Isle of Wight ferry operator Red Funnel has announced it will run a one boat 'shuttle service' after the Red Eagle was taken out of service after a 'fault' this morning (Wednesday).
As previously reported by Isle of Wight Radio, passengers were left queuing on York Avenue in East Cowes this morning after the 10:30 sailing failed to depart, and the ferry was unable to leave the dock due to the malfunction.
With the Red Osprey out of service for repairs, the shuttle service - using only one boat - will depart Southampton and East Cowes every three hours.
The next scheduled departure from East Cowes is expected at 2pm, with the next departure from Southampton expected at 3.30pm.
Customers affected are being contacted by the operator.
Leanna Lakes, Operations Director, Red Funnel said:
“We sincerely apologise for this additional disruption to our vehicle ferry service between Southampton and East Cowes, especially as we are already contending with the disruption to our network.
"Our teams shore-side and onboard continue to work their hardest to get passengers to their destinations as quickly and as safely as possible and we wish to thank all our customers in advance for their patience and understanding.
"We hope to have a second vessel back in operation from this evening and are completely focused on achieving this.
"We promise to keep customers informed of our progress and ask that they bear with our front-line teams as they do their very best to adapt to this stressful situation.
"We are working very hard to fix this and apologise again for the impact that this will have on our customers’ plans.”
The company said that it's Hi-Speed service from West Cowes is unaffected by the issues.
It's hoped a second vessel will be back in service this evening.
Traffic in East Cowes is currently extremely heavy, with long queues along York Avenue.
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