QLD:Bad weather holding up barge

AAP General News (Australia)
08-13-2010
QLD:Bad weather holding up barge

By Tony Bartlett

GOLD COAST, Aug 13 AAP - Authorities hope the weather will ease enough on Friday to
allow a desalination plant barge, which was blown onto a Gold Coast beach earlier this
week, to be towed into port.

The barge was torn from its moorings at the Tugun desalination plant and washed up
on the beach on Wednesday morning where it was pounded by rough seas before being refloated
later that night on the high tide.

It was towed to Brisbane and arrived on dark last night but the weather was too rough
to bring it into port.

Water Secure, the company which runs the desalination plant, says the barge is being
held off Cape Moreton and will be towed in as soon as the weather eases.

The 50-metre, 1000-tonne work platform, which has no motor, will be surveyed over the
next few days to make sure it hasn't been damaged.

It will then be towed back to the Gold Coast to work on repairs to the Tugun desalination
plant's outlet diffuser pipe, which returns salt water from the plant back into the ocean.

AAP bart/pjo/dep

KEYWORD: BARGE

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