It is with sadness I have to tell you that my friend for many years Geoff Wheat passed away yesterday. He had been suffering from long and painful cancer treatment and it was hoped he would make a good recovery but unfortunately not to be.                       He was better known in recent years for skippering the Trent gravel barge Fusedale for Humber Barges Ltd. mainly on the Collingham to Whitwood run. He spent most of his working life either campaigning for commercial carrying or hands on reviving operations and has worked just about every navigation and every sort of carying craft,–too many to go into here. Unwittingley at the time, he was partly responsible for starting our project by asking me if I knew the name of a laid up barge at Knottingley when I went mate with him for a few trips back in 2005. When we had purchased what we finally found out was Leicester Trader he towed us from Knottingley to Cromwell on our journey home.

Geoff Wheat loading sand at Collingham, Feb 2005