AGROUND

The events of May 31 to June 1, 2002

By Matt Davis

[The Son-in-law of Dr. Robert E. Plucker]

First off, you need to understand that I hate sailboats, especially white sailboats.    And that’s why I erased the rock from Bob’s charts when I knew he was heading to Sullivan for the night. Alas, some plans are destined to fail.

A year after Greta's grounding, John went back to the site and took this photo of the rock in question.
He very graciously sent it to me so I could use it here.

Holly had just started to re-alphabetize the books and I was settling down on the couch with my laptop to check the news.

Then the phone rang and Davy Gross the harbor master was on the line.  Sweat started to bead up on my forehead. My first thought was, “Oh, no.  He wants me to get my trailer out of his yard, and I still don’t have an air pump, or a jack.”  I was a bit relieved when all he had to say was that Bob and John had run aground in the Greta. 

That was a close one. 

He added that the Fjordland and a few other boats had talked to him and that they were in no immediate danger.  Holly was very worried.

Holly and I headed straight to the Haines boat harbor, and to the Windbreaker to look at the tide-book.  It was seven when we’d gotten the call, so our first concern was for the height and time of the next tide.  After seeing that Friday evening’s tide was 14.1 feet and Saturday’s morning tide was 14.4 feet, we knew they’d have an additional 0.3 feet of water on the next high tide; we breathed a sigh of relief.  Thank goodness it wasn’t an 18 foot high tide they’d run aground in, or they’d be stuck on the rock until the 23^rd of June.  If that’d been the case, they could possibly have been in very dire straights, as the bi-daily rising and falling of the tide would leave ample time for the boat to be dashed on the rocks.  Immediately, Holly wanted to know the exact time they’d gone up on the rock.

Matt Davis' fishing boat "Windbreaker"

We got on the VHF, “Greta, this is the Windbreaker.  Greta, this is still the Windbreaker.” We switched to channel 12.  I really wanted to take the boat out for a spin and needed a distraction, so I was eager to head out.  Holly definitely wanted to go too, because she’s always ready for a fun-trip.  The next high tide was going to be at 5:32 am, so we had plenty of time to get there and take a picture for the paper, offer some moral support, perhaps give them a brush to scrub the underside of the boat, then get back to town by 9 am for the Saturday morning garage sale rush.  We made a quick decision to head down to Sullivan.  I offered Bob, “Do you want us to bring down some Root Beer and chips?”  He declined, without even a hint of a smile in his voice and we said we’d be leaving town within the hour and would see them shortly thereafter.  I forgot to ask about the exact time they’d run aground.

We needed sleeping bags; Holly needed her contact supplies.  The boat was fueled up and ready to go.  We didn’t bother with any extra food, but brought along the radar, the chart-plotting GPS, and the binoculars, so we could get set up to navigate in case it got foggy or otherwise nasty. 

As we headed out of the harbor it was getting dark, black clouds were starting to pour over the eastern mountains and it was starting to rain.  We passed by what looked like a commercial charter boat at the transient dock with the owner and his family aboard.  He opened the window and flagged us down.  Concerned, I started to pull alongside to hear him out. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Oh, nothing.” He said, “I’ve been listening to the VHF and I was just wondering, are you Matt?”

“Yes.” I said.  “Has anything else happened?”

“No.  But good luck out there.  I’m going to stay tuned in.”

“Thanks,” I yelled back.  And we headed on out of the harbor.

With all the local people listening in on VHF channel 16, and with all the scanners out and about, I didn’t want to call Bob and John every time we rounded a new corner, pulled in a dock line, or used the bathroom, so I decided just to call him when we got past Seduction Point, if all went well.

Holly was very brave of course.  I hadn’t thought about it at all until I noticed we were both being drenched as we plowed along into the small waves that seemed to be growing by the minute.  I looked down at her on her cushion as we motored along and said, “You’re really brave.  You know that?”

She smiled up at me nodding her head, “Yup!”

“The weather’s not too great out here.  Did you notice those clouds?”  I pointed off to the southeast.  “As a matter of fact I can’t imagine a worse night for this type of a trip.”

