The Danger of the Sea and the Violence of the Wind
by Published on 3rd January 2021 04:32 PM
I read with great interest the article on the sinking of the MV Pool Fisher in 1979. A tragic and upsetting event for all those involved in the incident. That story prompted me to write this article. Not that I have ever had to abandon a ship in danger of sinking, however, I have known the fear of being on a ship in danger of foundering at sea. And as they say, ‘there but for the grace of God go I’
MT Velia. FD116 GRT296
I was sailing on the trawler Velia with Skipper John Dunn, a Fleetwood ‘Top Skipper’, on our way north from Fleetwood to the Iceland fishing grounds. As we cleared the Outer Hebrides heading into the open ocean, the weather, that had been freshening since leaving the Lune Deep buoy behind, took a turn for the worse with winds increasing to around gale force 8 to severe gale force 9. The Atlantic swell growing higher, longer, and more fearsome. I think waves have a maximum height in such winds of around 35 to 40 feet, correct me if I’m wrong, but the waves in front of us were pretty big. The Velia literally climbing up the waves from the trough to the crest and not crashing through them. The occasional rogue wave hitting the middle-distance trawler seemed to be coming from the east, starboard to port, rather than from the Atlantic. There were three of us in the wheelhouse, the skipper, the helmsman, and myself the radio operator. We were being broached, heeling heavily, mainly to port before bouncing back. I remember thinking what wonderful sea-boats these little side-winding trawlers are. Then one enormous rogue wave pushed us over, farther than I’d ever been before. Instead of rolling back, we seemed to hang there on the beam for what seemed like forever. Then, a second rogue pushed us over ever further. This second wave knocked the three of us sprawling into a pile in the portside corner of the wheelhouse. The boat just hung there, shuddering and juddering as if unable to make up its mind whether to capsize or roll back to starboard. With the helmsman almost upside down in the corner on top of the skipper, there was no control of the helm adding to the confused state. I was completely disoriented. Then slowly but surely, Velia rolled back on an even keel allowing the helmsman to get back on the wheel and get control again. Skipper Dunn, who was one of the most experienced seamen sailing out of Fleetwood, looked pretty shaken to me, he said the immortal words, “Well, that’s as far over you will ever go on the beam and come back again!”
It was after this experience that in my mind there was no mystery surrounding the disappearance of the Hull trawler MT Gaul H247. I always thought she was simply overwhelmed by big seas sending her to the bottom before any chance of a Mayday being transmitted
MV Eugenie S Embiricos POR Andros GRT9061.
Sailing from Long Beach to Kobe Japan on the Great North Circle up by the Aleutians we were hit by a typhoon. The North Pacific can be as malevolent as the North Atlantic with tropical storms and typhoons. It was around September 1967, I cannot remember the name of the typhoon, Carla maybe. Anyway, as the barometer pressure dropped the wind and waves increased, we seemed to have been in rough seas for days on end. The wind increased to typhoon level.
We got a right battering from the north. The waves pounding the starboard side of the vessel. I had already experienced gales and storms in the Atlantic and an earlier typhoon in Hong Kong around 1960, but this typhoon was something different. The winds were reaching around 180 mph (295kmph) pressure around 900mb. This must have been a super typhoon. The sea an unbelievable maelstrom of confusion. Rain belting down. I was quite worried, watching the sea get much rougher than I’d ever seen before. I had joined the ship, in Honolulu, a couple of months earlier to replace the sick radio officer. I didn’t get on too well with the captain who I thought was a miserable old man, however, he was an experienced Greek sailor. The first sign that we were in trouble was when the ship’s bell and tripod broke free, torn from the fo’c’sle-head by the waves, came cartwheeling, clanging, and banging along the deck before plopping over the port side. The next sign was when the bulkhead walls along the starboard foredeck were bent and twisted by the force of the waves. The waves continually pounding the ship along the starboard side. I looked out over the dark sea and thought if we sink in this storm there is no way we’ll get the lifeboats away. Then the MacGregor folding hatches to holds one and two caved in; seawater pouring into the holds. It was at this point I said to the captain, “if we don’t come head to wind and waves and ride out the storm, we will bloody well sink.” Well, he gave me a look of contempt but didn’t say anything. And, who am I, a 25-year-old radio operator, telling a 63-year-old master mariner what he should do to save his ship, but I couldn’t help myself. Reluctantly, I thought, the skipper ordered a change, of course, to head into the wind. When the wind moderated and we were able to inspect the damage we were horrified to see that apart from the steel hatches being caved in, the buckled and twisted steel walls, and the mainmast badly damaged, there was a crack in the deck from the fo’c’sle to the superstructure housing. There is a photograph on this Friends site of the Eugenie S Embiricos, from that you can see how substantial the bulkhead walls and mainmast are. We had bales of cotton in number 1 hold. I’ve been told that cotton, subjected to seawater, can swell and break the hull plates. Thankfully this didn’t happen. Almost a week overdue we were diverted to the Yokohama shipyard for repairs. We were in dry dock for six weeks. I believe a cargo ship sank in the same typhoon with the loss of all hands, although I didn’t pick up any distress signals. I am convinced that if the ship had not been built in Germany to their high standards, the Eugenie S Embiricos too would have sunk with all hands.
