Rogue Wave Sinks Maine Lobster Boat

It was just after noon, but Billy Bob Faulkingham was calling it a day. The weather was turning in the Gulf of Maine, the remnants of Hurricane Lee were just a day away, so Faulkingham and Alex Polk, his sternman, started hauling traps on Faulkingham’s 40-foot lobster boat named 51. They were off the south end of Turtle Island, on the far side of Mount Desert Island, and they were going to head home to Winter Harbor, just a few miles away.

Faulkingham knew those waters well. He’s 44, and he’s been a working lobsterman there all his life (although since 2018 he’s been spending some time as a member of the state legislature, where he’s the Republican minority leader). So Faulkingham was at first surprised, then horrified, when he saw a giant wave 40-feet-high heading for the boat’s starboard quarter. He hit the throttle.

At 12:20 the Coast Guard station in Southwest Harbor received an emergency distress message from the EPIRB on Faulkingham’s boat. Mounted on the boat, the EPIRB activates automatically when it’s in the water. The Coast Guard tried to reach 51 over VHF, but it got no reply. They called Faulkingham’s home number. Was he there? No, his wife Carrie replied, he’s out on his boat.

The Coast Guard then sent an emergency call to all mariners, saying that 51 was missing and giving the EPIRB’s location. It also launched a search-and-rescue effort.

“We were in probably 50 feet of water when the towering wave struck us,” Faulkingham later wrote on his Facebook page. “I just remember the force. It hit like a freight train. I had gripped the wheel so tight and was torn off with such force that the calluses on the palm of my hand were torn off when I was ripped from the helm.”

In a matter of seconds, 51 was flipped upside down. “My biggest fear is drowning,” Faulkingham wrote. “I don’t know how deep I was but I just remember the sound of rushing water and looking to the light. It was almost like I was pulled or pushed to the surface.”

For his part, Polk, who can’t swim, was trapped inside the overturned boat with a broken arm. He pushed himself out with his good arm, and the two men climbed on the overturned hull. The engine was still running; the prop was turning.

They took off their boots and oilskins and Faulkingham used his sweatpants to stem the bleeding from Polk’s head. They waited to be rescued. They saw planes overhead; they saw other lobster boats in the distance.

After an hour or so, they saw Faulkingham’s cousin Mikie heading for them on his own lobster boat. Mikie had been back in Winter Harbor when he heard the Coast Guard call, and he rushed to the location the EPIRB had signaled.

“We stepped off the 51 boat and onto Mikie’s without even getting wet,” Faulkingham wrote. “The 51 boat never sank an inch for over and hour, keel up, upside down. But just moments after we were rescued, the 51 boat sank below the sea.”