By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
Repairs to the Sitka Sound Cruise Terminal mooring dolphins wrapped up Sunday, about a week ahead of schedule, allowing two boats to dock at one time today, dock officials said.
The cruise terminal lost one of its two docking spaces after a cruise ship struck one of the dolphins on the north end of the dock on May 9.
“Last week they told us they could finish by Sunday,” dock manager Chris McGraw said today. “I’m happy we’re back to normal operations.”
Cunard’s Queen Elizabeth – with about 1,000 passengers aboard – came in at 8 a.m., today and the Norwegian Bliss, with about 3,000 passengers, was just arriving at the dock around 10 a.m. when McGraw spoke to the Sentinel.
With the dock at full capacity, a third ship, Silversea Cruises’ Silver Muse anchored in the harbor and lightered passengers to Crescent Harbor.
McGraw estimated the cost of the repair at about $2 million, and is working with his insurance company on recovering the costs.
The repair work also meant McGraw lost out on docking 12 cruise ships, and the fees they would have produced. Most of the vessels that couldn’t use the dock during repairs anchored near town and lightered passengers ashore, but two canceled their stops because the dock wasn’t available.
Repairs took a little longer than expected after contractor Turnagain Marine found the damage to be more extensive than originally estimated. But McGraw said the work generally went well and he was pleased to see the dock back at full capacity today.
“It looks like it did before the damage,” he said.
McGraw said arriving ships are at around 60 to 70 percent capacity but those percentages are expected to increase in July and August.
Rachel Roy, executive director of Sitka Chamber of Commerce and Visit Sitka, said she was able to keep up with the changing visit schedule.
“We had to update the cruise schedule, get the word out on lightering dock assignment changes, and providing visitor information at the O’Connell Bridge dock for large-capacity ships,” she said.
The main lightering dock is at Crescent Harbor. The O’Connell Bridge dock was designed for lightering use, but before this season it had not been used for that purpose in years. The city made a major expenditure to stabilize the dock for use primarily by visiting private yachts, but the record number of cruise ship visits this year required it to be used for ship-related purposes to ease congestion in Crescent Harbor, harbor officials said. So far, the record number of visitors and the temporary capacity limit at the cruise terminal increased the number of times it’s been needed.
Roy commented, “All in all operations seem to go well but the ships will be happy to be out at the cruise terminal again.”
