Quote Originally Posted by islaydarkblue View Post
You would soon change your tune if your car was sitting underneath the mezzanine deck on one of the large Calmac ferries and the mezzanine deck collapsed on top of your car because the Calmac staff loading the mezzanine deck said that a poster on Dundee Mad called Grantzer says that this increased weight for electric cars is a lot of nonsense.
It is more than a passing coincidence that several large Calmac car ferries have been taken out of service since the beginning of 2022 to repair their existing fire fighting equipment.
I also previously posted that Calmac ferries are in dialogue with the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) about the possibility of an electric vehicle combusting on board one of their ferries.
It must be a problem otherwise the management of Calmac and the MCA would have dismissed these concerns as scaremongering and ignored them.
More total nonsense

A few points

1. The mezzanine deck of any Calmac ferry will be rated for the weight it can safely carry, that rating will include a factor of safety of probably 50%. Calmac will know the spec of all vehicle and will know what cars can and can't go on a mezzanine deck. Marine safety is incredibly complex and very strict and Calmac will not be able to operate any ship without the appropriate licenses and safety certificates in place. Although The Herald Of Free Enterprise was an awful disaster at least some good marine safety laws came from it. No mezzanine deck will be collapsing under the weight of electric vehicles any time soon, I'm pretty sure of that.

2. Ships are always uprating their fire safety systems, it's one of the safety requirements that are upspec'd very regularly. One of the drawbacks of using steel systems at sea is that they rust and need constant repair or replacement. Any rust on a fire protection system will result in it requiring immediate action.

3. I really would hope that Calmac Ferries are in regular dialogue with the MCA about the possibility of EVs catching fire. These pesky risk assessment get everywhere don't they? And thankfully they didn't just dismiss their legal duty to assess that risk as scaremongering.