 “Oh, I can.” She said.  “We could have a strong south wind with pouring rain.  It could be pitch black or foggy too, like when we went fishing on that Sunday in September.  This isn’t so bad.  This is wonderful.  I like being out on the water.  It reminds me of when I was a girl and we’d go out in the sailboat.  I Like that.”

“Hmmm.  I guess you’re right.” I said

“Yup.  It’s perfect.  I’m not worried at all.  Lots of expecting mothers would be staying at home, ‘I’m not going out there with my baby! I’m staying right here where it’s warm and safe.’ But for me, I’m not afraid of the water at all.  The boat is safe, the water is reasonably calm.  They’ll be glad to see us.  It’s going to be a great trip.”  She smiled again.

Then I thought to myself, “Yes, Life is good.   It’s at times like these when things could be dark and morbid, that I look at Holly and ask her what she thinks.  She smiles and talks for a while, then again I think to myself, ‘Matt: You’re a lucky man.  She’s a special girl, with a neat family.  Keep her happy Matt, just keeeeeeeeeeeeeepppppppp her happy.’  Life is amazing.  We go for MONTHS at a time and when we look back, it’s all a blur; same old, same old.  Then BOOM, something happens and you know you’ll remember it forever.  Good or bad, you’ll never forget it.

We got to the boat around 11 pm. And it was so dark we could barely see any of the details of the hull. But what we could see looked very, very sad.  Here was Bob’s beautiful sailboat up on the rocks, and from where we were at a very low tide like it was quite far out of the water.  Looking up at Greta on the rock like that, we couldn’t help think to ourselves, “What in the world were they thinking getting up on the rocks like that?  Look at all that beach and all those rocks.  Look at the angle of the boat; the angle of the mast.  Wow.  What were they thinking?” 

We asked them where we should spend the night and they explained how to get to the place they’d been trying to get to. So we went there to anchor up. We found a nice safe semi-secluded spot on a gravel beach in about 24 feet of water.  I dropped the anchor and we decided to get back to them at about 4 am. 

At about 12:30 AM I heard a loud BOOM or a CLANG.  I was instantly awake and soon up out of bead, out of the v-berth, and looking around out the windows in the cabin.  Afraid that we’d run aground too, I quickly realized the chances of that were slim, as the tide would be rising now, instead of falling; the low tide being at 12:06 am.  I jumped up and down, like I’d learned to do when the boat was on the grid, to see if we were floating. It bounced reassuringly.  I’d tied the anchor securely.  Checking the radar, our position relative to the shore hadn’t changed.  The soft rain was still tinkling on the boat.  It was peaceful and nice.  I relaxed.  Then I remembered that I’d left the bucket off of the exhaust so I donned my boots and climbed up to the mast to replace the bucket and keep out the rain.

The alarm on my wristwatch hanging from the electrical panel in the starboard v-berth blared annoyingly at 3:30 am for twenty seconds, 40 bleeps.  I counted them like I always do, I counted 38, so it had taken me a second to become alert.  Then I woke up Holly.  She saw the bright diffuse morning light pouring in the cabin windows and was quickly alarmed and alert. “Matt, Matt, what time is it?  Are we too late.  Have we slept too long?”

            I hadn’t rolled over or opened my eyes or touched my watch or done anything but wonder, how was it that I came to think this was going to be an enjoyable trip, heading out away from town like this.  Without opening my eyes or pulling my head from the bag I said, “It’s 3:30.  Why did we have to get up two hours before high tide, if it only takes 45 minutes to get down there?  I want to sleep till 4:15.”

            She was out of bed looking around out the cabin windows.  “No, no, no.  We need to go right now.  They’re probably already awake, wondering where we are.  Let’s get down there right away.  Are you sure it’s not 7:30?  What if we missed them?”

            I rolled over, and without opening my eyes reached out of the bag and unclasped my watch from the wires.  Looking at the watch, I said, “3:31.  Do we really have to get up?”

            “Yes, Yes, Yes!  Let’s go.  Let’s go.  Pull up the anchor.”  She was already getting out the cereal to eat some breakfast.  “Pull up the anchor!”  I crawled out of bed.

