M/V Chilkat | |
History | |
---|---|
Name | Chilkat |
Owner | Alaska Marine Highway System |
Port of registry | United States |
Builder | J.M. Martinac Shipbuilding Company [1] |
Cost | $300,000 [1] |
Launched | 1957 [1] |
Decommissioned | 1988 [2] |
Out of service | 2021 |
Fate | Sank January 13, 2021, raised January 28, 2021 |
General characteristics | |
Length | 99 ft (30 m) [1] |
Ramps | Bow |
Capacity |
|
The M/V Chilkat was the first ferry purpose built for what was to become the Alaska Marine Highway. Originally built to serve the Lynn Canal out of Juneau, she was built with a bow ramp that allowed her 59 passengers and 15 vehicles to offload on an unimproved beach as well as a dock. [1]
In 1948, Chilkoot Motorship Lines provided ferry service between Haines and Juneau using the M/V Chilkoot, a surplus WWII landing craft. The line provided weekly service carrying up to 14 vehicles with limited passenger accommodations. [3] The cost of operating a single vessel proved too great for the company, and in 1951 they sold their assets to the Alaska Territorial Board of Road Commissioners, [1] who continued to run the Chilkoot.
The needs of the ferry service outgrew the Chilkoot, and the territorial government commissioned the construction of the Chilkat to replace her in 1957. [3] She became the first vessel of the Alaska Marine Highway when it was established in 1963. [4] After breaking loose from her mooring during a severe windstorm on January 13, 2021, she capsized and sank west of the Guemes ferry dock in the Guemes Channel in Anacortes, WA. The vessel had most recently been used as a scallop tender.
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In 1988, the state of Alaska sold the Chilkat for $50,000 to a private party. After that, it served various roles in Alaska's marine industry, hauling various cargoes like fish or even Christmas trees. [2]
In 2012, Chilkat was purchased by Island Scallops for use as a scallop tender. [5]
Haines is a census-designated place located in Haines Borough, Alaska, United States. It is in the northern part of the Alaska Panhandle, near Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve.
British Columbia Ferry Services Inc., operating as BC Ferries (BCF), is a former provincial Crown corporation, now operating as an independently managed, publicly owned Canadian company. BC Ferries provides all major passenger and vehicle ferry services for coastal and island communities in the Canadian province of British Columbia. Set up in 1960 to provide a similar service to that provided by the Black Ball Line and the Canadian Pacific Railway, which were affected by job action at the time, BC Ferries has become the largest passenger ferry line in North America, operating a fleet of 41 vessels with a total passenger and crew capacity of over 27,000, serving 47 locations on the B.C. coast.
The Alaska Marine Highway (AMH) or the Alaska Marine Highway System (AMHS) is a ferry service operated by the U.S. state of Alaska. It has its headquarters in Ketchikan, Alaska.
Lynn Canal is an inlet into the mainland of southeast Alaska.
MV The Second Snark is a small passenger ferry, built in 1938 by William Denny of Dumbarton, later operated by Clyde Marine Services on the Firth of Clyde, Scotland.
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M/V Kennicott is a mainline ferry vessel for the Alaska Marine Highway System.
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The MV Wickersham was a mainline ferry vessel for the Alaska Marine Highway. Wickersham was the second vessel, after the MV Chilkat, in the Alaska Marine Highway fleet to not have been constructed specifically for AMHS, but was rather acquired for from the Stena Line, where it was known as the Stena Britannica and served the Kiel, Germany–Gothenburg, Sweden route. Constructed just one year prior to its purchase by AMHS in April 1968, her arrival and status as an "oceangoing" vessel allowed AMHS to expand the southern terminus of its route system south to Washington and the Port of Seattle.
The U.S. state of Washington is home to a number of public and private ferry systems, most notably the state-run Washington State Ferries.
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MV Tazlina is a ferry operated by the Alaska Marine Highway System. It began serving Southeast Alaska Communities in 2019.