Work continues on Lock 17 and the problem with the guillotine door.
by Dave Warner
A large crane and a number of workers continued to gauge whether they had fixed the problem with the guillotine door that lets boats in and out of Lock 17 on the eastern end.
According to a post this afternoon, the New York State Canal Corporation announced that boaters’ services are nearing full capacity on the Erie Canal between Lock E-8 (Scotia) and Lock E-17 (Little Falls). “Only local vessel traffic will be passed through locks in this area until Lock E-17 reopens for navigation.”
“The Canal Corporation will soon announce a temporary operating schedule for Lock E-17 with instructions for mariners that will ensure all waiting to transit the eastern Erie Canal can do so in a timely, orderly manner,” the release stated.
In the meantime, boats that have been trapped for five days continue to wait on the construction, and according to all that we spoke to, they are loving the treatment they have received in Little Falls.
According to Ron and Vivian Hansen on the Seadragoness, “There’s always someone coming by asking if we need anything, or do we need a ride to town. It’s just been fantastic. From the lockmaster to the mayor, to the Rotary Club. The Canal Corporation even sent a pump-out boat.”
They both said that it could have been a lot more difficult for the five days that they’ve been there. The couple was coming up from Florida on their way back to Canada.
Another boater named Al stated, “There were three boats that were all here waiting to go through and they started lifting the door. I didn’t hear the bang but, they radioed us and said they had mechanical difficulties and that we might want to tie up while they figured it out.”
Al said that a little while later, they came to see him and said it would be a day to a week before it would be fixed. “I could have left at that moment and turned around, but I didn’t. I didn’t want to do all those locks again.”
He said that his stay in Little Falls has been amazing. “Yesterday with the Rotary Club doing the BBQ, that was just unbelievable. The food was extraordinary.”
“They had these really good hamburgers that were like this thick and then sausages and even the fixings. They had these carmelized onions with green peppers and then this red relish tomato sauce. They had coleslaw with cranberry and it was the best coleslaw I’ve ever had. Someone just made it. Then there was potato salad and wine and beer,” Al stated.
The Hansens said that they’d just walk into town and people would be waving and saying hi. “We’re going ‘they don’t know us, and we don’t know them’, but it was very much like being home.”
