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- Feb 28, 2007
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So I wake up to my Cdn long weekend with a call from our campus police that one of our boats is reportedly strandard on a U.S. island in the Detroit River near an industrial complex. The big worry was wether a crew was on board, but seeing as the boat in question was my boat and I was the one using it the previous day, I was able to alleviate that fear.
However, it was up to me to recover the boat and the homeland security dudes where the boat was stranded were none too pleased about it. First, I had to scramble someone to help me - which isn't easy considering its a long weekend. Second I had to find another boat, which wasn't easy again given half the boats are in a lockup and nobody could find the key. My luck was in having a conversation with one of my graduate students that another Post Doc fellow had a boat and was actually planning on taking it out today. So I got his number and arranged to give him some rescue pay for his boat and labor.
We arrived at the scene which was about 4 km from where his boat was docked. It was unfortunately a much smaller boat than I would have hoped, but good enough. An old 20' with an engine that was 4 years younger than me. He assured me it would get us to our destination. On the way there, a thousand thoughts were running through my head and I wasn't as organized or clear of mind as I'd should be. I grabbed my maxpedition falcon II with all my PSK, towel, gloves etc in it, a wet suit, 50' of rope and my work boots. In my pocket was my izula like it usually is. I also had an RC-4 in my maxpedition.
We found the boat and it was grounded pretty good on the island. I put on my wetsuit, but instead of using booties, put my steel toe work boats on. It is an industrial site after all and there were lots of hazards, broken glass and metal shards near the shore. The neoprene wet suit offered pretty good protection for my legs, but no room for a belt knife. Thats where the Izula, worn in neck mode came in handy. I just clipped a carbiner through the centre hole at the bottom of the moulded sheath and fashined a paracord necklace.
Got to the boat, more like jumped into waist deep water rather than swimming, and found it was tangled up in a pile of old rope and lines. Izula came out and it was a struggle, but managed to cut it free. A bigger knife would have helped, but then I might have felt less secure with one in my hand being the waves were punching me about and such.
After getting the boat untangled, I then had to try and push it off shore, where the waves clearly pushed it up. Not fully beached, but it is a heavy beast of a boat. Couldn't directly push it out myself, but managed to rock it with the wave action. A found a couple of logs that I brought over to the boat and placed under the boat. Then as I rocked it with the wave, I'd wedge the logs under it with my feet. This helped enough to loosen it some.
Then we tied the post doc's boat to the corner of mine and he was pulling the back end out at the same time I was pushing the end out towards the water from the shore. This swung the back end enough to get my props in the water, after which I jumped in the boat and lowered the props just enough, started the boat and between my engines and the other boat pulling, we pulled her free. Phew, that was a lot of work!
So I get the boat back to the marina and temporarily tie the boat up with the line I brought. So it turns out my boat became stranded because of the actions of vandals
Yesterday, as I finished my sampling on the Detroit River for the day, I brought the boat back to the private slip at the back our institute. We don't normally dock the boat here because it has little shelter from the waves. My intent was to leave the boat there overnight and today come bring it back to its regular spot. Anyhow, I secured the boat at four points like I normally do, then added another line and finally as another security measure threw the anchor into the water with all of its rope out (50') into the water. I left the boat like this for overnight stays several times in the past and it was tied down very well.
When I looked at the rope lashings today, they were all burned off at the cleat including the anchor rope. Some bastard came on board and just burned off all the lines probably with a cigarette. I hope the burning rope gives him cancer Why would somebody do something like that? It clearly took them about 10 minutes to do. I just don't understand. I'm almost surprised, and happy, that they didn't torch the boat as there was enough gas in the tanks to douse the boat and set it off in flames. Fortunately, they were vandals that lacked initiative.
Anyhow, the Izula was put to good use today getting me out of a bind. I was also able to use it as a neck knife which I normally do not as I use it primarily for pocket carry. The versatility of this little knife to be used in neck, pocket or clipped to your belt loop is really great. Wearing a wet suit precluded most of those options except neck or some type of baldric style carry. So Plus One for keeping a neck knife handy for those unknown situations. Oh yeah, the guy who helped me. Had nothing but sandles and doesn't carry a knife. So if I didn't have my own, the boat would have been stuck there for sure.
Finally - a plug here for why keeping a bug out bag loaded up with stuff is such a great idea. In this case, I just grabbed my maxped. falcon II which already had work gloves, my RC-4, pliers, firekit (which wasn't used), first aid kit (which might have been needed) and paracord which was used for making the neck loop. I know I wasn't thinking all that clearly trying to race around with options on how to recover the boat. Being able to just grab the bug-out-bag and have an idea that it would contain most of what I would need really made my life much easier.
