| Author | Message | ||
     Captpete |
The Keystone Kops – Marine Division Last week I spent some time being entertained by a local traveling circus, and much to my surprise, The Keystone Kops stole the show. The following is my account of their act: I was at the north end of Agat Bay, southbound with three lines overboard and trolling at my maximum cruising speed of six knots, nearly a blazing seven miles per hour. It was midday, and the weather conditions were as good as it gets out here this time of year, with light easterly trade winds and a small swell wrapping around the island from the windward coast. The only thing that was missing were the fish, and I was fighting boredom as I navigated along the 60-fathom line, the preferred depth for my target species, which was wahoo, one of the fastest fish in the ocean. It was the last day of a two-day outing, and without even having had a strike, my level of preparedness had deteriorated drastically; my grungy fishing shorts were hanging on a hook in the deckhouse, my trusty deck knife was out of reach in its scabbard, which hung from the salt-cracked leather belt threaded through the loops of the old cut-off Levis. My deck boots stood empty on the deck beneath the shorts, and the risk of hooking up a fish with none of these accoutrements at hand was more than acceptable. I was wearing only my skivvies and flip-flops. If a 40-pound wahoo slammed into one of my lures at warp speed, I’d be happy to deal with the consequences in exchange for the comfort I was enjoying. I was standing at the wheel, and had just made a minor course correction to the autopilot, when I heard a siren, a common sound on land, but one that I’d never heard on the ocean before. My first thought was that its source was the marine VHF radio, and I stepped across the small deckhouse where my ear was close to the radio speaker. I heard it again, but through the other ear, and the only place left to look was outside the house. I exited through the open door at its aft end, stepped out onto the deck, and there was the siren, perched atop a small vessel trailing me off my starboard aft quarter. It all made sense when I saw the half-dozen flashing blue lights and the word POLICE boldly affixed to the side of the deckhouse of that classy little boat. She was brand new, all the aluminum she was constructed of still shiny and gleaming, and even her black inflatable bulwarks showing no effects of the tropical sun. She was no more than fifteen feet from me, and I could have easily conversed with any of her three crew at that distance. But that’s not how the conversation began. Instead, the helmsman keyed a microphone and a 2000-decible PA horn sent a shock wave roaring across my deck. The only thing that saved the hair from being blasted off the top of my head is the fact that there was none there to start with. “STOP YOUR BOAT,” it demanded, its voice dripping with authority - one that was accustomed to being obeyed instantly Stop my boat? I’ve been a commercial fishing captain for more than thirty years, and have been boarded more times than I could count during that period by both state and federal authorities, and it has never been demanded, or ever requested, that I stop my boat. The standard procedure is to bring her back to an idle, which I had done before my ears had stopped ringing. All my fishing vessels over the years have been designed for seaworthiness rather than speed, and this one was the same; I lacked the capability to outrun the proverbial one-armed paperhanger doing the backstroke. On top of that, I had fishing gear in the water, three trolling lines strung out 150 feet behind the boat. As soon as I stopped her, the light easterly breeze would cause me to drift over the trolling lines, possibly causing them to foul in the propeller or rudder. Since I had no equipment to match the decibels they were generating, I responded using sign language. I pointed to my trolling lines and then shrugged my shoulders with my palms raised, a gesture that is pretty universal, although my translation would have been, “Are you people idiots?” Maybe their translation was the same as mine, for their response seemed to come at me with an extra thousand decibels, if that even possible. “THIS IS THE GUAM POLICE DEPARTMENT,” the PA horn screamed! Ah, ha! That solved that dilemma. I had been thinking that perhaps this was the Chicago Police Department, or maybe even the one from Denver, which is even farther from any water. Denver actually made more sense, judging by the lack of seamanship skills I was seeing. The two crew other than the helmsman were both standing on the flush foredeck, and it was obvious that they hadn’t spent enough time on the water to have gained their sea legs yet: they stumbled about trying to maintain their balance. One in particular was having