CONCORDE BARGE UNDERTAKES RECORD BREAKING VOYAGE ON THE RIVER TRENT
The barge that recently carried Concorde to its final resting place in Scotland is set to break more records this week. The Terra Marique is currently making her way from the Port of Goole to EDF Energy's Cottam Power Station in Nottinghamshire, and on Thursday will become the largest vessel ever to pass through Gainsborough's historic road bridge and into Nottinghamshire.
The Terra Marique, which is a colossal 80m in length by 16.5m in width and weighs some 2211 tonnes, is carrying a 270 tonnes electricity transformer. Traditionally, large ‘Abnormal Loads’ being delivered to Cottam would normally have be transported around 60 miles on the road network, travelling at speeds of between 5 and 12 miles an hour and causing significant disruption to road-users. In this instance, use of the river Trent will mean that road movement is entirely avoided.
The Terra Marique hit the headlines last month when it transported Concorde GBOAA along the river Thames, en route from Heathrow Airport to the National Museum of Flight at East Fortune in Scotland..
The Terra Marique was constructed at a cost of £8.5million, 99% of which was met by a Department for Transport ‘Freight Facilities Grant’. The grant was awarded to Staffordshire based Robert Wynn & Sons Ltd. in 2002, the company that now operates the vessel. The grant award, the largest ever given for a inland waterways project, underscores the Government’s policy of maximising the use of water for the movement of disruptive ‘abnormal loads’, around 1500 of which crawl along Britain’s roads each year.
Tim West, Research and Corporate Affairs Co-ordinator & spokesperson for Robert Wynn & Sons, commented:
"The passage through Gainsborough and along the Trent is complex operation. However working with Associated British Ports and British Waterways we are confident it will be a success. The Terra Marique was grant aided to take abnormal loads of the road network, we do however hope that our pioneering voyage will serve to demonstrate the potential of the River Trent as a freight-carrying waterway. "
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