MV Walla Walla

History

The Walla Walla was originally assigned to the San Juan Islands, however, in its first year of service it was reassigned to the Seattle-Bainbridge route for which ridership better aligned with the high capacity of the Jumbo-class vessels.

After being replaced on the Seattle–Winslow route by a , the ship began serving as a fill-in vessel for whenever one of the larger ferries goes into scheduled maintenance periods; usually she can be found on either the Seattle–Bremerton or Edmonds–Kingston routes. Occasionally the Walla Walla will still end up filling in on the Seattle–Bainbridge Island run where it spent its early years. In late July 2014, the Jumbo Mark-II-class ferry, sailed to Vancouver, British Columbia for repairs. Since Washington State Ferries had no large backup vessels, the Walla Walla once again found herself on her old run, the Seattle–Winslow route. As a result, she was the other vessel on the route on the day the suffered her massive electrical failure.

April 1981 grounding

On April 23, 1981, the ferry ran aground near Bainbridge Island at approximately 7:50 a.m. after heavy fog impacted the navigation of the vessel. No serious injuries were reported among the more than 600 commuters. Two tug boats attempted to pull the ferry free but were unsuccessful leading officials to wait until high tide approximately 12 hours later. Passengers walked off the vessel at approximately 10:15am onto a waiting barge and 2 tour boats. The vehicles on the boat were made available to passengers at about 7:30 p.m.

November 2012 incident

In early November 2012, during routine maintenance, one of the ship's four drive motors was damaged and failed after it overheated. The ferry was removed from service while a replacement was installed. WSDOT announced that if the damaged motor could be replaced with a spare already in its warehouse, the ferry could be back into service within several months. The spare motor was refurbished by General Electric in Los Angeles and then installed at Vigor Shipyards. The Walla Walla returned to service in April 2013.

April 2023 grounding

At approximately 4:30 p.m. on April 15, 2023, the ferry ran aground on a Bainbridge Island beach after a generator failure while transiting Rich Passage during a Bremerton–Seattle run. No injuries or hull damage were reported among the 596 passengers and 15 crew members. All passengers were evacuated onto Kitsap Fast Ferries and returned to Bremerton within a few hours. The Walla Walla was towed by tugboats back to Bremerton for inspections and to unload the 200 vehicles left onboard until the following morning.

A subsequent investigation by Washington State Ferries and the U.S. Coast Guard determined that contaminated fuel had clogged filters leading into the boat's generators and caused them to shut down. The fuel contamination was caused by excessive air that entered the "two-day tank" and formed a black sludge of bacteria and fungus that clogged the filters. The onboard backup generator also failed and the crew were unable to start a third generator, leaving the vessel without power. Walla Walla sustained a bent propeller and other minor damage. The ferry later reentered service, but again damaged a propeller and was withdrawn for dry-docking on September 18.

References

References

1. [http://www.evergreenfleet.com/wallytoday.html The Walla Walla], evergreenfleet.com
2. [http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/ferries/vesselwatch/VesselDetail.aspx?vessel_id=36 MV Walla Walla vessel info from WSDOT]
3. "The jumbo ferry Walla Walla went aground near Bainbridge... - UPI Archives".
4. [http://blogs.seattletimes.com/today/2012/11/walla-walla-ferry-out-of-service-indefinitely/ Walla Walla ferry out of service indefinitely] – Seattle Times, retrieved November 9, 2012
5. [https://archive.today/20130127213837/http://kgmi.com/Electrical-Accident-Puts-Walla-Walla-Ferry-Out-Of-/14764502 Electrical Accident Puts Walla Walla Ferry Out Of Service] – KGMI, retrieved November 12, 2012
6. Frame, Susannah. (March 11, 2013). "Report: Human error was cause of ferry maintenance accident". King5.com.
7. (April 16, 2023). "Passenger ferry carrying almost 600 people runs aground in Washington". [[CNN]].
8. (April 15, 2023). "WA ferry runs aground on Bainbridge Island after losing power". The Seattle Times.
9. Kroman, David. (April 16, 2023). "Passengers retrieve cars from WA ferry that ran aground on Bainbridge Island". The Seattle Times.
10. Kroman, David. (September 27, 2023). "Bacteria and fungus in fuel caused ferry Walla Walla to run aground". The Seattle Times.
11. Pilling, Nathan. (May 4, 2023). "Washington State Ferries: Contaminated fuel led to Walla Walla grounding". Kitsap Sun.
12. (September 29, 2023). "Kitsap ferry service takes another reduction". Bainbridge Island Review.