After a gap of just over two weeks since Ernest Bevin, the last of the old ferry boats to leave London, departed the River Thames there is once again a ferry at Woolwich.
The first of two new boats that will operate the service once again, starting in the New Year, made its maiden arrival at North Woolwich just after 10am on Thursday 15th November to take part in docking trials with the new magnetic coupling automated docking system.
As with all such projects there are long checklists to test that all of the components parts work together as part of the complete system and so this first vessel will spend several days doing tests.
A video of the Ben Woollacott arriving, including some fast pirouettes mid river, followed by some of the docking trial activity can be seen below.
The arrival of the second new ferry, named Dame Vera Lynn, is expected in the near future and training and testing will continue for several weeks prior to the relaunch of the ferry service across the Thames.
Update 19th November
At 0930 on the morning of Monday 19th November 2018 the second and final of the new fleet of Woolwich Ferry boats arrived at Woolwich in the shape of Dame Vera Lynn.
She arrived with no fuss or fanfare but headed straight to moor alongside the southern ferry terminal in Woolwich.
Further testing will take place with both boats continuing with handling and docking trials to get them ready for the service to resume but once again there are ferry boats at Woolwich.
A few more pictures of the new Ferry boats can be seen here.
The arrival of the first of the new vessels is the final stage of a complex marine engineering project undertaken by BAM Nuttall on behalf of Briggs Marine and Transport for London to remove the old ferry terminal docking structure and replace it with the new one.
A few photos of the various elements of the project can be seen below.
A report about the retirement of the former Woolwich Ferry vessels can be seen here.
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