difficulties, as he kept one hand resting on the butt of his holstered sidearm. I must have looked pretty fearsome to him, a 66 year-old man standing on the deck in flip-flops and skivvies. I said a little prayer, asking God to please not let him pull that thing out of the holster. Since Dewey and I were the targets, we would probably be in the safety zone, but I could easily picture him sinking their vessel as he blasted holes through his own deck and down through the bottom of their little craft, maybe shooting himself in the foot in the process, or even blowing one of his cohorts off the deck. All this flashed through my mind in an instant, as there was no lull in the stream of sound waves blaring across my deck. “WHEN YOU SEE THE BLUE LIGHTS FLASHING, YOU STOP YOUR BOAT! IT DOESN’T MATTER IF YOU ARE FISHING OR NOT. FLASHING BLUE LIGHTS MEANS STOP YOUR BOAT IMMEDIATELY!” Now, I got it. It was just like driving down Marine Drive. Blue lights – pull over and stop the vehicle. Yep, I had the whole picture. I seemed to remember something a while back when the GPD got this cool little boat these guys were driving. I’m not certain about this, but I think the Feds gave it to them. Something about Homeland Security, and there was a big political ceremony when they took possession. This was a serious little pursuit craft, and as I looked at it through my mariner’s eye, I saw lots of dollar signs. Certainly not something that GovGuam could ever spring for without curtailing some serious graft in their ongoing employee entitlement program. I’ve no doubt that when it came time to crew her up, they were selected by the usual good-old-boy method, and handed an attaboy slap on the back, along with the keys. Yep, I got it, all right. The circus was about to begin. There was another blast from the loud speaker. “DO YOU HAVE A RADIO,” it asked? I nodded my head in the affirmative. “WHAT CHANNEL ARE YOU ON,” it continued? I cupped my hands around my mouth, and cleared my throat in preparation to continue this 15-foot conversation. “SIXTEEN,” I screamed at the top of my lungs, but of course, my reply was pitiful compared to 2000 decibels. What I didn’t scream was, “Sixteen, the international hailing and distress channel, you moron. What channel did you call me on?” There is a lull in our conversation. I wonder if we are going to continue on channel sixteen. I hope so. I’d like the Coast Guard to listen in on the rest of this jack-assery. But it is not to be. “PREPARE TO BE BOARDED,” the PA system blasts at me. Right out of the Pirates of the Caribbean. I’ll tell you for sure I had to bite my tongue on that one. Lying dead in the water, drifting across my trolling lines, and standing on the back deck in my skivvies. “What sort of preparations would you like me to make? Hors d'ouvres on the poop deck? Get my fife out and pipe y’all aboard?” But this was the Guam Police Department. The same one that had an intoxicated man cornered in the middle of a large field at one of the cemeteries lately, and shot him ten times because they thought maybe he had a gun. One small byline in the local newspaper, and that was that. Never mentioned again that I’m aware of. Yep, I had to bite my tongue, but it was easy. There’s a reason vessels are boarded while under way. They maintain a steady course, the boarding vessel matches that speed, pulls alongside and the boarding party climbs aboard. Easy, peasy. But not this time. My little Alaskan steel trawler is equipped with 40-foot outriggers, which are lowered after she leaves the dock, and then stick out from each side of the boat. Great for trolling. Pretty handy for the circus style boarding, too. The police helmsman makes a couple of confusing turns and then decides that he will board me by coming alongside on my starboard side. He gets in position behind me, and then begins his approach. I have no idea what this guy is thinking at this point. His approach looks pretty good to start with. His bow comes even with my stern, and he continues up along my side. His bow makes it to amidships, just beneath my outrigger, and had he stopped right there, he would have been in position for a reasonable boarding. Had he misjudged a little, the inflatable side of his craft would have acted like a fender, he would have bounced away from me a little, and his crew would still be in position to hand me a line. But of course, no crewman has a line. I guess that isn’t the plan. I think the plan is every man for himself. Get close, and scramble aboard. But the helmsman doesn’t stop. He just keeps driving up my side until the two guys on the foredeck start screaming at him because their antennas are being bent in half by my outrigger, and all those flashing blue lights and siren, and the top of their house are framming and banging on the underside of the outrigger, and