Yacht ‘TOBAGO’ Westerly Centaur 8m.
After leaving the Merchant Navy I bought my own boat and sailed it around the Irish Sea. Kathleen, my wife, and I had some squeaky bum times over the 22 years we had the boat and once had to call for the lifeboat. We were heading for Howth in Ireland with the wind over tide the sea was quite choppy. Kathleen was on the tiller when suddenly there was an awful noise coming up from the rudder. I looked down the engine hatch to see that the propellor shaft had parted from the engine and had disappeared down the stern tube and had jammed on the rudder. We couldn’t steer the yacht or retrieve the propeller shaft. I looked at my youngest son sheltering below, and thought, well I’ve supported the RNLI most of my life and I’m going to get them out to us. Via the Holyhead coastguard, they sent out the Lytham lifeboat. By this time the tide had turned and the sea had calmed down. The inshore lifeboat found us, they were unable to assist, so they called for the Tyne class boat to tow us to Lytham (Make lifeboats two, Peter is at sea again!). All the lifeboatmen were brilliant. But, instead of Ireland, we spent our holiday on the lifeboat’s reserve mooring at Lytham and in the marina at Preston! However, the story I want to tell you happened a couple of years later. My wife, Tim my youngest son, and I were storm-bound in Liverpool. The weather was terrible, so I sent Kathleen and Tim home by train and asked my good friend Eddie if he would crew me back to Fleetwood. I misread the weather forecast thinking there was a slot between the low pressures crossing the Atlantic that would allow me time to get back to Fleetwood safely. A big mistake! We were the only boat to leave Coburg Dock that day. Once in the river, I contacted Mersey Control for permission to proceed down the river to the sea. Mersey Control called me up on VHF and asked, “What are your intentions, Tobago?” I told him I was heading for Q4 then to sail north to Fleetwood. A few moments later, I think for my benefit, he called Lynas Pilot and asked, “What’s the weather like out there, Bob?” “Bloody awful.” Was the reply. Never-the-less I pushed on regardless. Night fell and the weather freshened to about 4 or 5 and to make things worse, Eddie knelt on my compass and broke the lamp. The night was so dark you could not distinguish the sea from the sky. At that time, I did not have a GPS so it was all dead-reckoning and estimated position. I calculated by the time I got to the Lune Deep it would be low-water so to avoid running aground I headed west for the north cardinal Lune Deep buoy intending to sail from buoy to buoy to the Fleetwood fairway buoy. As I said, it was pitch black as we headed towards shell wharf buoy with a massive following sea that sounded like an express train bearing down on us. It was terrifying. The waves roared down onto the poop. Twice we were knocked down. The following sea picking us up and thrusting us forward like surfing the ocean waves in the roaring 40s. The fact that we could not see anything, including the compass, trying to keep the flashing North Cardinal on our stern before picking up the green light on the starboard. That night was the most terrifying night I have ever spent at sea. Eventually, we reached the fairway and relative safety of the River Wyre. Inside the marina, the halyards tinkling like cowbells gave no indication of the nightmare out at sea. Come to think of it, I’m glad now passing my time writing and gardening…Or maybe not, as I’m sure a lot of our readers would love to go down to the sea again, the wonderful sea and sky, etc…On second thoughts…Not likely.
