Thursday, July 14, 2016

Great Lakes Pilotage Authority Turns The Tables On A Ship Going A-Viking

Historically, it's the Vikings with their longships that would go forth and pillage. Now the tables have been turned.

A Viking ship heading towards the Tall Ships Festival in Bay City, Michigan received a rude awakening - a bill for $400,000 in Great Lakes Pilotage fees.

The Detroit News: Viking ship heads to Bay City despite surprise bill.

$9,000 a day for pilots for the vessel for each and every day is rather spendy for a non-profit oar and sail-powered 6-knot replica Viking longboat.

Apparently there was a misunderstanding as to whether they were required or not and they've found out that they are. Apparently the fees don't scale for size.

On the upside, the fees have successfully stopped Viking raiders entering the Great Lakes since the 1960s when the rule went into place, so that's one way how you can stop a boatload of Viking raiders.

I expect it looked something like this but on the water, The ship was happily sailing along until:

They may need to do a raid on Detroit to get some more dimes, they're going to need them.

1 comment:

Old NFO said...

Truly sad, but rules be rules...