levittownnick
Senior Chief Petty Officer
- Joined
- Jul 2, 2003
- Messages
- 789
Tough end to a season. My son Seb along with my other son Joe and his long-time friend Rob went fishing (11-19-2010) Friday night in the ocean off Democrat Point, Long Island. I was invited but due to my work schedule, I declined. My pre-teen Grandson, Matthew (Joe?s younger son) was scheduled to go but for other reasons, he didn?t go either.
The bottom line is there are no injuries, just some property damage. (I want to get that out of the way so you don?t think that it was a disaster.)
It was night and the weather was good, a working GPS/Chart-Plotter was operating. My son Seb bought this boat new in 2008, a 24 foot Striper. He has decades of experience operating boats, yet this past Friday he lost perspective and ran into the beach. (He lost perspective because with the small screen size of the average GPS, if you?re over 40 you need reading glasses, but to see where your going you need distance lenses.) If you know the area you know that it?s a sandy bottom without rocks. Thank God for that. They went hard aground and could not get free. He contacted a towing company. They want $6,000.00 (yes $6K) to tow him so he opted out and planned to wait several hours for the high tide. (I would have done the same.) The 3 of them spent the knight in their underwear in the water which is very cool this time of year in NY trying to free the boat. There was about a 4 foot surf to deal with. Finally, they got her to float. They had 2 anchors set and (I don?t know why at this point, that they couldn?t haul them in) they decided to cut the anchors free and get on there way. When the 2nd anchor rode was cut it got picked up by the prop and stalled the engine. The surf quickly put the boat on the beach again. Last chance was shot. Contacted the towing company again but the wind had picked to gale or near gale and they could not get to the boat until Sunday morning. During Saturday night, a surf fisherman found one of his anchors and put it next to the boat. There are good people to restore faith everywhere. Overnight some other dirt-bag stole the GPS/Chart-plotter and Radio. So much for restored faith.
A day later and $6K + stolen items, no one has been injured, the boat has been recovered, and minimal damage to the boat except for the stolen items. At this time the boat is being prepped for winter storage.
The bottom line is there are no injuries, just some property damage. (I want to get that out of the way so you don?t think that it was a disaster.)
It was night and the weather was good, a working GPS/Chart-Plotter was operating. My son Seb bought this boat new in 2008, a 24 foot Striper. He has decades of experience operating boats, yet this past Friday he lost perspective and ran into the beach. (He lost perspective because with the small screen size of the average GPS, if you?re over 40 you need reading glasses, but to see where your going you need distance lenses.) If you know the area you know that it?s a sandy bottom without rocks. Thank God for that. They went hard aground and could not get free. He contacted a towing company. They want $6,000.00 (yes $6K) to tow him so he opted out and planned to wait several hours for the high tide. (I would have done the same.) The 3 of them spent the knight in their underwear in the water which is very cool this time of year in NY trying to free the boat. There was about a 4 foot surf to deal with. Finally, they got her to float. They had 2 anchors set and (I don?t know why at this point, that they couldn?t haul them in) they decided to cut the anchors free and get on there way. When the 2nd anchor rode was cut it got picked up by the prop and stalled the engine. The surf quickly put the boat on the beach again. Last chance was shot. Contacted the towing company again but the wind had picked to gale or near gale and they could not get to the boat until Sunday morning. During Saturday night, a surf fisherman found one of his anchors and put it next to the boat. There are good people to restore faith everywhere. Overnight some other dirt-bag stole the GPS/Chart-plotter and Radio. So much for restored faith.
A day later and $6K + stolen items, no one has been injured, the boat has been recovered, and minimal damage to the boat except for the stolen items. At this time the boat is being prepped for winter storage.
