Turbine pulled out of Bay of Fundy

The damaged underwater turbine in the Bay of Fundy was recovered Thursday by Irish tidal renewable energy company OpenHydro.

The 400 tonne turbine was removed from the floor of the Minas Channel.

"The turbine is in extremely good condition," said James Ives, OpenHydro's CEO. "All the blades have failed. We have overloaded the turbine. We've underestimated the loadings in the Bay of Fundy. We underestimated the energy in the Bay of Fundy."

OpenHydro and Nova Scotia Power first tried to remove it in November.

That attempt was unsuccessful due to a rise in tides. Subsequent efforts to retrive it were hampered by bad weather, including strong winds.

The turbine was deployed in November 2009.

The turbine will now be towed to Cherubini Metal Works in Dartmouth for a forensic engineering assessment.

They will try to extract information on six sensor systems.

Then it will be decided if another attempt to put a turbine in the Minas Channel will happen and if it will be the refitted turbine or a new one.