Saturday 24 December 2011

Torpoint gets a visitor!

With thanks to Luke Farley I can bring you this very rare shot of First Devon and Cornwall Volvo B6BLE WK02 TYF having a day out across the river to Torpoint depot. Despite the blind stating '81B Polperro' the bus was not actually used in service while in Torpoint, but was used to transport some engineering crew to Torpoint to fix Trident 32758 which was suffering with a water leak. Certainly a brave move to take a vehicle with such a long overhang, and no ferry lift across the Torpoint ferry, unless the tide was high enough meaning there was little risk of any grounding out occurring. This is nearly undoubtedly the first time a B6 will have visited Torpoint, although this is not the first time a B6 has run on an 81. I've heard stories in the past of various failed buses having their services continued on the Plymouth side of the ferry using B6s as a stop gap before a 'ferrybus' can be put back in its place. Still, nice to see something different! 

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

came via the ferry

fred said...

it does have a ferry lift, possibly one of the few that do?

Laurence Mayhew said...

Oh really!? I never knew any of these were fitted with ferry lifts.

Anonymous said...

All First bus B6's have a ferry lift, also a full kneel facility. Its just a engineering switch hidden behind the dash.