Mollydooker mishap...and how!

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Peter Creasey

Peter Creasey
From the Herald Sun...

Million dollar drop as wine tumbles

IT was certainly an expensive drop - more than $1 million worth of shiraz wine has gone down the drain after it was dropped by a malfunctioning forklift.

The 462 cases of 2010 Mollydooker Velvet Glove shiraz - at $185 a bottle - fell more than 6m to the ground as it was being loaded for export from Adelaide to the US.

The drop was so forceful, the bottles punched through the top of the cartons. Winemaker Sparky Marquis said the accident had cost him a third of his annual production.

"We just couldn't believe it," Mr Marquis said.

"This wine is our pride and joy, so to see it accidentally destroyed, and not consumed, has left us all a bit numb."

Mr Marquis now is working with insurance agencies to help recoup the losses.
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. . . . . . Pete
 
(I've told this story before)

My wife and I were tastting at Barnard Griffin in WA State one day when there was a tremendous crash, and stuff started falling off the walls of the tasting room.

Turns out a guy on a forklist had made too tight a turn & clipped some stacked pallets of wine. They crashed on the floor, on the bottling line and almost everywhere else. Thankfully nobody was hurt, though a lot of wine and an expensive bottling line was ruined.

Nobody laughed. Nobody made jokes.

We do't like Mollydooker, but it's not a laughing matter. Thankfully nobody got hit/killed by the falling wine.
 
originally posted by Cory Cartwright:
Moving wine with a forklift is terrifying. Why 462 cases at once though?
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Maybe it was a loaded freight container? This story would seem to support that. It seems strange to use a forklift to hoist that, though.

Mark Lipton
 
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Cory Cartwright:
Moving wine with a forklift is terrifying. Why 462 cases at once though?
Click to expand...

Maybe it was a loaded freight container? This story would seem to support that. It seems strange to use a forklift to hoist that, though.

Mark Lipton
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I thought so too. but a quick google earch indicates it's not at all strange. Container ships can be loaded via ramp using a heavy duty forklift.
 
originally posted by Tom Glasgow:
I thought so too. but a quick google earch indicates it's not at all strange. Container ships can be loaded via ramp using a heavy duty forklift.
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That makes sense, but I'm just used to seeing cranes at major ports for that purpose. I don't know enough about Port Adelaide, but I find it hard to believe that they wouldn't have cranes, too. Maybe the Mollydooker folk used a smaller container?

Mark Lipton
 
Knowing Sparky, I can't imagine that it's an insurance scam. Nowadays most Aussie shipping companies don't use pallets, but something called a Slipsheet that's used to slide a forklift or pallet-jack sort of tool underneath. This enables the shippers to pack more into each container and also decreases the chance of a wooden pallet breaking during the transit. I don't know if that was a factor - the container may just have been loaded improperly or maybe it's just that the forklift operator screwed up.

I wonder where this wine was being shipped? These are tough times for the Oz wine industry in general these days, particularly at the high end. A couple of difficult vintages in 2010 and 2011 didn't help much, although short vintages give everyone the opportunity to lessen the stocks remaining in warehouses.

originally posted by MLipton:
I don't know enough about Port Adelaide, but I find it hard to believe that they wouldn't have cranes, too.
Mark Lipton
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Actually, Adelaide has Crows, Port Adelaide has The Power. The Cranes used to be the name of the Uganda football team but it's now based in East London, although it seemingly still consists of ex-pat Ugandans.

-Eden (still trying to figure out the differences between Aussie Rules Football and rugby, and I still can't understand certain parts of the world's fascination with cricket. Maybe it's because I haven't played it?)
 
Aussie Rules is ironically named; the joke being that there are no rules. Rugby has so many rules that if they were rigidly enforced by the referee, the game would never move at all; hence the occasional complaint you see that the ref 'ruined the game' or was whistle-happy.
GG
 
Mollydooker just withdrew their press release regarding the accident saying another one will be released at a later date?....Dookergate
 
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