Victor reckons three days of hot weather have caused chaos

THE past three days of hot weather have left waterways closed or heavily restricted through lack of water.

With even the London canals, with all their plenty of feeds, being in a state of chaos with boaters told they must not use the Hertford Canal as it will be closed, Keith Gudgin reports.

So boaters have to use the longer route, via Limehouse Basin and Limehouse Cut to get to or from the Lee Navigation to the Regent's Canal.

Also on the London canals, there are  restrictions on Hanwell Flight on the Grand Union and Hampstead Road Lock on the Regent’s Canal, both being closed overnight. The expected excuse this time is paddles left open.  Mustn't mention leaking lock gates, don't you know...

Then the Chesterfield Canal is closed through lack of water between Stret Lock and Deep Lock, but this time 'caused by damage to the top gate and cill'.

Still on Friday, there's five pounds closed on the Erewash Canal, this time between Potters Lock 69 and Pastures Lock 64, with the reason being 'the continued hot and dry weather'. No excuse blaming boaters this time, as so often in the past with the Erewash.

Of course the Huddersfield Narrow Canal had to be short of water with it short pounds, but this time it is closed all the way from Lock 16E to Lock 1E due to low water levels caused by a leak at the Aqueduct at Lock 12E.

It also being closed from Colcar to Huddersfield, our being told the temporary fixes were too temporary they having quickly failed, with not enough water to keep the canal open.

The Rochdale Canal, that has caused boaters such problems for many months still has problems with lack of water, now extended from Lock 21 to Lock 28, and telling that Lock 22 has had its paddle left open.

How it's paddle was managed to to be left open when the section  was closed is not told.

Still on Friday the 2nd August the low water closure on the Lancaster Canal now extends to Lock 21 due to low water levels, and though water levels are continuing to improve, it is still not in a navigable state.

As Keith gave this information I'll let him conclude—'A handful of sunny days and CaRT run out of water. We've just had one of the wettest winter/spring seasons recorded so what have they done to conserve stocks? Did this happen 200 years ago every time there was a few sunny days? You can bet your life if they had run out of water then, the working boatmen would have rioted'...

No explosion

A boat exploding on the trust's waters? It can't have that, CaRT can't possibly tell that gas is dangerous and boats can blow up.

So Canal & River Trust's explanation was to tell boaters that there was debris in the water!  And that was it!

It's message was—'Please be advised navigation is restricted Red Lion visitor Moorings on the Weaver Navigation, due to debris in the water. Navigation will remain open, however we politely request all customers to navigate through the affected area with care'.

Explosion? Never!

What absolute rubbish

I'm afraid that CaRT is coming in for some stick from me this week with its ridiculous explanations, such as telling that a lock gate left open will drain a pound.

This of course is its explanation for the drained pound on the Rochdale with around 20 boats left stranded, it telling that a lock gate was left open.

Now I ask—how many times have you followed a boat who left a gate open when leaving a lock.  We have, only too often, but there's still water in the pounds, for of course the remaining gate in the locks are of course closed.  You can't possibly open both top and bottom gates, so therefore the water is held. If it wasn't the whole system would be drained!

And there was the boater Jay Dykes telling the BBC of a cruiser on the Rochdale that after being stuck at Todmorden for two weeks at a stoppage was in an hurry to get going so speeding from Lock 27 left every gate open when leaving a lock.  But of course, no water loss.

But spreading this untruth to such as the BBC—who will believe anything—can only show there's someone at CaRT who knows no better or is purposely misleading...

Which is it?

I don't get it

We are told the stoppage on the Audlem Flight on the Shroppie was caused by vandals removing the shear pins at the top of the tail gates of Lock 10.

What sheer pins?  I have just looked through literally hundreds of our photographs of lock gates and can see nothing on the top of a gate that would resemble a pin!

But the trust state 'shear pins at the top of the gates have been removed and when the lock was being emptied, the gates dropped and are now inoperable, with the boat stuck in the lock'.

That too doesn't make any sense if it happened with a boater actually working the lock.

So what's it all about?

Victor Swift—telling tales for 24 years