Cedar Island and Swan Quarter ferries, which carry passengers across Pamlico Sound to Ocracoke, resumed Tuesday after having been suspended over the weekend and on an altered schedule through most of April.
North Carolina Department of Transportation officials said Tuesday that service will begin with a two-boat, alternate schedule while the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers continues to mitigate shoaling issues in Bigfoot Slough.
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The schedule for April 13 – 16, weather permitting, is as follows:
- Ocracoke to Cedar Island: 7:30 a.m. and 1 p.m.
- Cedar Island to Ocracoke: 10:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m.
- Ocracoke to Swan Quarter: 7 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.
- Swan Quarter to Ocracoke: 10 a.m. and 4:30 p.m.
The schedule was first reduced from three to two ferry runs per day on March 26, and again April 1,then April 5. The ferry was suspended completely from April 8 to April 12, all due to shoaling in the ferry channel just outside of Ocracoke’s Silver Lake Harbor.
Shoaling happens when sand and sediment fill into a ferry channel, making water depths too shallow and the channel too narrow for safe operation of the ferry system’s largest vessels.
For up-to-the-minute information on schedule changes on the Cedar Island and Swan Quarter routes, please follow @NCFerryPamSound on Twitter.