So how is your weekend shaping up?
However, it was up to me to recover the boat and the homeland security dudes where the boat was stranded were none too pleased about it. First, I had to scramble someone to help me - which isn't easy considering its a long weekend. Second I had to find another boat, which wasn't easy again given half the boats are in a lockup and nobody could find the key. My luck was in having a conversation with one of my graduate students that another Post Doc fellow had a boat and was actually planning on taking it out today. So I got his number and arranged to give him some rescue pay for his boat and labor.
We arrived at the scene which was about 4 km from where his boat was docked. It was unfortunately a much smaller boat than I would have hoped, but good enough. An old 20' with an engine that was 4 years younger than me. He assured me it would get us to our destination. On the way there, a thousand thoughts were running through my head and I wasn't as organized or clear of mind as I'd should be. I grabbed my maxpedition falcon II with all my PSK, towel, gloves etc in it, a wet suit, 50' of rope and my work boots. In my pocket was my izula like it usually is. I also had an RC-4 in my maxpedition.
We found the boat and it was grounded pretty good on the island. I put on my wetsuit, but instead of using booties, put my steel toe work boats on. It is an industrial site after all and there were lots of hazards, broken glass and metal shards near the shore. The neoprene wet suit offered pretty good protection for my legs, but no room for a belt knife. Thats where the Izula, worn in neck mode came in handy. I just clipped a carbiner through the centre hole at the bottom of the moulded sheath and fashined a paracord necklace.
Got to the boat, more like jumped into waist deep water rather than swimming, and found it was tangled up in a pile of old rope and lines. Izula came out and it was a struggle, but managed to cut it free. A bigger knife would have helped, but then I might have felt less secure with one in my hand being the waves were punching me about and such.
After getting the boat untangled, I then had to try and push it off shore, where the waves clearly pushed it up. Not fully beached, but it is a heavy beast of a boat. Couldn't directly push it out myself, but managed to rock it with the wave action. A found a couple of logs that I brought over to the boat and placed under the boat. Then as I rocked it with the wave, I'd wedge the logs under it with my feet. This helped enough to loosen it some.
Then we tied the post doc's boat to the corner of mine and he was pulling the back end out at the same time I was pushing the end out towards the water from the shore. This swung the back end enough to get my props in the water, after which I jumped in the boat and lowered the props just enough, started the boat and between my engines and the other boat pulling, we pulled her free. Phew, that was a lot of work!
So I get the boat back to the marina and temporarily tie the boat up with the line I brought. So it turns out my boat became stranded because of the actions of vandals
Yesterday, as I finished my sampling on the Detroit River for the day, I brought the boat back to the private slip at the back our institute. We don't normally dock the boat here because it has little shelter from the waves. My intent was to leave the boat there overnight and today come bring it back to its regular spot. Anyhow, I secured the boat at four points like I normally do, then added another line and finally as another security measure threw the anchor into the water with all of its rope out (50') into the water. I left the boat like this for overnight stays several times in the past and it was tied down very well. When I looked at the rope lashings today, they were all burned off at the cleat including the anchor rope. Some bastard came on board and just burned off all the lines probably with a cigarette. I hope the burning rope gives him cancer
Why would somebody do something like that? It clearly took them about 10 minutes to do. I just don't understand. I'm almost surprised, and happy, that they didn't torch the boat as there was enough gas in the tanks to douse the boat and set it off in flames. Fortunately, they were vandals that lacked initiative.Anyhow, the Izula was put to good use today getting me out of a bind. I was also able to use it as a neck knife which I normally do not as I use it primarily for pocket carry. The versatility of this little knife to be used in neck, pocket or clipped to your belt loop is really great. Wearing a wet suit precluded most of those options except neck or some type of baldric style carry. So Plus One for keeping a neck knife handy for those unknown situations. Oh yeah, the guy who helped me. Had nothing but sandles and doesn't carry a knife. So if I didn't have my own, the boat would have been stuck there for sure.
Finally - a plug here for why keeping a bug out bag loaded up with stuff is such a great idea. In this case, I just grabbed my maxped. falcon II which already had work gloves, my RC-4, pliers, firekit (which wasn't used), first aid kit (which might have been needed) and paracord which was used for making the neck loop. I know I wasn't thinking all that clearly trying to race around with options on how to recover the boat. Being able to just grab the bug-out-bag and have an idea that it would contain most of what I would need really made my life much easier.
So how is your weekend shaping up?
