The Alderney Shipping Company

The Alderney Shipping Company Limited Has been successfully operating since January 1969. At first the Company based its activities on Poole. The intention was to run a weekly service from there to Jersey, Guernsey and Alderney combining loads if there was not enough freight to justify a single port discharge and doing general tramping if there was any spare time.

The company was eventually awarded the contract in September 1969 to operate a twice weekly service to Alderney. Due to the collapse of the housing market in the U.K. major share holders were becoming short of liquid cash and had lent considerable sums of money to keep the company afloat. By 1973 the Directors of Link Services, Gordon and Alice Buckle and Jon and Martine Kay-Mouat gradually became increasing shareholders in the Company.
The Company Traded for several years and it became apparent that a twice weekly service to Alderney was not suitable and that freight quantities were not sufficient to operate two ships. Eventually the Company decided to operate a once weekly service to Alderney. This move to a once a week sailing required the Company to purchase a larger ship that was capable of carrying the increased freight which was now available.
The Company went through many ships which served the Islands well, and, as freight increased so was the need to invest in larger ships. In the summer of 1994 the Company decided to have one last attempt to make the inter Island service viable following the upgrade of its operations in Guernsey. Inspired by Bruno Kay-Mouat's insistence that it purchase a ship and his willingness to travel to look at ships, the first half of 1994 was spent searching for a ship that could fit into the upper berth in Alderney and yet was capable of carrying the maximum amount of freight.
The Company finally settled on a ship called M.V. Deer Sound, now called M.V.Isis which was purchased from Fishers after they had repossessed the ship from Denison Shipping. She had previously been used in and about the Scottish Islands and indeed was registered at Kirkwall in the Hebrides.

With a cargo capacity of nine hundred and fifty three tons and a cubic capacity of 1347 cubic meters below decks, she is well capable to carry all the inter island freight each week. She also has sufficient capacity to trade profitably with any bulk cargo that is offered from the South Coast. The Alderney Shipping Company now has a fleet of four ships, the M.V. Isis, M.V. Burhou I, M.V. Pongo and the M.V. Mungo that operates successfully around the coasts of England and between the Channel Islands and from Ridderkerk in Holland.