought our readers might enjoy hearing of some less usual ship operations which are nevertheless all in a day's work. In the late hours of 11 March 2006 a request was received from the Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) for Granuaile to go to the assistance of a Russian crewed 1500 GRT cargo vessel, MV Sesam, which was adrift without main propulsion off the Isle of Man. The vessel had 30 tonnes of bunker fuel on board and was drifting at about 3 knots towards the Co. Down coast. The vessel was registered in Antwerp and had a crew of six. Within an hour Granuaile left Dun Laoghaire, arriving on the scene at daylight on 12 March. The casualty was drifting broadside to south-easterly force 7 to 8 winds in rough seas and a short swell. With both Larne and Donaghadee lifeboats in attendance Granuaile manoeuvred close to MV Sesam and passed two nine inch circumference towing ropes to the drifting ship.
Under instructions from Belfast Coastguard Granuaile towed MV Sesam to Bangor, Co. Down, the nominated port of refuge, arriving at 1402 hours. Granuaile remained on stand-by while Sesam anchored and was inspected by an MCA surveyor.
Sesam was on passage from Bromborough near Liverpool to Coleraine with a cargo of steel coils when her main engine broke down in worsening weather. Granuaile was the only vessel within reach with enough capability to handle a ship of this size in the prevailing conditions.
On 12 September a sperm whale became stranded on a shallow sandbank half a mile off Culleenmore Strand, Ballisadore Bay, Co. Sligo, where it died later the same day. The whale was an unusually large female, 14 metres in length and weighing about 40 tons. Scientists estimated she was 40-50 years old. Her emaciated state indicated that she had not eaten for sometime and suggested she may have been unwell.
For public health and safety reasons Sligo County Council was anxious to remove the dead whale but its position on a sandbank between two shallow channels made removal of the carcase difficult. On 14 September Granuaile completed landing building materials and fuel on Blackrock Mayo in a major ship-helicopter underslinging operation and was on her way to re-fuel Tory Island Lighthouse.
Granuaile diverted to Sligo Bay and sent two motorboats to the sandbank. Working with Sligo County Council personnel and Sligo inshore lifeboat, crew members dug a trench under the whale's tail and secured strops around it. The motor boats then towed the whale into deeper water where the tow could be passed to Granuaile which brought it to the uninhabited island of Inishmurray where it was beached in shallow water clear of navigable channels to decay naturally.
In addressing the threats to the marine environment posed by both of these events, Granuaile and the Marine Department of Irish Lights are glad to have contributed to their successful outcomes. Nothing unusual about that I could say, since in perhaps less dramatic ways, it's what we do every day. It's all in a day's work.
For a change this year I thought our readers might enjoy hearing of some less usual ship operations which are nevertheless all in a day's work. In the late hours of 11 March 2006 a request was received from the Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) for Granuaile to go to the assistance of a Russian crewed 1500 GRT cargo vessel, MV Sesam, which was adrift without main propulsion off the Isle of Man. The vessel had 30 tonnes of bunker fuel on board and was drifting at about 3 knots towards the Co. Down coast. The vessel was registered in Antwerp and had a crew of six. Within an hour Granuaile left Dun Laoghaire, arriving on the scene at daylight on 12 March. The casualty was drifting broadside to south-easterly force 7 to 8 winds in rough seas and a short swell. With both Larne and Donaghadee lifeboats in attendance Granuaile manoeuvred close to MV Sesam and passed two nine inch circumference towing ropes to the drifting ship.
Under instructions from Belfast Coastguard Granuaile towed MV Sesam to Bangor, Co. Down, the nominated port of refuge, arriving at 1402 hours. Granuaile remained on stand-by while Sesam anchored and was inspected by an MCA surveyor.
Sesam was on passage from Bromborough near Liverpool to Coleraine with a cargo of steel coils when her main engine broke down in worsening weather. Granuaile was the only vessel within reach with enough capability to handle a ship of this size in the prevailing conditions.
On 12 September a sperm whale became stranded on a shallow sandbank half a mile off Culleenmore Strand, Ballisadore Bay, Co. Sligo, where it died later the same day. The whale was an unusually large female, 14 metres in length and weighing about 40 tons. Scientists estimated she was 40-50 years old. Her emaciated state indicated that she had not eaten for sometime and suggested she may have been unwell.
For public health and safety reasons Sligo County Council was anxious to remove the dead whale but its position on a sandbank between two shallow channels made removal of the carcase difficult. On 14 September Granuaile completed landing building materials and fuel on Blackrock Mayo in a major ship-helicopter underslinging operation and was on her way to re-fuel Tory Island Lighthouse.
Granuaile diverted to Sligo Bay and sent two motorboats to the sandbank. Working with Sligo County Council personnel and Sligo inshore lifeboat, crew members dug a trench under the whale's tail and secured strops around it. The motor boats then towed the whale into deeper water where the tow could be passed to Granuaile which brought it to the uninhabited island of Inishmurray where it was beached in shallow water clear of navigable channels to decay naturally.
In addressing the threats to the marine environment posed by both of these events, Granuaile and the Marine Department of Irish Lights are glad to have contributed to their successful outcomes. Nothing unusual about that I could say, since in perhaps less dramatic ways, it's what we do every day. It's all in a day's work.