VICTORY/JAMES L. KUBER Visit Again; CLIPPER LOYALTY Due

VICTORY and JAMES L. KUBER arrived in Erie at 0700 on Monday with stone from Calcite, and after unloading at the Mountfort Terminal departed at around 1400 bound for Cedarville, Michigan.

CLIPPER LOYALTY is expected to arrive Erie at 1800 on August 7 to load biodiesel.

U.S. Brig NIAGARA returned to Erie at about 1630 this afternoon after an extended Great Lakes trip. A "pan-pan" alert was out briefly on the vessel this afternoon after it failed to call in upbound at Long Point and did not answer repeated radio queries from Seaway Long Point and Sarnia Traffic. The NIAGARA finally answered a radio call from Sarnia Coast Guard Radio at around 1500 this afternoon.

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VICTORY/JAMES L. KUBER departing the Mountfort Terminal.


Outbound.


Another view.


Stern view.


Passing the lighthouse.


KAILARY, of Port Dover, ON, stayed at Wolverine Marina on Saturday.

Ferry News

The double-ended ferry NINDAWAYMA, laid up and rotting in Montreal, was recently sold to Upper Lakes Group. The former ONTARIO No. 1 was used in Georgian Bay between the ports of Tobermory and South Baymouth, Ontario. She assisted the ferry CHI-CHEEMAUN on this route, until it was proved that there was no need for two of them. Since then she's been rotting in layup in various Canadian ports.

All the information I'm getting indicates that she will be refitted and returned to service on the proposed truck-ferry route between Erie and Nanticoke. The Port Authority is working in conjunction with Upper Lakes to get this off the ground, and all proposals had called for this service to start in 2008. Now it actually looks like this might happen. In the past it had all seemed to be a pie-in-the-sky dream.

In other news, officials of Norfolk County, Ontario, report in today's Erie Times-News that the proposed Erie to Port Dover fast-ferry is almost completely up to the Erie Port Authority. Although a 49-passenger ferry will start running between the two ports either this year or in 2008, the 46-car, 200 passenger ferry that the Erie Port Authority wants would cost $20 million and is still years away, according to the article.