the trolling line they insisted I leave overboard is getting tangled with some other part of their boat that is sticking out. Man, this is classic. I’d go for my camera if I weren’t so afraid of getting shot. So I just relax, leaning against the longline reel, and enjoy the entertainment. The extraction process gets even better. It becomes apparent that the big boss is one of the guys on the foredeck, and he is getting pissed at the guy doing the driving. The more he screams at him, the more shook the helmsman becomes, and the tangle gets worse before it begins to get better. But they finally break away, and the boss man has had enough of that incompetence. He banishes the helmsman to the foredeck and takes the helm to do the driving himself. He has a better plan. Before I continue, I should say a little about how their vessel was constructed. As I mentioned, her sides were inflatable, but she was actually built of aluminum. Up toward the bow, where the hull was getting narrow, the inflatable section stopped and was replaced by what appeared to be aluminum pipe the same diameter as the inflatable area, twenty inches, or maybe more. But before the bow came to a point, it was squared off, using that same big aluminum pipe, leaving her with a blunt nose about three feet across. She was flush decked about eight feet back from that snub nose, and that’s where the crewmembers had been dancing around, trying to remain upright. So here she comes with the boss man at the helm, like she’s going to ram me in the side, except he’s aiming at the bow. He’s going to nose up to me bow first, and the boys are going to climb aboard from there. Now, this is going to be good. My little fishing boat has a high flared bow, and her rails up there are easily eight feet above the water, maybe closer to ten. And the bulwarks are right at a couple feet (that’s the distance from the rail back down to the deck). These guys are going to need pogo sticks to get up over the rail and down to the deck. I push away from the longline reel I have been relaxing against and take a seat on the rail amidships. I don’t want to miss any of this. I’m starting to get some idea what that guy on the loud speaker was talking about when he told me to prepare to be boarded. So here they come, the one guy with his hand still on his pistol butt. Because of my flared bow, and the curve of the hull as the bow comes to a point, there is a point where I lose visibility of their bow during the approach. But I damn sure feel it and hear it. KA-BAM! The boss man rams me in the bow. And in spite of my best attempts to repress it, a smile creeps onto my face as I think about that aluminum coming up against this little over-built steel boat who’s purpose was to take any weather that fishing in the Bering Sea during winter could hand her. Maybe there would be a scratch in her paint. A demolition derby with that hundred thou or more worth of aluminum? Bring it on, Boss Man. I light a cigarette. They back away, and the foredeck crew are still on their feet. Or, maybe back on their feet. But the pistol guy has forgotten all about his sidearm, and is scrambling back to the house, where he ducks inside. Moments later, he reappears, donning a life jacket. When he makes it back to the foredeck, his partner up there sees why he had left, evidently thinks that was a pretty good idea, and he scrambles back to the house to get himself one of those orange gizmos too. And they are ready for round two. This time the boss man tries something a little different. Same plan, but different end. And here they come at me broadside again, this time aiming at my stern. I guess the boss man has never attended an AA meeting where they talk about doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results. KA-BAM! They ram my stern. But this time, the rail is much lower, and the two guys on the foredeck steady themselves for the impact by hanging onto my rail. When you’ve done this boat stuff as long as I have, you get to where you can see most of these kinds of things coming way before they happen. Maybe that’s part of what seamanship is all about. When you see it coming, you can avoid a lot of it. And at this point, I am already thinking about how I am going to go about fishing one or both of those foredeck guys out of the water. If what I am anticipating happens, most likely they will end up in the water, but not injured, and the first thing they will need will be a secured line to hang onto. They could share one line, but one of them is wearing combat boots along with his shorts, and he is the one I am going to have to get the line to first. The other guy is wearing practical, lightweight wading shoes, and could tread water until I have the first guy hooked up. I turn my head to the port side for an instant where I have various lines stowed, choose the