A train ferry is a ship (ferry) designed to carry railway vehicles. Typically, one level of the ship is fitted with railway tracks, and the vessel has a door at the front and/or rear to give access to the wharves. In the United States, train ferries are sometimes referred to as "car ferries",[1][2] as distinguished from "auto ferries" used to transport automobiles. The wharf (sometimes called a "slip") has a ramp, and a linkspan or "apron", balanced by weights, that connects the railway proper to the ship, allowing for tidal or seasonal changes in water level.
While railway vehicles can be and are shipped on the decks or in the holds of ordinary ships, purpose-built train ferries can be quickly loaded and unloaded by roll-on/roll-off, especially as several vehicles can be loaded or unloaded at once. A train ferry that is a barge is called a car float or rail barge.
The first modern train ferry was Leviathan, built in 1849. The Edinburgh, Leith and Newhaven Railway was formed in 1842 and the company wished to extend the East Coast Main Line further north to Dundee and Aberdeen. As bridge technology was not yet capable enough to provide adequate support for the crossing over the Firth of Forth, which was roughly five miles (8km) across, a different solution had to be found, primarily for the transport of goods, where efficiency was key.
The company hired the up-and-coming civil engineer Thomas Bouch who argued for a train ferry with an efficient roll-on roll-off mechanism to maximise the efficiency of the system. Custom-built ferries were to be built, with railway lines and matching harbour facilities at both ends to allow the rolling stock to easily drive on and off the boat.[5] To compensate for the changing tides, adjustable ramps were positioned at the harbours and the gantry structure height was varied by moving it along the slipway. The wagons were loaded on and off with the use of stationary steam engines.[5][4][pageneeded]
Although others had had similar ideas, it was Bouch who first put them into effect, and did so with an attention to detail (such as design of the ferry slip). This led a subsequent President of the Institution of Civil Engineers[6] to settle any dispute over priority of invention with the observation that "there was little merit in a simple conception of this kind, compared with a work practically carried out in all its details, and brought to perfection."[7]
The company was persuaded to install this train ferry service for the transportation of goods wagons across the Firth of Forth from Burntisland in Fife to Granton. The ferry itself was built by Thomas Grainger, a partner of the firm Grainger and Miller.[8]
The service commenced on 3 February 1850.[9] It was called "The Floating Railway"[10] and intended as a temporary measure until the railway could build a bridge, but this was not opened until 1890, its construction delayed in part by repercussions from the catastrophic failure of Thomas Bouch's Tay Rail Bridge.[11]
The largest train ferry ever built is MSSkåne on the Trelleborg-Rostock route, built in 1998, 200 meters (660ft) long, 29 meters (95ft) wide, with six tracks plus two on an elevator to the lower deck, having a total length of track of 1,110 meters (3,640ft).
Train ferries rarely sink because of sea hazards, although they have some weaknesses linked to the very nature of transporting trains "on rail" on a ship.
These weaknesses include:
Trains are loaded at a rather high level, making the ship top-heavy. (Although modern train ferries often have truck decks above the train deck, making them less top-heavy)
The train deck is difficult to compartmentalise, so that sloshing flood water can destabilize the ship. However, train ferries are often built as "large barges", partly with open train deck, with the superstructure above, meaning the water will pour out into the sea again. Car ferries, on the other hand, usually have "normal hulls" with "holes" in them for loading; this design retains sloshing flood water within the ship
The sea doors where the trains go in and out are a weakness, even if placed at the rear of the ship.
The train carriages need to be strongly secured lest they break away and roll around, particularly on long, open-water routes. (The brakes are normally put on on long open-water routes)
The Ann Arbor Railroad of Michigan developed a system of making cars secure that was adopted by many other lines. Screw jacks were placed on the corners of the railcar and the car was raised slightly to take its weight off its wheels. Chains and turnbuckles were placed around the car frame and hooked onto the rails and tightened. Clamps were placed behind the wheels on the rails. Deckhands engaged in continual inspection and tightening of the gear during the crossing. This system effectively held the cars in place when the ship encountered rough weather.
Some accidents have occurred at the slip during loading, when stability can be a major problem. Train ferries often list when heavy cars are loaded onto a track on one side while the other side is empty. Normal procedure was to load half of a track on one side, all of the track on the other side, and then the rest of the original track. If this procedure was not followed, results could be disastrous. In 1909, SSAnn Arbor No. 4 capsized in its slip in Manistique, Michigan when a switching crew put eight cars of iron ore on its portside tracks. The crew got off without loss of life, but salvage operations were costly and time-consuming.
