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Rough seas halt speedboats

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DENPASAR, 24 July 2018: Bali’s harbour masters have ordered the halt of all speedboat transfers between Bali and Lombok islands due to poor weather conditions.

Asian Trails Indonesia, in a notice to its travel partners, Monday, said small boats have been ordered to stay in harbour, due to “severe sea conditions” making island commutes extremely dangerous.

All speedboats transfers have been halted until further notice according to harbour master communications issued at various jetties and ports.

Asian Trails said it anticipated speedboat transfers would be back either 25 or 27 July.

However, the travel company warned that the seas are most likely to remain quite rough.

“We have already advised alternative arrangements for clients travelling to or from Lombok and the Gili Islands.”

One option for tourists is to cross by larger slow boats and ferries, or to book a trans-island flight between Bali and Lombok.

For those travelling to the Gili Islands it is possible to fly to Lombok, or travel by ferry and then join a small speedboat in Lombok for the short crossing to the Gili Islands.

According to a report in the Jakarta Post bad weather forced scores of fast boats that travel from Bali to Lombok and Nusa Penida Island to stop operations from last Thursday.

The suspension ordered by harbour masters kept speedboats at their moorings at several ports or jetties in Bali, including Padangbai in Karangasem, Sanur and Benoa in Denpasar, as well as three jetties in Klungkung.

“We decided to suspend operations because of the bad weather. Safety is the most important factor,” Sanur’s harbour master Warsita told the Jakarta Post.

All fast boats were told to stay in harbour following a warning issued by the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG). The agency said waves could reach 4 metres high in southern Bali waters and in the Lombok Strait.

Bad weather continued throughout the weekend into Monday.

5 COMMENTS

  1. Hi ! Thanks for the article ! Very useful. Any updates regarding the situation? We should be leaving tomorrow to gili air.

    Thanks 🙂

  2. Just fly.
    These inter-island boats are just plain dangerous, even in apparently fine weather on the Lombok Strait.

  3. Thank you fo the update do you know an English speaking website where we can be keep updated ?

Comments are closed.

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