A Bit on the Side

We are in Ricky awaiting the festival at the weekend. When we passed through here a month ago I was grumbling about the sunken boat just below Batchworth Lock.
Well it's still there today.

This afternoon whilst I was pottering about on Gecko - fixing pretty lights for the festival etc. - The Wood, Hall and Heward tug Weaver came past pushing a barge with HiAb.  Being a curious sort of fellow I grabbed a camera and followed on the towpath.

They pulled in against the sunken boat and prepared to remove it.

First they rigged up a pump to see if the boat would float.

After a while it was apparent that water was entering the boat as fast as the pump was extracting it.

So pump number two was set up which did the trick.

Once the boat was floating straps were put under it and connected with chains for the HiAb to lift it clear of the water.









Up
Up
and 
Away

With the boat loaded on the barge the remaining water was pumped out.

But this load is too tall to get under the bridges so it was lifted out again and towed off for processing.

The whole operation was carried out by two men who obviously knew what they were doing and executed it efficiently - well done guys!

The word on the towpath is that the owner had trapped the rudder between lock gates when descending a lock and that had been the start of problems with the boat.  The boat sank a few months ago and tragically he committed suicide a month ago.

He used to keep this boat alongside his main boat and so this friend of his named it for him -

 


A Bit on the Side