The Japanese train ferry Toya Maru sank during Typhoon Marie on 26 September 1954, killing more than a thousand. Four other train ferries, Seikan maru No.11, Kitami Maru, Tokachi Maru and Hidaka Maru also sank on that day; the loss appeared to be of about 1,430 people.
At the time, Japanese train ferries did not have a rear seagate, because engineers believed that in-rushing water would simply flow out again quickly and would not pose a danger.[citation needed] However, when the frequency of waves bears the wrong relationship to the length of a ship, each wave arrives as the water from the previous wave is trying to leave, causing water to accumulate on the ship. After the accidents, all Japanese train ferries were retrofitted with rear seagates and weather forecast technology was greatly promoted.
The Norwegian train ferry Skagerrak built in 1965, sank in gale-force winds on 7 September 1966, on a journey between Kristiansand, Norway, and Hirtshals, Denmark, when the rear seagate was destroyed by heavy seas. One person subsequently died of injuries, and six freight cars and a number of automobiles sank to the bottom with the ship.
The Canadian train ferry MVPatrick Morris sank on 20 April 1970, while assisting in a search-and-rescue operation for a sinking fishing trawler (MFV Enterprise) off the northeast coast of Cape Breton Island. The ferry was trying to maintain position to retrieve a body when its stern gates were overpowered by 30-foot (9.1m) waves. It sank within 30 minutes taking several rail cars and 4 crew members, including the Captain, to the bottom of the Cabot Strait. There were 47 survivors.
Several train ferries, including SSMilwaukee, SSPere Marquette 18, and SSMarquette & Bessemer No. 2, have been lost on the Great Lakes. These losses, though causes remain unconfirmed, were attributed to seas boarding the unprotected stern of the ship and swamping it in a severe storm. As a result, seagates were required on all new ships and required to be retrofitted on older vessels. In addition, two wooden cross-lake railroad ferries caught fire and burned.
Loaded train ferry approaches dock in Detroit, Michigan, United States in April 1943.
Many train ferry services ceased their operations around the world. There are several services that are still in use in Azerbaijan, Bolivia, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Germany, Georgia, Iran, Italy, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Russia, Sweden, Tanzania, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Ukraine, and United States. Some of these are RORO train ferries that carry passenger trains. Some are for freight transportation only.
SSBadger, passenger and vehicle ferry in the United States that has been in Lake Michigan service from 1953 until the present
Related Research Articles
Sir Thomas Bouch was a British railway engineer. He was born in Thursby, near Carlisle, Cumberland, and lived in Edinburgh. As manager of the Edinburgh and Northern Railway he introduced the first roll-on/roll-off train ferry service in the world. Subsequently as a consulting engineer, he helped develop the caisson and popularised the use of lattice girders in railway bridges. He was knighted after the successful completion of the first Tay Railway Bridge, but his reputation was destroyed by the subsequent Tay Bridge disaster, in which 75 people are believed to have died as a result of defects in design, construction and maintenance, for all of which Bouch was held responsible. He died within 18 months of being knighted.
MS Herald of Free Enterprise was a roll-on/roll-off (RORO) ferry which capsized moments after leaving the Belgian port of Zeebrugge on the night of 6 March 1987, killing 193 passengers and crew.
A ferry slip is a specialized docking facility that receives a ferryboat or train ferry. A similar structure called a barge slip receives a barge or car float that is used to carry wheeled vehicles across a body of water.
Roll-on/roll-off ships are cargo ships designed to carry wheeled cargo, such as cars, motorcycles, trucks, semi-trailer trucks, buses, trailers, and railroad cars, that are driven on and off the ship on their own wheels or using a platform vehicle, such as a self-propelled modular transporter. This is in contrast to lift-on/lift-off (LoLo) vessels, which use a crane to load and unload cargo.
A moveable bridge, or movable bridge, is a bridge that moves to allow passage for boats or barges. In American English, the term is synonymous with drawbridge, and the latter is the common term, but drawbridge can be limited to the narrower, historical definition used in some other forms of English, in which drawbridge refers to only a specific type of moveable bridge often found in castles.
