Spirit of Vancouver Island breaks down AGAIN

0:00I'm not very happy about it. We just returned from a 12-hour flight, 14-hour flight. I'm anxious to get to the island. What do you think about the reliability of BC Ferries these days? Well, it seems to be getting going downhill. I'm not very pleased about it. And I'm sure he is not the only passenger, not very pleased with what happened earlier today. You heard the voice of Global News reporter and anchor Jordan Armstrong there. He was on the spirit event who were island when only back in service for a couple of days broke down once again and he joins us on the line now. Jordan, good afternoon to you. Hello, Jill from Tawassen. We thought we'd be in Victoria about now, but we're still in Tawassen. How are you? Very well. I think I'm better than you and the others who were on that vessel. So how did things, I know you've been posting about this. How did things unfold? Yeah, so we all got on the 9 a.m. boat. Everything was looking fine. The ship was basically on time. And once everybody had got on, so getting close to 9 o'clock, passengers on board noticed the light

1:06flickered twice. After a couple of minutes, the crew came on and said, as you're no doubt aware, there's an electrical issue. We're investigating and by for further instruction. But things went on as normal. You know, the cafeteria lineup was moving. People were getting their food. But the clock kept ticking about 9, 20, 9, 25. We're still in Tawassen and then comes the announcement nobody wanted to hear from the bridge. The captain comes on again and says, not only is the one generator not working. Both generators are broken. So unfortunately, we cannot sail. We're going to have to offload everybody from the ferry. And yes, that means backing off. So this is a fully loaded ferry. 350 plus vehicles and people have to back off the ferry. And anybody who rides the ferries knows that it can sometimes be a challenge driving on to the ferry. That must have been pretty chaotic. Very slow process and very manual, of course, like they have to do it. What at a time?

2:10Crew members with those especially those first few vehicles. So what they did is they backed off the two inside lanes created a bit more space. And then eventually when there were enough vehicles already off, then people could start turning around on the ferry and driving straight off. But very slow process. I imagine it took well over an hour. We got off relatively early into the process, but an hour and then they were still just getting started with it. And so I understand that a number of sailings have been canceled. Did they tell you anything else? Then once they managed to get everybody off this ferry, again, if I'm correct, it was just back in circulation. Wasn't it after a previous breakdown? Have they told you anything about when you might sail? Well, this is what must be frustrating for a lot of people. Like we were going over for a news conference today. So whatever, we're fine, right? But for people who have medical appointments

3:12or family issues or that gentleman you heard from who was just trying to get home after a very long travel day already, this is tough. We were told that if you need to sail today, you can go back through the ticket booth and they'll try and get you on a later sailing. We ended up calling one triple eight number for BC Ferries and just canceling our reservation. We were told that it would take up to three weeks to get the refund though. So the best luck if people do need to travel, it may be walking on. You know, this is the thing. When one breaks down, it just backs everybody up and it's not like the people get to the front of the line because very good chance the other sailings are already full. So for people who are on that boat, I imagine a lot of them will just give up if they have the luxury of doing that. In terms of the problem, not a lot of the specifics on board, obviously the crew is very busy just trying to handle the situation, but I have heard from BC Ferries. This is the same sort of issue which took the boat out of service last week. It was a

4:18generator problem. The ship, as you mentioned, only returned to service on Sunday and now here we are on Tuesday and it's broken again. Obviously the big question, Jill, this is one of the two spirit vessels which are the biggest in the fleet. Will it be back in time for the long weekend? Seems like BC Ferries doesn't know right now. They have canceled all of the spirit of Vancouver Island sailings for the rest of the day. They've moved, I think at least one other boat into service, but it's a smaller vessel. Fewer sailing, so there will be backups anyway, and I was going to ask you that. I'm glad you clarified because I was curious. I thought it was one of the spirit vessels. Are these the vessels that we've seen a lot of issues with? These are the ones that that not only in this scenario, but we were kind of talking about this earlier that you almost come to expect it now when there's a long weekend in the horizon, but are these the ones that have been giving people the most trouble? You know, they're actually known as the more reliable Ferries. They're built in BC, but they're getting old, right? They're 30 plus years old.

5:22They are really the backbone of the Toassan Disworx Bay run. Last couple of years that the German built coastal vessels seem to be having a lot of the problems, but you know, we are starting to see breakdowns now on these spirit vessels. There was before last week, there was another issue in the last few months. I can't recall the specifics, but the spirit has been down. Last week, as well, there was the Queen of New Orleans Minister that had a breakdown. So I imagine what will hear from the politicians in Victoria when they are asked to comment on this, is, well, this is why we need those ships from China, those controversial Ferries from China. They will point to situations like this, you know, because the ferry fleet is getting very old. It's been, oh my goodness, almost 20 years since a new major vessel was put into service, Jill. Wow. Well, I so much appreciate you sharing with us. So what happened, and again, I know you've been posting about this as well. A lot of frustration, and like you said,

6:24the big question, will this vessel be back in place for what's going to be a very busy weekend? Jordan, thank you for this, and I look forward to a senior report. Different story than you set out to cover today, but I look forward to hearing and seeing more of on this on the news tonight. My pleasure anytime, Jill. Hello there. Thursday's on global. I'm Madeline Matlock. She's the lawyer with the legendary name. Don't underestimate this Matlock. This one is a sharp. You know it, baby. The one you can trust, even if she has to bend the rules. Things aren't always as black and white as they seem to crack a case. This is how I get things done. Any winning actress Kathy Bates is Madlock. All new Thursday's at 9 Eastern on global. Stream on Stack TV.