one I would use, and get back to watching the show. I know what might happen, and if it does, I have a plan. That is as far as I need to go for the present. If one of them is injured while going overboard, the plan will start out the same, with a secured line overboard. After that, I will have to improvise and adapt. But I have years of experience to guide me, and the time while getting the line to modify the plan. It is close, but it doesn’t happen. What I was anticipating was that the boss man would back away so quickly that the two guys couldn’t disengage from their weight-forward positions while holding onto my rail. They would end up in the classic predicament of having their feet on the boat and their hands on the dock as the boat pulled away from the dock. They’d never make it to horizontal before something got wet. As I said, it is close… but no cigar. (Damn!) DING! End of round two. And as the old saying proclaims, the third time’s the charm. This time the boss man goes for the old T-bone, and comes at me amidships, right beneath my outrigger. The outriggers leave the side of the boat at something a bit less than a 45-degree angle, so they have plenty of clearance as they pass beneath the outboard end. This was the boss man’s best plan, but provided no diminishment of the circus atmosphere in its execution. As he gets close to the side of the boat, the outrigger comes within grasping distance of his foredeck crew, and they are able to take hold of it and guide the bow to the side of the boat. The only problem is that I have three of four lines that run out to various places on the outrigger, and they all hang slack when not being used. And there is that pesky trolling line that they insisted I leave overboard, as well. The lines all join together in a nearly successful attempt to hog-tie the boarding crew by the time their bow bangs into the side my boat. No big jolt this time. Just a little smack as the two boats make contact… and then a bunch of crunching and grinding as the light swells cause my boat to roll and their bow to pitch up and down. On each pitch up, their bow smashes into the big steel stabilizer, weighted at one end with about thirty pounds of lead, which is stowed hanging from the base of the outrigger. Crunch, grind, crunch, BAM, crunch, grind, crunch, BAM, as the two guys try to get untangled from all the lines, and not get beaned by the outrigger each time their bow pitches up; and then occasionally a BIG BAM when my boat rolls to starboard at the same time theirs pitches up, and my outrigger slams down onto the top of their house. But soon they’re coming over the rail, and the boss man has managed to back away from us. “Does your dog bite,” one of them asks? “Only on command,” I reply, before I am even aware the words are coming out of my mouth. But I remember that guy with the ten bullet holes in him that they buried a month or two ago, and give them a big smile so that they know I was kidding. “I’ll tie him up, if y’all would be more comfortable,” I tell them, and before they can answer I start toward the house to get Dewey’s lead. First, they request some ID and the boat’s papers. Standard procedure. But her documentation papers are throwing them for a loop. They take turns pointing to various places on the document and discussing it in quiet voices that I’m not privy to. I can’t stand it any longer. “Y’all are familiar with Federal Documentation Papers, right,” I ask? Oh, yes, of course. See ‘em twenty or thirty times a day. They didn’t have a clue what they were looking at. Had this occurred on the mainland, where the local police have no jurisdiction aboard documented fishing vessels, I would have refused their boarding and immediately called the Coast Guard on the radio, requesting assistance. But this is Guam, not the mainland. Lethal Force Capital of the USA. (They shot and killed another guy recently because he wouldn’t surrender his penknife.) So, I wait patiently. And finally, they direct their attention my way and one of them asks, “Have you registered this boat on Guam?” I’m sure he had visions of out-of-state vehicle license plates dancing through his head, as the hailing port on my transom is in Florida. “No,” I reply. “This vessel is a documented fishing vessel, registered with the Federal Government. You don’t see that on her papers?” No one answers. They look at her papers for another minute or two without speaking to one another, and then hand them back to me. And then one explains to me that they are concerned that I might be smuggling aliens (read Chinese) onto the island from Saipan, 125 miles north of here, and that they want to search my boat. Now I know what the deal is, and I take charge. To the one nearest me, I ask, “Would you like to inspect the lazarette?” “Yes,” he answers. I step into the house and retrieve