A ship's hold or cargo hold is a space for carrying cargo in the ship's compartment.
SS Milwaukee was a train ferry that served on Lake Michigan. It was launched in 1902 and sank with all hands off Milwaukee on October 22, 1929. Fifty-two men were lost with the vessel.
The Grand Trunk Milwaukee Car Ferry Company was the Grand Trunk Western Railroad's subsidiary company operating its Lake Michigan railroad car ferry operations between Muskegon, Michigan, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from 1905 to 1978. Major railroad companies in Michigan used rail ferry vessels to transport rail cars across Lake Michigan from Michigan's western shore to eastern Wisconsin to avoid rail traffic congestion in Chicago.
DEV Arahura was a roll-on/roll-off train ferry that operated on the Interislander service between Wellington and Picton in New Zealand from 1983 until 2015.
The Night Ferry was an international boat train from London Victoria to Paris Gare du Nord that crossed the English Channel on a train ferry. It ran from 1936 until 1939 when it ceased due to the onset of World War II. It resumed in 1947, ceasing in 1980. It was operated by Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits until 1977 and then British Rail.
The Solano was a large railroad ferry, built as a reinforced paddle steamer with independently powered sidewheels by the Central Pacific Railroad, that carried entire trains across the Carquinez Strait between Benicia and Port Costa in California daily for 51 years, from 1879 to 1930. When launched, the Solano was the largest ferry of its kind in the world, a record held for 35 years until 1914 when she was joined by her sister ship, the Contra Costa, which was 13 feet (4.0 m) longer.
A linkspan or link-span is a type of drawbridge used mainly in the operation of moving vehicles on and off a roll-on/roll-off (RO-RO) vessel or ferry, particularly to allow for tidal changes in water level.
The Mackinac Transportation Company was a train ferry service that shuttled railroad cars across the Straits of Mackinac from 1881 until 1984. It was best known as the owner and operator, from 1911 until 1984, of the SS Chief Wawatam, an icebreaking train ferry.
The Edinburgh and Northern Railway was a railway company authorised in 1845 to connect Edinburgh to both Perth and Dundee. It relied on ferry crossings of the Firth of Forth and the Firth of Tay, but despite those disadvantages it proved extremely successful. It took over a short railway on the southern shore of the Forth giving a direct connection to Edinburgh, and it changed its name to the Edinburgh, Perth and Dundee Railway.
MV Pentalina-B was a ferry which operated on a variety of Scottish routes. Launched in 1970 as MV Iona, she was the first drive-through roll-on/roll-off ferry built for the David MacBrayne fleet. She was the first ship in the company's history to have bridge-controlled engines and geared transmission, rather than direct drive. During her career she inaugurated more endloading linkspans than the rest of the fleet put together. Purchased by Pentland Ferries in 1997, she was renamed MV Pentalina-B and operated across the Pentland Firth until the arrival of their new vessel. In 2009, she was sold to a Cape Verde owner.
MV Glen Sannox was a Clyde car ferry launched in 1957. Built for the Arran service, she spent her first 14 years there. Thereafter, she had a versatile career on the west coast of Scotland, lasting over 32 years, including providing cruises between 1977 and 1982. In 1989, she was sold for service on the Red Sea. She ran aground south of Jeddah and lay in a sunken condition from 2000.
TSS Train Ferry No. 1 was a roll on roll off freight vessel built for the British War Office in 1917 to transport rail freight to Europe during the First World War. After the war, it was used for civilian purposes until the Second World War. During the war it was converted to carry and launch landing craft
The Dover–Dunkerque train ferry was one of two regular rail freight train ferries that operated between the United Kingdom and Europe. The route connected the English port of Dover, with the French port of Dunkerque. After rationalisation of other Anglo-European train ferries, the Dover to Dunkerque sailing was the last to survive, though it ended its days on freight carryings only after the Night Ferry passenger service ended in 1980. The last Dover to Dunkerque wagon-freight ferry service became redundant upon the opening of the Channel Tunnel when freight was carried directly through the Channel Tunnel.
SS Pere Marquette 18 was a steel-hulled Great Lakes train ferry that served on Lake Michigan from her construction in 1902 to her sinking in 1910.
References
↑ Hodson, John C. (April 1898). "Car Ferries". Strand Magazine: An Illustrated Monthly. 15 (88): 443–447.
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