Rough Sunday For The Steamship Authority

It was a rough Sunday for the Steamship Authority.

Just one week after overbooking the Iyanough fast ferry and having to bargain with passengers to get off the boat, the Steamship was dealing with more issues over the weekend.

On Sunday morning, the Authority announced that its website and reservation system were down, the result of the failure of an air conditioning unit.

"Due to the failure of an A/C unit, our computer servers are offline, and our website and reservation system are unavailable," the Steamship announced around 9:30 a.m. on Sunday. "Our staff are working diligently to assess and correct the issue. Currently no reservations can be made online, at the terminals, or by phone. All existing vehicle and high-speed ferry reservations are being honored, and any last-minute vehicle travel for today is on a standby basis only until our systems are restored."

Roughly two hours later, the issue had been resolved, and the Steamship's website and reservation system were back online. But another issue was almost immediately on the horizon.

Just after noon, the Authority sent out an alert that the 5 p.m. trip of the Iyanough to Nantucket, along with the 6:15 p.m. return trip to Hyannis, had been cancelled due to "unforeseen circumstances." Nantucket Currrent reached out to the Steamship's communications director Sean Driscoll for clarification on those circumstances.

There was a "crewing issue," Driscoll said. Which means the Steamship did not have enough staff members to run the boat. The staffing issue affected only that one round-trip of the Iyanough.