the lazarette deck plate wrench from where it is stowed, and run smack into him as I turn to come back out of the house. He had followed me into the house, thinking that we were on our way to the lazarette. He is playing his part exactly as if I had handed him a script before we began this little play. The next line is mine. “Do you know what a lazarette is,” I ask him? “No,” he replies, a little sheepishly. “C’mon,” I tell him, a smile on my face and the big wrench dangling from my hand. “I’ll show you.” I lead him to the very aft portion of the deck, and punch the hexagonal end of the wrench into the socket of the deck plate located there. I turn the wrench counter-clockwise a couple of turns until I hear the dogs fetch up against the housing, lay the wrench aside, and withdraw the deck plate from the big oval-shaped housing, revealing all the innards of the hydraulic steering and rudder stock. He gets down on hands and knees, and assures himself there are no Chinamen hiding below. But his partner is not so easily fooled; naturally, I would take them to a space that is a Chinaman-free zone. He is eying my fish box on deck suspiciously, the one that is sadly void of fish at the moment. Why not? Chinese contortionists want to get to the good old USA as much as anyone else. He lifts the lid and takes a peek. No joy there – for either of us. “No fish,” he asks me? “No trolling fish,” I tell him. “But you ought to see the gadao I caught on Rota Banks up north yesterday. It’s got to be a record.” And that was the truth. And I figure it is smart to show them something that has scales on it. I lead them to a smaller deck cooler, where we poke through the smattering of bottom fish that I had caught the previous day. And then back to the fish hold hatch cover, where they peer down into a space that would hold two or three-dozen Chinamen, packed loosely. And that is that. They not only forget to check the engine room, but fail to even consider the bunkroom up in the forepeak where a dozen Chinamen could fit, some reclining comfortably on mattresses. They tell me to have a nice day, and motion for the boss man to come pick them up. I keep my mouth shut, and wonder how badly my trolling lines are fouled beneath the boat. All that is left to do is for them to get back on their own vessel and leave. But the show isn’t over yet. The boss man is lining up for one more broadside shot at the stern. He comes in too hot again, and KA-BAM! Another ramming. I sit down on a cooler and light another cigarette. The boarding crew backs onto the safety of my deck, and waits. Another slam, crunch, and grind contact, and one of the guys goes for it, nearly busting his ass as he hits the foredeck. I can see the apprehension building in the last guys face as he watches his partner barely make it across. Three more crunch and grinders before he gets up the nerve to give it a whirl. But he makes it across safely, and they are soon zooming off across the briny blue in that cool little boat with its newly acquired battle scars. I started out on this adventure full of the ill will that arrogant loudspeaker had pounded into me. But as it unfolded, about the time of the lazarette exchange, I began to realize these guys weren’t the ones at fault. It was the jerk who had handed them the keys to that fine little vessel with no training to go along with it. He needs to be the one I contemplate as I puff on my cigarette, deciding when the time will be right to throw a line across his shoulder. I hope that crew gets it figured out before they hurt or shoot one another. (Message edited by captpete on December 28, 2007) | ||
| Jb2 |
Capt. - Good to see your name pop up. Ping me and let me know where I might reach you via snail-mail. Great read too as always. So when can we buy your book in stores? JB2 | ||
| Reepicheep |
I live for these stories Cap! Great to see another installment. I've already got one badwebber book on the shelf (the Harley Davidson book with the Steve Anderson chapter). I've got spots reserved for Court, Dave Gess, Danger Dave, and You as well. Get to work boys!  | ||
| Court |
My day is made! Good to hear from you Capt'n ! | ||
| Blake |
Great story Captain. You sure have a good attitude. | ||
| Smiley1eye |
As a former sailor, that held special enjoyment for me. Just great. Wonder if all those "atta-boy's & backslaps" will keep em on that boat when the boss sees what they did to it?  | ||
| Road_thing |
I must have looked pretty fearsome to him, a 66 year-old man standing on the deck in flip-flops and skivvies. Well, hell, can you blame him? Great stuff, Pete! Maybe you need a bosun's pipe and some white gloves for the next time...  rt | ||
| Rotzaruck |
Thanks for the tale Cap!! I just wish you'd gone ahead , taken your life in your hands and managed to get that camera. The telling conjured up some pretty good images though. No fish, no Chinamen--good thing you got a free show!! Rotzaruck!! | ||
