ianc1200
Well-Known Member
Top gate upper band snapped at 9.35. No EA presence lock on self service. People who were trying to come down trying to contact EA. GRRRR....
Caversham lock broke.
- Thread starter ianc1200
- Start date
boatone
Well-Known Member
Confirmed has been reported to EA.
ianc1200
Well-Known Member
2.5 hours on no action no engineer (at least as far as I can see).
ianc1200
Well-Known Member
Engineer has been at Caversham and now waiting on a 3 ton puller.
apollo
...
I take it lock(s) are fixed?
kremmen
Well-Known Member
Lock was fixed late afternoon
ianc1200
Well-Known Member
Apologies was updating on ThamesMobo Facebook and Twitter feeds but forgot to give the all clear on here. It seems Sonning never was broke but engineer was there resolving timing issues from 9am until 1pm when he was informed of the Caversham problem. All my information is 2nd hand but believe to be correct. He said if he had been told about Caversham he would have gone there straight away. It was said he was the only engineer covering Teddington to Lechlade, although that doesn't tie in with the fact a second man in an EA van turned up later. Whenthe enginner arrived he attempted to close the top gate with the broken collar by opening the bottom sluices. When this didn't work he arranged a 3 ton puller hence the second man arriving another hour and a half on. This puuler appeared to be length of anchor chain and a metal block. This was carried under one arm by the second man to arrive (why did the only engineer covering the whole rIver not have this in his well equipped van?). After this arrived it took the engineer about 30 mins to pull the gate up and get the lock operational. We had been the since 9.30 and were the first through the lock at 15.15. There were no bad tempers/arguements, despite heavy rain all was done by the staff there very well and very professionally. There was a young guy permanent EA staff and a very experienced and knowledgable volunteer. Obviously there was no management input, or if there was it was hopeless. On an August high season Saturday to have such wait when it should have been a 30 min repair is abysmal. I can only surmise, much said in the first world war, the EA staff are lions led by donkeys - and that's being unfair to donkeys. I tried to get some response from the waterways manager Barry Russell on Twitter, but obviously he's only interested in tweeting good news. Please please get rid of the current group of cretins who organise the staff at the EA. Also remove the threat of any increase in licence fees.
apollo
...
I agree on the last part, only time you see managers post anything its to pat themselves on the back followed by the equally pointless RTA.