The morning was bright and clear with friendly little tufts of fog and clouds on the nearby mountains, the dark ominous clouds of yester-night were gone, the water was as calm as a street puddle in the rain; millions of drops forming concentric expanding circles on the grey surface.  The sound of the nearby waterfall was steadily droning on into the still crisp morning air blending with the rain tapping on the cabin roof.  Out on the deck, at 3:50 am, with the anchor up, the boat running smoothly, and rain gear bundled all around us, we headed south again to see what there was to see.

At the first glimpse of the Greta I cut our speed down to a near idle; Holly and I were astonished at how far it was from the beach and from any appearance of rocks.  The thought came to mind.  ‘What in the world is that rock doing out here in all this water?‘ 

On closer inspection, the mast was still at quite an angle.  Getting out the binoculars, I could see that no one was visibly up and about. 

Then our own wake hit us. Being nearly at a standstill, we began to bounce around quite a bit.  I thought about calling Bob and John on the VHF right then, but decided against it.  They’d deduce it was our wake as soon as it hit them. Who else’s wake could it be at 4:20 am, after all?

Then our wake hit the Greta.  We were quite alarmed!  The mast started to rise and fall dramatically against the mountain, time and time again.  Holly grabbed my arm, “Look what we did to them, they’re starting to sink!  Look at the mast!  It’s going down with each wave.” She got quiet.  “It’s getting lower and lower.”  A bit taken aback, I looked at the mast.  Sure enough, she was right; the Greta was sinking deeper with each bounce.

I said, at nearly a whisper, “Do you think we should call them now?” Holly was silent.  Then I thought better of it.  “No.  Let’s not bother them now; they’re busy enough as it is.  Going down that fast, they’re surely in a panic over there. Let’s hope they find that damned leak.  They must be going crazy over there…”

“Yeah, just leave them be for now.”

After a few minutes of morbid silence, I looked at the hull, rather than the mast.  We’d moved on down-current of them quite a bit, and the hull was still fully visible.  “You know,” I said in a quiet tone, “maybe it’s just an optical illusion, or a geometric illusion… or whatever?”  Picking up the binoculars again, I was sure.  “Yeah, we’ve just been pulled along by this tidal current.  They’re not sinking at all.  It’s just the mast and the mountains playing tricks on our perception.”  Thank goodness.

Soon after that, we relaxed and hailed them on 16, then switched to 12. 

My first concern was to NOT get on the rocks myself. So I gingerly floated up next to them with my eye on the fish finder and Holly’s eye on the fathometer in the cabin as a back-up.  John and Bob told us that the rock was almost entirely to their starboard side, and that they wanted to be pulled off stern first, rather than by going forward.  Making a quick mental note, I backed away from them and got on their port side.  Then we pulled away and started doing an informal ‘chart’ of the waters nearby, in attempt to find a safe route of egress, and also to get used to the current in the water.  If what they said was true, we’d have to be careful about maneuvering around them and about pulling them off the rock because the current would naturally want to pull us directly onto the rock.

After about 35 minutes of exploring the nearby waters with the sounders, it was clear, with John and Bob standing on the deck with ropes in hand appealing to us to come near enough to throw a line, that there would be no waiting for the high tide.  They wanted us to start pulling right away.  They wanted a line thrown now.  They wanted us pulling on them steadily.  No more fussing around.

It took John three tosses for Holly to get the line, then about eight failed tugs to get the job done.  It was necessary to set up a quick way to change cleats in order to steer the Windbreaker, and John came up with a quick method that we wound up using.  After that, it was all fairly simple.  We steered the boat with the rope and the cleats and the current, until we were straight off the Greta’s aft then gave a quick hard burst of the throttle to the Cummins diesel.  The combined efforts of the Greta’s engine and the Windbreaker’s, along with the rising tide, all worked together to haul them free. 

It was a wonderful site to see John and Bob, smiling with hands in the air, and victorious hollers all around, as she came off the rock.  I kept pulling them for a few minutes at quite a high rate. And I had no intention of slowing down until we were all safe and back in the main channel.  Shortly, Bob started yelling for me to slow down, and John announced he was unhooking the line.  They didn’t need me anymore, they claimed.  Holly pulled in the line very quickly so that it wouldn’t wind up in the props, and we were off for home.

Photos by Jean E. Straatmeyer and John Plucker