Friday, December 28, 2018

Paul R Tregurtha arrived Duluth 12/27/2018 - Emergency go-around



Sometimes things do not go as routine as one would like, especially in the middle a winter storm. As the bridge was about to lift, a brief malfunction resulted in the 1000ft Paul R Tregurtha aborting the approach and circling around for successful entry. This video shows the professionalism by both the captain of the Tregurtha and the bridge operator at the time.
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Follow-up information provided by Dave Campbell the Bridge Supervisor --- "It’s interesting for a number of reasons, first the operator was Paul Thomas. This just happened to be the last lift of Paul’s career. At the end of the shift, Paul retired after 30 years operating the bridge. We thought it was fitting that Paul’s last lift was going to be for the Paul R. the Queen of the Lakes. Finally, he sounded so calm on the radio transmissions but not quite so calm when he called me on the phone because the bridge wouldn’t lift. We were able to go through a couple of checks and found that one of the crossing gates, though it looked like it was completely lowered,  had not come down completely and was holding the bridge from going up. A quick raise and lower of the gate and we were off and running again."