| Captpete |
So when can we buy your book in stores? It's gonna be a while if I don't get back to work on it, Jim. I'm half-way through the first draft, if it comes in @ 500 pages. More if it's less. Or maybe not. The circular file cabinate will probably claim a bunch. Just too damned tired at the day's end to fool with it. (The final push in this research for the last volume is taking its toll.)  You sure have a good attitude. Blake... you need to learn to control the sarcasm on this public forum.  Get to work boys! Patience, Reep. Great works are not wrought in the blink of an eye. | ||
| Court |
aye aye | ||
| Oldog |
Thanks Cap'n I too want a copy when you go to print... | ||
| Captpete |
aye aye | ||
| G234146 |
First time I read one of your stories Capt. Great Stuff!  | ||
| Bluzm2 |
Capt. Pete, That made my day! It's been a really crappy couple of weeks in the cube farm and I really needed something like that. What part of Guam are you on? If you see my son go by on the USS Pasadena (big honkin submarine....) give him a wave from the old man.. Actually, he just left there last Thursday. Probably be back in a month or so. I can't wait to read your book or more stories, they are the best.. You just can't make this stuff up, it's too real! Thanks tons for sharing with us land lubbers. Brad | ||
| Captpete |
I'm in Agat, Brad. Tell your son to look me up when he gets in off his cruise. My little piss pot fishing boat is tied up right behind Jan Z's @ Agat marina. (He'll know where that is if he's spent any time on the hill here.) He can't miss her; she's a 40-foot steel Alaskan trawler, and if he's sittin' at the bar, all he has to do is look out the window. Tell him to buy me a beer. I'm too poor to even sniff one on my own these days. I'm glad y'all enjoyed my scribbling. I still shake my head in disbelief when I think about that day. Capt. Pete | ||
| Mikej |
I can just see the next story to come: CaptPete: "There I was running a deep line when the line went tight. Figured I'd snagged the bottom on something. Line finally let loose but felt a little heavy. Pulled the line in and found some sort of netting attached to the end. Opened up the netting and inside was a bottle of beer with a hand written note that said BluzM2 said to say hi and that you might be thirsty. About then I look off the stern and see a periscope peeking up over the transom at me. Then just as quick as that it was gone." Yep, I can see it now. | ||
| Iamike |
Mikej- Now that is funny! | ||
| Captpete |
That would be cool for sure, Mikej, but in all honesty, I'd prefer it to be one of those stomp the hatches closed stories. But your little scenario makes me wonder: did they have a pretty good harvest up your way this year?  Capt Pete | ||
| Reepicheep |
You could probably catch a lot of fish with a nuclear sub... once... | ||
| Captpete |
I was about to take umbrage, Reep, until I scrolled down to the end of your post. Then I spat coffee all over the pilot house windows. Thanks, buddy. I'll be watching the mail for your box of handy wipes. | ||
| Bluzm2 |
Too funny! I'll pass the info on to Carl. Not sure when he'll get it though. Sounded like they were going to be gone a while... Here's a few pictures he sent just before they left Guam on Tuesday of last week. My wife hasn't even seen them yet, I did up a picture frame and custom mat for her. She'll see them tomorrow.    Merry Christmas all. Brad | ||
| Iamike |
Brad- Pete may not let you drive his boat but maybe Carl could make arrangements so that you could drive his, or at least shoot a torpedo. A picture like that must make a father pretty proud! | ||
| Captpete |
A picture like that must make a father pretty proud! Roger That! Half my bad dreams involve sinking boats. My hat's off to anyone who rides around in one that's already sunk! Not to mention the torpedo thing. Capt Pete | ||
| Bluzm2 |
Thanks guys, I didn't mean to hijack this thread.. However, he really does put a smile on the old mans face. BTW, the two green cylinders in the last picture are "fish" of the VERY DANGEROUS variety. Their bite is quite fatal. Merry Christmas to all from the frozen tundra of MN. Brad | ||
| Captpete |
Hijack, Smijack! Merry Christmas Capt. Pete | ||
| Skyclad |
Pete, Regarding riding around in a boat that has already sunk, think about it this way. Subs are designed to come back up; you only get to sink your boat once... Skyclad (former bubble-head) | ||
| Captpete |
