At Oban, Nos. 2 RoRo berth

Port bow with section cut away

The section of damaged plate.

Looking down onto the foc'stle head

The repair team turned up last night and started this morning to
repair the damage to the hull. It made me quite nostalgic hearing the
Polish accents of the guys carrying out the work who have come from a
firm in Aberdeen.
A scaffolding has been erected to hang over the side of the bow and a
platform is in place to allow the men access to the outside of the
hull at the point of the damage. This is the comparatively easy bit,
now onto the repair. The new steel is scheduled to arrive tonight and
will then be fabricated to fit and then of course fitted which will be
tricky.
The damage is to the lifting visor so the team are working in quite a
confined space inside. On the outside the overhang of the bow and
having to work over the water makes life difficult there. None of
this helped by the Oban weather which overnight turned to steady rain
and a stiff south westerly breeze.
We would normally have been on our way to Colonsay this afternoon
after a 7:00 am Mull run, but our replacement is doing sterling service
for us and keeping the Island folk in bread, milk and gin.