KiwiRail is investigating an Interislander ferry steering problem that saw passengers stuck on board for more than six hours on Friday.
The Kaiārahi experienced steering problems during its 3.30pm voyage across the Cook Strait to Picton. The vessel returned to Wellington as a precaution, docking at 10.05pm.
A North Island man on board, who didn't want to be named, said passengers collected their bags at 10.40pm, more than half an hour after the ship docked.
He said while in the terminal, he received a text advising he had been rebooked on a Saturday morning sailing, but had already missed the event he was planning on attending.
"[We] are unsure if we will be refunded."
The passenger said the mood on board had been "fairly calm" before passengers were told at 8pm that the ship would be returning to Wellington.
"From there, while mostly calm, there was a lot of tension and stress from being unsure what was happening. There was a lot of confusion of who to contact and what would be happening," he said.
"There was very little communication on board and the general feeling was that it would've been preferable to have regular updates than the few we had, which often gave us no extra information. A lot of people booked for new sailings with Bluebridge while on board."
The passenger said the confusion continued once the ship had berthed, but acknowledged it was a "hugely challenging situation" for staff.
"There was a large line at enquiries and the staff in the terminal were incredibly polite but also didn't have the information to pass on."
Wellington harbourmaster Grant Nalder told RNZ crew still had "full control of the wheel", despite what he said was a "technical problem with the steering".
"As they were approaching Tory Channel and did their regular checks, they found something was behaving oddly with the steering.
"They didn't go through Tory Channel, just went out into Cook Strait to test what it was. After doing that, they decided they were going to return to Wellington."
Issue resolved - KiwiRail
Interislander executive general manager Duncan Roy said the organisation was "confident" the issue had been resolved.
Roy said Interislander was working with Maritime New Zealand for Kaiārahi to return to service today.
"We are planning to schedule additional sailings, and we will reach out to affected passengers to accommodate them as soon as possible.
"KiwiRail is contacting freight customers directly on our plan to manage freight.
"Safety will always be our first priority. We deeply regret the impact of the disruption on our customers at this busy time of year and thank them for their patience."
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