Raising Annette II
Raising Annette II
by: Peter A.
Following the State of the Nation address this morning, everyone dispersed to get on with the jobs of the day. In the case of the Tug, Dredging & BAT Squad, we all headed off to Dudbridge to action the devised plan to recover Annette II which has been laying on the bed of the navigation for the past couple of months.
The plan specified the placing of a loaded hopper near the wing wall where water jets across causing much turbulent flow to impact on the side of Annette. This was secured in position a bit before lunch and did the job of protecting the work site well.
After a team brief, one of the first acts was to secure eight buoyancy bags to the top rails of the craft to act as an anti-capsize precaution.
The protracted job was that of installing the pumps to enable the cabin to be emptied. The boat was sitting with the hatch partly out of the water, so preventing the inrush whilst trying to pump gave us quite a challenge. Two pumps proved to be not quite enough to win over the inrush through cracks in the doors, air vents and leakage around the hatch. So, a third was called in.
This worked and soon the cabin began to lift. As it did, the process just got quicker as less water was entering. Eventually, with all the ‘pumpkins’ in place, the long line was secured and the tug placed on standby to pull.
When the command was given, Margarete took the load and Annette began to move forwards. After about one boat length, she stopped fast. The next couple of hours were spent attaching a second tug, pulling some more. We broke the steel line in the process. In the end, we could not shift here any further. At this point, water was allowed back in and activities ceased for the day.
interestingly, an inspection at 21:50 tonight showed here to be sitting roughly where we left her, she had not sunk back to her submerged condition at the start of the day. This would suggest that she has hit a large silt bank and gone aground, hence the behaviour when she stopped suddenly. Quite how we get her over this obstacle is a task for our next attempt on Wednesday.
Today has been quite a learning curve, but the team(s) have a considerable knowledge of matters canal and boating and hopefully we will make more progress next time.