Subs are designed to come back up; Gubment propaganda. You think they'd ever find a crew if they didn't tell you that? Seriously, human error is always lurking. One of them ran into the southern banks here (my fishing grounds) a couple of years ago while submerged. It came back up, with one fatality and a bunch of injuries. But, it did come back up; a testament to its design. I just don't understand how that happened. I know those banks intimately, having spent hundreds of hours surveying them, and have all the depth curves stored on the boat's computer. And I'm just one guy in a little piss-pot fishing boat. Could I possibly know something that they didn't know? Seems unlikely. I sure wish I knew where and at what depth they ran aground. Another scenario is that there's another bank down there that no one knew about. If so, it's full of fish that are dying of old age. Capt Pete | ||
| Jackbequick |
The USS San Francisco apparently struck an uncharted sea mount while running at flank speed and at a depth of about 525 feet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_San_Francisco_%28 SSN-711%29 That boat weighs about 6,900 tons and, as a pure guess, flank speed is probably 40 knots of more. The damage was extensive to say the least: http://navysite.de/ssn/images/ssn711acc2.jpg I got no submarine time but if it was running with passive sonar (listening, not radiating) there would have been little or nothing to warn of the presence of the sea mount. People were fired and punished, I'm sure there must have been some amount of human error involved. It is a sad thing for all... Jack | ||
| Captpete |
Thanks for the links, Jack. I'd seen the pics taken in drydock here in Guam. But I never knew where they ran aground. It's right at 300 nautical miles south of here, which put them around the northern atolls in Micronesia. I wonder why they'd be running passively at flank speed at nearly 100 fathoms? I've spent a good bit of time perusing the public domain 2-minute bathy grid looking for something like they hit, but a little closer to Guam. There are a bunch of rumors about a lost bank about 75 miles south of here, and I'd sure like to find it if it exists. But there are cautions that the database is not that accurate in shallow water, whatever that means. I do know that it shows the banks that I fish as being a lot deeper than they really are. Knowing that, I have investigated some seamounts that are shown as being 1300 fathoms in hopes that they would actually be shallower, but have had no success. My deep-water bottom machine is on the fritz, I can't afford to fix it, and my little one loses the bottom around 500 fathoms. As a consequence I never saw a thing. But I set a few vertical longlines anyway, in hopes that there might have been some tuna hanging around in +/- 100 fathoms, but no joy on that effort. I've always assumed that the government had a bathy database that was much more accurate that what's available to the public, but maybe not. We need better satellites. Capt. Pete | ||
| Jackbequick |
One of those links mentioned them having a SEAL team on board that had arrived shortly before the accident, I suppose they were doing some kind of training that either got out of hand and/or that someone just made a error in judgment. Active sonar could have helped or warned them, even at that speed, but it is not in the nature of either submarines or special ops to run around making a lot of noise. And I suppose they were doing things that have to be learned or practiced. I spent about four years around and working in support of the special ops guys while I was in the Navy. I consider it a wonderful thing that we have the capabilities, however unknown to most, that we have there. But developing capabilities and tactics was hard dangerous work and things got broken and people got hurt. And people died in training accidents more regularly than I care to even think about or remember. My work was in intel more than navigation but we always had access to almost anything that was available when we wanted charts and mapping. But non-availability of adequate mapping could be a major problem. The Grenada rescue went down mostly with a hodge podge collection of auto and tourist maps. The satellites are getting better I guess it takes a really good hydrographic ship to nail down the details in the vast open ocean areas. That takes a lot of time and money and we don't have anywhere near the number of hydrographic vessels we used to have. There are some sea mounts near or along the routes I run regularly for deliveries up here in the Northeast. Places that may be only half the ambient depth or even less. As long as I have plenty of water to play with, sometimes out of boredom I'll tweak the autopilot and try to pass directly over the summits. But I always have a lot of water left beneath me. I am Mister Conservative when I'm delivering boats I don't own and can't afford to fix much less buy. Did you get your boat to Guam over the water? Boy, that would be heck of a trip. I make it about 3,900 NM from Guam to Honolulu and then another 2,300 to San Diego. Jack |
