boom! what we've got to look forward to. Yes indeed, unless the wind gets up too much, this Sat­ur­day (12 Nov) at 3pm, the ex-Frigate F69-Welling­ton is going to be scut­tled off the south coast, between Island and Houghton Bays (just to the East of Tapu Teran­ga — the island of Island Bay).

There’s prob­a­bly going to be a heap of peo­ple going down to watch the event, so take heed of the offi­cial advice regard­ing trans­port…

Motorists are urged to park their vehi­cles away from the coastal road and take a bus to Houghton Bay. Houghton Bay School is pro­vid­ing a lim­it­ed amount of park­ing in their grounds and at Houghton Bay Park as a fundrais­er for their new hall.

The Island Bay launch­ing area and car park will be reserved for police and offi­cials and closed to the pub­lic from 6am to 6pm on the day of the sink­ing. South Coast boat ramps are like­ly to be extreme­ly busy and spec­ta­tors should con­sid­er using oth­er ramps.

Motorists are being warned to watch for pedes­tri­ans between Princess Bay and Island Bay, park legal­ly and keep off foot­paths and areas of veg­e­ta­tion.

No road clo­sures are planned, but the Coun­cil will put up signs to warn res­i­dents to expect traf­fic delays.

For those of you head­ing out in a boat, there’s a few more things you should be aware of — head over to the offi­cial site to find out just where the best place to view from the water will be.

UPDATE: Well, it’s look­ing a bit iffy. The Met­Ser­vice Inshore Welling­ton Marine fore­cast (which I should have linked to in the first place, as Tom over at WellUr­ban right­ful­ly points out) has this to say about Sat­ur­day…

Norther­ly 25 knots gust­ing 35 knots, eas­ing to 10 knots in the evening. Rough sea eas­ing to slight in the evening. Most­ly cloudy with brief light rain in the after­noon.

If it’s Norther­ly, it needs to get below 20 knots for the whole she­bang to hap­pen. Fin­gers crossed.