MV Argyle
 Sailing from Wemyss Bay to Rothesay, May 2019.
| |
| History | |
|---|---|
 United Kingdom | |
| Name | MV Argyle |
| Owner | Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited |
| Operator | Caledonian MacBrayne |
| Port of registry | Glasgow, United Kingdom |
| Route | Wemyss Bay - Rothesay |
| Builder | Remontowa, Poland |
| Cost | £9 million |
| Launched | 12 September 2006 |
| Christened |
|
| Maiden voyage | 16 May 2007 |
| Identification |
|
| Status | in service |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type | Ro-ro passenger ferry |
| Tonnage | 2,643[1] |
| Length | 72 m[2] |
| Beam | 15.3 m |
| Draft | 3 m |
| Speed | 18 kn (33 km/h) |
| Capacity | 450 passengers, 60 cars |
MV Argyle (Template:Lang-gd) is a ferry owned by Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited and operated by Caledonian MacBrayne on the route between Wemyss Bay and Rothesay. She is the seventh Clyde ship to have the name Argyle.
‘She’s the vessel the MV Bute wishes she was,’ Cite error: A <ref> tag is missing the closing </ref> (see the help page). Following delivery, the fitting out process took into account design modifications based on lessons learned from Bute. She was formally named at Rothesay Bay on 4 May 2007 before joining the Caledonian MacBrayne fleet later in the month.
Layout
MV Argyle has a semi-open car deck with a clearance height of 5.1 m (16 ft 9 in). Like the MV Coruisk before her, she has bow and stern access and in addition she has a starboard vehicle ramp aft which was used at Rothesay before the pier was converted to allow end-loading.
Passenger accommodation is located on two levels, the first housing forward and aft lounges with a kiosk area and toilets between, while the second level is open deck space from the twin funnels to just forward of the bridge. The bridge sits on its own perch above the open deck.
Superficially there is very little to differentiate Argyle from Bute. Argyle has a second lift from the car deck and the passenger lounge is a little larger than on her sister.[2]
Service
Argyle operates the route between Wemyss Bay and Rothesay on the Isle of Bute, joining her sister ship MV Bute, already on the route, in May 2007.[2] Being more manoeuvrable than the new vessels, the streakers MV Juno and MV Saturn returned to provide the service during work to build a new end-loading linkspan at Rothesay pier in 2007.[citation needed]
In May 2015, Argyle encountered some technical problems and broke down mid-firth. What is usually a 35-minute crossing took 5 hours for her to finally berth in Rothesay, where she berthed bow-in and undertook repairs.[citation needed] In June 2015 her turbo charger had a problem that led to a massive amount of smoke coming out of her engine room. She diverted back to Wemyss Bay and berthed stern in while fire fighters, ambulance and police were at the scene. There were no casualties and Argyle was later towed to James Watt Dock in Greenock, and she was back in service a week later.[citation needed]
Because of works at Wemyss Bay pier, Argyle and Bute were temporarily relocated to Gourock in October 2015, making each crossing an hour long. Services resumed from Wemyss Bay in March 2016, after a £6 million pier upgrade was completed.[3]
References
- ^ "MV Argyll". Caledonian MacBrayne. CalMac. Retrieved 5 December 2019.
- ^ a b c Cite error: The named reference
shipswas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ "Wemyss Bay Ferry Terminal". Caledonian Maritime Assets. Retrieved 21 December 2017.
External links
- MV Argyle on www.calmac.co.uk