BC Ferries takes Northern Sea Wolf out of service due to COVID-19 illness in crew

Sailings for a vital ferry route on B.C.’s central coast have been cancelled over the holiday season due to COVID-19 among crew members.

BC Ferries says as a result of the staffing issue, there were no sailings during Christmas weekend from Dec. 24 – 26 and the route is not expected to be back in service until Jan. 2

The vessel, the Northern Sea Wolf, has been docked in Bella Coola and is undergoing a deep clean this week ahead of a return to service.

“My understanding is that every employee on that vessel is fully vaccinated at this time, or every employee who was on the vessel is fully vaccinated,” explained Eric McNeely, provincial president of the BC Ferry & Marine Workers’ Union.

“There has been at least one positive case of COVID aboard that was confirmed. As such, that has led to the crew being removed from the vessel and a commercial cleaning crew being brought in to ensure that the new crew that’s coming in to provide the service … is able to work in a safe an environment as possible.”

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Although the route is not as busy as the southern routes, it does serve an important role in the region.

The ferry links hard-to-reach communities, including Indigenous communities, many of which are remote and not accessible by road.

“On this vessel itself at the time, there weren’t any passengers on board so that was different than say routes that are coming between Vancouver Island and Southern Gulf Islands, Northern Gulf Islands, or the mainland, where they’re still seeing huge amounts of public travelling, hundreds of people at a time and not knowing the vaccination status of those passengers,” McNeely told CityNews.

McNeely says there have been few instances of COVID-19 among BC Ferries staff putting vessels out of service.

“We apologize to our customers for any inconvenience the sailing cancellations may have caused, particularly at this time of year,” BC Ferries wrote in a statement to CityNews.

It did not provide any details on the number of staff who are sick, or any change to protocol as the Omicron variant has led to rising COVID-19 case counts across the province in recent days.