The vessel at the center of Scotland’s long-running ferries saga has begun ferrying passengers between the Scottish mainland and the Aran Islands.
MV Glen Sannox – which was delivered almost seven years ago – is the first new large ship to join the UK’s largest ferry fleet in almost a decade.
He made his first scheduled journey before dawn between Troon and Brodick-on-Arran in South Ayrshire.
The ship will return on this route three times each day, with a journey duration of 75 minutes.
She had completed a test sailing on the return route from the Scottish mainland to Arran on Sunday.
With a capacity of 127 cars and 852 passengers, Glen Sannox will help relieve pressure on the state-owned operator which has struggled to maintain services in recent years with an aging and increasingly unreliable fleet.
PA MediaThe orders for the dual-fuel ships Glen Snooks and her sister ship Glen Rosa were placed at Port Glasgow’s Ferguson Shipyard almost a decade ago.
But fierce disputes over design challenges and claims of cost overruns saw the shipyard fall into administration and nationalized in 2019.
The cost of the ships has quadrupled the £97m contract price and sparked the longest political row of the divestment era.
CalMac chief executive Duncan Maxon said crews had worked hard on sea trials and crew familiarization for the UK’s first gas-powered ferry.
He told BBC Scotland News that the successful maiden voyage was “a huge sigh of relief” and “good news for a lot of different people”.
“We’re glad he’s in the condition he’s in,” he added.
Mr Maxon said the Glen Snooks would be a “huge benefit” to the Isle of Arran as it was a modern vessel that could sail in more difficult conditions.
Named after the Aran Beauty Spot, Glen Snooks will make three return trips each day from Troon to the island’s main town of Brodick.
A similar vessel, the Glen Rosa – still under construction at Port Glasgow’s Ferguson Shipyard – is due to join the route later in the year, although it was reported at the weekend that A new delay will be announced soon.
Glenn Snooks carried its first passengers and vehicles on Sunday when it was swapped for a vessel for an unexpected return to a test ahead of Monday’s full timetable.
Mr Maxon said: “A huge effort has gone into bringing MV Glen Snooks to this stage, and everyone at CalMac is excited to have her join the fleet and serve Arran.”
The arrival of the new vessel should bring relief to island residents after years of transportation uncertainty.
Mr Maxon added: “This new generation of ships is more powerful and has more sophisticated thrusters which enable them to sail in rougher conditions and stronger winds.”
Mike Dobson, chairman of Erin Cancer Support, said it was particularly difficult for those requiring hospital treatment on the mainland.
“An aging ferry fleet with a lot of technical or weather-related issues has made it more difficult for people to feel like they’re going to get there,” he told BBC News.
“It means more cancellations of appointments and it puts a certain weight on people and affects their mental health.”
Sheila Gilmour, from Visit Arran, said businesses had also been badly affected, but she was hopeful that tourist numbers would now start to recover.
“We are very optimistic, it has been a long struggle to get here but we have to look forward and put the past behind us,” he said.
Scotland’s entire west coast ferry network should also benefit as the average age of the fleet falls and new capacity allows vessels to be redeployed.
SNP politicians will hope that the arrival of Glen Snooks will herald the end of Scotland’s long-running ferry dispute, although reports of new delays for Glen Rosa mean it is premature.
The contract to build both ships was awarded to Ferguson in 2015, a year after it broke up.
Just before Scotland’s 2014 independence referendum, it was rescued by an investment firm headed by Jim McColl, then First Minister Alex Salmond’s economic adviser.
While a decade of decline left the Clyde’s last commercial shipyard with just 76 staff when it went into administration, the merchant invested millions of pounds and expanded rapidly.
But construction of the dual-fuel ships soon fizzled out as the firm faced complex design challenges while trying to meet production milestones and modernize rundown facilities.
Claims of overspending led to a bitter standoff between the yard’s management and government ferries procurement body Caledonian Maritime Assets Ltd (CMAL).
Glen Sannox was launched by former Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon on a smoky day in November 2017, but a major political storm was brewing behind the scenes.
It was later discovered that the ship was far from finished – the windows had been painted over, the temporary funnels were made of plywood and, most importantly, a large amount of engineering and electrical work was needed inside.
The yard’s managers blamed CMAL, claiming that a poor design, late decision-making and intervention led to unforeseen complications.
CMAL said the firm underestimated the complexity of the work entrusted to it and made poor management decisions.
The impasse eventually saw Ferguson run out of money and return to administration in 2019, nationalizing the shipyard, saving 350 jobs.
Problems continued under new “turnaround director” Tim Hare, who was paid around £2m before a permanent chief executive was appointed in 2022.
Opposition parties, meanwhile, claimed the crisis was rooted in the incompetence of Scottish ministers – which they denied.
Under new boss David Tiedmann, construction of the ships finally progressed but with huge cost overruns and frequent delays.
It was dismissed by the Ferguson board last March, and after several more brief delays in November, the ship was finally delivered to CMAL.
PA MediaThe Glen Sannox is the first dual-fuel ferry built in the UK, capable of running on both marine gas oil (MGO), a form of diesel, and liquefied natural gas (LNG).
When running on gas, ship engines are quieter and emit lower levels of exhaust pollutants known as NOx and SOx.
However, LNG’s climate change credentials are questionable because the engines also emit methane, a much more potent greenhouse gas than CO2.
LNG fuel also has to be imported from Qatar and trucked from a terminal in Kent to Scotland.
Despite being a tall sided vessel, Glen Snooks is extremely maneuverable and should be better able to cope with stormy weather conditions on the west coast of Scotland.
But the ship’s size means it is currently unable to berth at Ardrossan, Ern’s closest mainland port, until an agreement is reached to rehabilitate the multi-million port.
In addition to the Glen Rosa, four other large CalMac vessels are being built by a major shipyard in Turkey – although these too are being delayed by about six months.
The first of these ships, the MV Isle of Islay, should be delivered in the spring, with the others about four months apart.