Ice on the Hudson Briefly Shuts Down Waterway Ferry

Chunks of ice on the Hudson River briefly shut down a New York Waterway commuter ferry with 20 passengers on board, one day after an overheated engine disabled another boat owned by the company.

The Gov. Thomas Kean was traveling between the 14th Street dock in Hoboken, N.J. and Manhattan's 39th Street dock on Thursday morning when ice began jamming a water intake, company spokesman Pat Smith said.

The ferry boats need fresh water to cool their engines, so the captain shut down the boat as a precaution while a deckhand cleared the clog, Smith said. A second NY Water ferry pulled alongside in case the Thomas Kean needed help.

The ferry restarted its engines and continued on to the 39th Street dock six to seven minutes later, Smith said.

"This would happen maybe four or five times a year and no one would care, no one would notice, but after yesterday's thing everybody's a little more sensitive to it," Smith said.

On Wednesday another ferry, the Moira Smith, began emitting dark smoke shortly after leaving Edgewater, N.J. with 25 passengers on board. The crew shut down the engine, and the ferry was towed back to New Jersey.

Crews were still investigating the cause of the overheating in the Moira Smith shutdown, Smith said.

Both the Moira Smith and the Thomas Kean rescued passengers of US Airways Flight 1549 after it splashed down in the Hudson in January 2009, an event that came to be known as the "Miracle on the Hudson."