Down to one ship: Interislander faces rough winter amid ferry maintenance woes

Thursday, 19 March 2026

The Kaiārahi ferry is back in action after a technical fault stranded hundreds of passengers in early March, but further disruption is expected this winter as the two Interislander ferries undergo scheduled maintenance.

The Kaiārahi has layby maintenance scheduled in June and July, before the Kaitaki sails to Singapore in August for dry docking.

Victor Billot, communications officer for the Maritime Union of New Zealand, said that meant there would be a long period with only one Interislander ferry operating. The Aratere was retired last year.

With both of Interislander’s remaining ferries prone to “intermittent technical faults”, Billot said having only one operating would be “quite concerning”.

“We've had concerns about the condition of the ferries, our ageing vessels, for a long time and there’s been a list of ongoing problems and technical failures with them over the last few years,” he said.

Additionally, technical troubles on Cook Strait ferries were not confined only to Interislander services, although these tended “to get the most attention”, Billot said.

“If we just look at this year, and we’re only in March, and we’ve already had two issues with the ferries — Bluebridge cancelling sailings because of technical issues at the start of the year when they had a fault on the Connemara that stranded a bunch of passengers on board the vessel in port,” he said. The Connemara was one of two Bluebridge ferries, the other being the Livia.

“And more recently, the Interislander Kaiārahi had technical faults that caused disruption and of course, when one of the two Interislander ferries is out, that takes us down to one Interislander ferry.”

To fix the technical fault on the Kaiārahi, Billot said an Interislander staff member had to travel to the Northern Hemisphere to collect a spare part.

“And, given the international situation at the moment, if we’re having to do stuff like that, it’s not a particularly good outlook.”

Taru Sawhney, Interislander’s general manager for operations, confirmed they would be down to one ferry for about three months during winter due to their “rigorous maintenance programme”.

“This allows us to complete three weeks of essential wet dock maintenance on Kaiārahi while Kaitaki serves the strait,” he said.

“Kaiārahi will then return and resume services, then Kaitaki will travel to its scheduled dry dock in Singapore for full out-of-water hull inspection and maintenance.

“Both ensure the ongoing safety and performance of our vessels. This is a necessary phase of the transition towards the brand-new, larger, rail-enabled ferries arriving in 2029.”

Sawhney said there were no dry dock facilities in New Zealand large enough to accommodate Interislander’s ships, so the company’s dry dock work was usually carried out in Singapore.

There was a dry dock in Sydney, but it prioritised Australian navy ships and was less predictable in terms of availability, he said.

Sawhney said Interislander was part of an integrated Cook Strait freight network and they were talking to their freight customers, both road and rail, to understand their needs through this period.

“There will be changes to available time gates, access to alternative days of sailing and coastal alternatives through KiwiRail's NZ Connect service,” he said.

“The maintenance periods have also been timed based on previous winter demand being the low season to minimise disruption.”

Sawhney confirmed a staff member had travelled overseas to collect a spare part following the Kaiārahi’s breakdown earlier this month.

“To minimise delays, one of our team personally collected the replacement electronic component from India to ensure it arrived as quickly as possible, rather than relying on courier timeframes,” he said.

“The minister for rail asked us to review our inventory levels after this incident to determine whether there are any other spare parts we could hold in storage, and we are actioning this review now.

“In recent times, Interislander has significantly lifted its inventory levels and this has contributed to near 100% reliability over the last year.”