Cruising Life

Coast Guard Chopper Rescues Couple, Dog, Off Oregon Coast

By Peter Janssen on March 1, 2020 Cruising Life

A Coast Guard helicopter crew rescued a couple and their dog after they were stuck in rough seas off the Columbia River bar in Oregon. You can see the Coast Guard’s video of the 4 a.m. rescue below. The couple, a 55-year-old man and 56-year-old woman, first called the Coast Guard at 2:30 p.m. They were on a 44-foot powerboat with their dog, off the coast of Seaside, and they were worried about crossing the bar to return home. The Coast Guard sent a rescue boat to find them. In a statement, the Coast Guard said, “The rescue crew determined…

Woman Awarded $3.7 Million in Fall From Yacht in Travelift

By Peter Janssen on February 24, 2020 Cruising Life

A New Jersey woman will receive $3.7 million in a settlement for traumatic brain injuries she suffered when she fell off a ladder from a boat suspended in a marina Travelift. The woman, Jennifer Brashears, 48, fell 10 feet from the top step of a ladder and hit her head on the paved parking lot at the Edgewater Marina in Edgewater, New Jersey. Surgeons had to remove a third of her skull to prevent fatal swelling, but she was left with a disabling brain injury and has not been able to work since the accident on July 22, 2014. On…

Giant Male Whale Protects Mother and Calf from Boat

By Peter Janssen on February 24, 2020 Cruising Life

A giant male humpback whale breached in front of a small sailing catamaran off Hawaii, flinging himself out of the water, perhaps in an effort to warn the sailors away from a nearby calf and its mother. The 40-feet-long, 22-ton whale almost crushed the catamaran, sailing off Kaanapali Beach on the northwest coast of Maui. No one on the cat was injured. The incident was filmed by Don McLeish, 67 and retired, who was following the whales on his blue Zodiac. He saw the male escorting the mother and the baby, and then saw the catamaran almost on a collision…

Coast Guard Rescues 3 from Sinking Fishing Trawler

By Peter Janssen on February 24, 2020 Cruising Life

Here’s a story about a fishing boat in distress in the middle of the night off Fire Island, New York, a Coast Guard rescue, and determined owner, from Newsday. It was 3:45 a.m., and the fishing trawler New Age was about 20 miles south of the Fire Island Inlet, heading to New Jersey to unload its catch with a crew of three. It had 1,500 pounds of fluke in the hold, the wind was blowing about 30 knots, and the swells were getting even the stern. As the New Age started to list, the crew realized it was sinking. Billy…

Ferry Captain Disoriented by Fog, Goes Wrong Way, Sinks Yacht

By Peter Janssen on February 23, 2020 Cruising Life

Here’s a report from the BBC about how a ferry boat captain became disoriented in fog, went the wrong way, and crashed into a yacht off the Isle of Wight: Cowes ferry yacht-crash captain ‘lost control in fog’ A ferry captain became disoriented in dense fog and ended up going in the wrong direction and crashing into a yacht, a report has concluded. The Red Funnel car ferry sunk Nigel Minchin’s yacht when it ran aground off the Isle of Wight in October 2018, leaving people stranded for hours. Investigators found Red Falcon’s captain became “overloaded due to high stress” as…

Freak Wave Hits Virginia Beach Whale-Watching Boat, Injures 4

By Peter Janssen on February 23, 2020 Cruising Life

A rogue wave hit a whale-watching boat leaving Virginia Beach on Saturday, terrifying many of the 124 people on board and injuring four seriously enough they had to be taken to a local hospital. The boat was operated by the Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center on a scheduled two-hour-plus whale-watching trip. The Aquarium offers cruises Wednesday through Sunday to take visitors out in the ocean to see humpback whales and bottlenose dolphins. At about 10:30 on Saturday morning, the boat was hit by a rogue wave as it was going out Rudee Inlet. Passengers said the boat launched about…

Divers Find More Artifacts from Doomed Franklin Expedition

By Peter Janssen on February 22, 2020 Cruising Life

Archeologists and divers working with Parks Canada and the Inuit population have found new artifacts from one of British explorer John Hope Franklin’s ships that may help them understand what happened to Franklin and his 128 men when they were trapped in the Arctic and disappeared in 1846. Working in 37-degree water, divers found some 350 artifacts from the HMS Erebus, one of Franklin’s ships, in about 40 feet of water off King William Island. On 93 dives, the divers were able to reach only three cabins on the Erebus last fall, with 17 more to explore. The deck of…

Two Tugs Stranded, Crew Not Paid, Off Sabine Pass, Texas

By Peter Janssen on February 19, 2020 Cruising Life

Two tugboats have been stranded in the Gulf of Mexico, five miles off the coast of Sabine Pass, Texas, since Nov. 26. Members of the crew say they haven’t been paid since the start of the year. The tugs, with their attached barges, are more than 700 feet long, and are lying at anchor. The crews are asking for help, and contacted Father Sinclair Oubre, who’s with the International Seafarers Center in Port Arthur. He, in turn, asked the Transport Workers Federation, as well as the marine safety unit in Port Arthur, to seek a solution. Various members of the…

Albatrosses with Radar Detectors Find Illegal Fishing Boats

By Peter Janssen on February 18, 2020 Cruising Life

A team of French and New Zealand scientists have used almost 200 albatrosses, fitted out with radar detection devices, to track fishing vessels at sea. Their findings, just reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: About a third of the vessels the birds tracked were probably fishing illegally. Henri Weimerskirch, a marine ornithologist at the French National Center for Scientific Research and one of the leaders of the albatross project, said that albatrosses were ideal for finding fishing boats, legal or illegal. With wingspans up to 11 feet, the largest of any bird alive, an albatross can…

Whaler To Offer Raymarine’s Assisted Docking on Some Boats

By Peter Janssen on February 11, 2020 Cruising Life

Worried about docking? About overcoming wind or current or accidentally bumping into nearby boats? About looking bad in front of your friends? Well, at one time or another, who isn’t? But a new era of “assisted docking” takes care of all that. And, with the spread of Raymarine’s DockSense Alert Technology, all those worries may be things of the past. To a large degree, the high-tech DockSense does the docking for you; at the very least, it keeps you from hitting anything. Think of the growing driver-assist technology for cars, which basically parks the car for you, now on boats.…

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