Sea Force Tug and Barge April 2023

Sea Force tugboat and the Barge arrived on Norfolk Island on the weekend and commenced unloading at Cascade Pier on Sunday 2 April. This was the third barge delivery for 2023, the last Barge and Sea-Force tugboat was in early March and previous was January, both deliveries were also unloaded at Cascade Pier. The Barge and Sea-Force tugboat also had voyages to Norfolk Island in early November and December 2022. This month’s delivery is the fifth of the organised barges to bring cargo and supplies to Norfolk Island from Queensland. I have read that there is another barge organised for later in April, but, unsure if this is still scheduled.

The crew had a few busy days transferring the cargo from the containers on the barge onto the transfer vessels and unloading the vessels at the pier with the mobile crane. I took a few photos on Sunday and Monday of the tugboat and barge anchored in Cascade Bay and the two transfer vessels. The smaller blue boat, was patiently waiting for its next load as the larger transfer vessel, Norfolk Supplier 1, was loaded by the lighterage crew on-board the barge, using the barge crane, lowing nets filled with cargo onto the larger boat.

On Monday the weather was changing, and I noticed there were white caps out to sea. On Tuesday I checked the Shipping App and the Sea Force tugboat and cargo Barge had already departed and was making steady progress on their journey back to Brisbane.

It will be interesting to see if the shelves are filled at Foodland after the warehouse received and checked the stock. There will be many awaiting mail deliveries as well, we have all become accustomed to being patient on Norfolk Island.

Last week’s news that Amazon Prime is stopping delivery to Australian remote islands will be interesting, as many Norfolk Island locals regularly purchase online orders. Even though I thought prime services was despatched via air freight, some items are also sent with the postal items on-board the cargo ships.

As mentioned above, this is the third delivery via Sea Force tugboat and Barge for 2023, and the last ship Southern Tiare was early January 2023. Frozen and refrigerated foods and supplies have been airfreighted since January as I believe there is no facilities on the barge for frozen and refrigeration products.

The new ship MS Norfolk is planned to start services for Norfolk Island in the middle of the year. It will be great to know that a large vessel is planned for our supply chain and hopefully regular full service will be successful.

Thank you to the crew for unloading the freight for the local Norfolk Island community. Here are a few photographs I took of Sea Force tugboat and Barge during the 2 and 3 April 2023 visit at the Cascade Pier of the barge filled with cargo containers.

Betty Matthews

April 2023