No one is allowed near the shrimp trawler IJM 22 on Thursday afternoon. The beach is very widely cordoned off and beach entrances are closed. The municipality of Zandvoort announced this on Tuesday.
“The municipality and Rijkswaterstaat do not want to take any risks. Suppose the cable between the boats comes loose and falls back on the beach, this will create very dangerous situations,” said Walter Sans, spokesperson for the municipality of Zandvoort.
It is striking that in previous attempts the beach was not so wide. “A heavier tugboat was involved on Thursday and there will be more pressure on the cable. The tug is now also being pulled from a different angle.”
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Large part of the beach is off limits
The refloating of the shrimp trawler can therefore only be seen by the public on Thursday from the Paulus Loot boulevard. Heavy equipment is also driving on the beach during the preparations, but it is still unclear whether the beach will then be ‘locked’.
The media are also not allowed on the beach during the refloating. “Rijkswaterstaat has seen things go wrong before when a similar cable broke. And we don’t want that to happen here,” says Sans.
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“We are still in discussions with the surrounding beach pavilions about how we will solve this together with them on Thursday,” Sans explains. The boat is located close to the Tijn Akersloot pavilion.
The intention is that a trench for the cutter will be dug at 7 a.m. on Thursday morning. There will also be a kind of pond around the cutter. Around 1 p.m. the cutter will be connected to a tugboat from Scheveningen via a cable of more than one kilometer long. The big moment for skipper Ed Rekers will be at 3:30 PM. If all goes well, he will soon be back at sea and sail to his home port in IJmuiden.
NH will broadcast the raft attempt live on Thursday. The cutter is still clearly visible from the Paulus Loot boulevard.