Winds hampering ferry operations

Winds have delayed the gulf ferry service during the last couple of days.

Environment Canada's website predicted blustery conditions would continue today with steady winds of 40 kilometres an hour with gusts of 60 km/h.

Tara Laing, communications officer for Marine Atlantic, said if the winds dropped sufficiently, the service could get on track as early as today.

As of Tuesday, the MV Joseph and Clara Smallwood was docked in Port aux Basques, while the MV Caribou had docked in North Sydney and the MV Leif Ericson had taken a load of commercial traffic toward North Sydney.

The MV Atlantic Vision is on a planned work period and is not sailing at this time.

Laing said the Ericson is being used to help clear the backlog of tractor trailers and drop trailers.

She said heavy sea states and high winds are slowing the crossings.

"The Joseph and Clara Smallwood, they took a longer route (to Port aux Basques) because of the winds and stuff," Laing said.

She said the missed crossings are easily made up because capacity is higher than the normal traffic.

"Essentially, at this time of year, we're behind one sailing at this point," Laing told The Western Star Tuesday afternoon.

"The good news is with the traffic at this point in time, we'll be able to catch up fairly quickly."