jumpjets
Petty Officer 1st Class
- Joined
- Nov 11, 2010
- Messages
- 313
The Beaufort NC inlet almost got the best of me tonight. My wife would have gone down as well.
It was a blazing hot Saturday afternoon, and I wanted to do something fun once the temperature started to decrease around 6pm. Three days earlier, on the 4th or July, I was able to navigate a very short distance to my boat ramp in the dark in very familiar waters after watching fireworks. This meant that after boating ONCE at night, I was now the subject matter expert of all things related to the night.
In my mind, my boat is a hybrid mix between the CVN-69, the USS Missouri, and the BAT SKI BOAT from "Batman Returns". In reality it's a 22 year old Wellcraft 22ft cuddy. I saddled up and towed it 60 miles south to Beaufort NC. Once the boat was in the water, the current was pushing it away from the dock so strongly, that my wife could barely hold on. I jumped in and turned the key to start the engine, but nothing happened. The ignition key switch has been slowly failing. I dorked with the switch for about 5 minutes, and finally got it started. My wife hesitantly climbed in, and I blasted out of Beaufort, through the seaport, and to the Beaufort sound, the gateway to the Atlantic ocean. OBTW, I've only been out to the Atlantic one time, and it was a beautiful sunny calm day.
I got the sound as the sun was right above the horizon. It was windy as hell, and the sea was very rough. This is one of the busiest boating areas in the US, and I was the only boat on the horizon. I hadn't checked the weather, surf report, or anything prior to launching.
I was having a great time blasting over the 5-6ft swells, catching air, and pitching 30* nose up and nose down. All of a sudden, I grind to a halt from 25knots to zero in about 20 feet, and my engine cuts off. There was a trail of brown in my wake.
Freak-out time has commenced. All the strong current must have really shifted the sandbars around, because I was out in open water, but I was high-centered on a sandbar that was only 2 feet below the surface. My prop was useless. If I trimmed down at all, I would just kick up mud. The giant swells began to crash over the stern of the boat, and it was getting pretty wet. I jumped off the back of the boat, dug my feet into the sand, and did linebacker drills on the boat until it was floating again. It almost got away from me, but I was able to climb back in.
I spent the next hour with the outdrive trimmed halfway up to the trailer position, at idle power, traveling about .5 knots in 3ft deep water with 3ft swells and whitecaps everywhere. The sun was below the horizon. I could barely see anything, and the swells were occasionally crashing into the boat still. I pointed toward the flashing green and red lights on the horizon, hoping that they were the shipping channel.
Once I made it into the shipping channel, it was fully dark. I limped back through the seaport, and back to my ramp barely on plane. My wife was dead silent and white-knuckling the railings of the boat. She was in full freak-out mode. She was dead silent except to tell me that she was ready to load the boat up and head home. She had been good about pointing out whitecaps, and reminding me that sandbars seem to hide beneath whitecaps. I had remained totally calm throughout the entire event. She has enough anxiety for the both of us.
Things I learned today:
-Check the weather and surf reports. (I'm a $*&%ing career jet pilot for Christ's sake, I know better. We live by the weather)
-When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Don't take your boat where there are no Romans.....or experienced ocean boaters. -I'm a city slicker halfway through my second season of boat ownership. I'm not a trailblazer. I have plenty of fun in the rivers I normally boat in. No need to get too adventurous.
-My boat is not the USS Missouri. It's not invincible.
-You can drown in 3ft deep water. It just takes longer, and your obituary is more embarrassing.
-Night makes everything 100 times harder. (Again, pilots know better)
-Never work alone. That cute girl who knows nothing about boating or manly stuff was able to keep me from getting into even more trouble with her keen eyes. When she felt threatened, she very quickly learned how to read the sea.
-Float plan. It would have been Monday afternoon before anyone realized I was missing.
I hope you enjoyed my story.
It was a blazing hot Saturday afternoon, and I wanted to do something fun once the temperature started to decrease around 6pm. Three days earlier, on the 4th or July, I was able to navigate a very short distance to my boat ramp in the dark in very familiar waters after watching fireworks. This meant that after boating ONCE at night, I was now the subject matter expert of all things related to the night.
In my mind, my boat is a hybrid mix between the CVN-69, the USS Missouri, and the BAT SKI BOAT from "Batman Returns". In reality it's a 22 year old Wellcraft 22ft cuddy. I saddled up and towed it 60 miles south to Beaufort NC. Once the boat was in the water, the current was pushing it away from the dock so strongly, that my wife could barely hold on. I jumped in and turned the key to start the engine, but nothing happened. The ignition key switch has been slowly failing. I dorked with the switch for about 5 minutes, and finally got it started. My wife hesitantly climbed in, and I blasted out of Beaufort, through the seaport, and to the Beaufort sound, the gateway to the Atlantic ocean. OBTW, I've only been out to the Atlantic one time, and it was a beautiful sunny calm day.
I got the sound as the sun was right above the horizon. It was windy as hell, and the sea was very rough. This is one of the busiest boating areas in the US, and I was the only boat on the horizon. I hadn't checked the weather, surf report, or anything prior to launching.
I was having a great time blasting over the 5-6ft swells, catching air, and pitching 30* nose up and nose down. All of a sudden, I grind to a halt from 25knots to zero in about 20 feet, and my engine cuts off. There was a trail of brown in my wake.
Freak-out time has commenced. All the strong current must have really shifted the sandbars around, because I was out in open water, but I was high-centered on a sandbar that was only 2 feet below the surface. My prop was useless. If I trimmed down at all, I would just kick up mud. The giant swells began to crash over the stern of the boat, and it was getting pretty wet. I jumped off the back of the boat, dug my feet into the sand, and did linebacker drills on the boat until it was floating again. It almost got away from me, but I was able to climb back in.
I spent the next hour with the outdrive trimmed halfway up to the trailer position, at idle power, traveling about .5 knots in 3ft deep water with 3ft swells and whitecaps everywhere. The sun was below the horizon. I could barely see anything, and the swells were occasionally crashing into the boat still. I pointed toward the flashing green and red lights on the horizon, hoping that they were the shipping channel.
Once I made it into the shipping channel, it was fully dark. I limped back through the seaport, and back to my ramp barely on plane. My wife was dead silent and white-knuckling the railings of the boat. She was in full freak-out mode. She was dead silent except to tell me that she was ready to load the boat up and head home. She had been good about pointing out whitecaps, and reminding me that sandbars seem to hide beneath whitecaps. I had remained totally calm throughout the entire event. She has enough anxiety for the both of us.
Things I learned today:
-Check the weather and surf reports. (I'm a $*&%ing career jet pilot for Christ's sake, I know better. We live by the weather)
-When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Don't take your boat where there are no Romans.....or experienced ocean boaters. -I'm a city slicker halfway through my second season of boat ownership. I'm not a trailblazer. I have plenty of fun in the rivers I normally boat in. No need to get too adventurous.
-My boat is not the USS Missouri. It's not invincible.
-You can drown in 3ft deep water. It just takes longer, and your obituary is more embarrassing.
-Night makes everything 100 times harder. (Again, pilots know better)
-Never work alone. That cute girl who knows nothing about boating or manly stuff was able to keep me from getting into even more trouble with her keen eyes. When she felt threatened, she very quickly learned how to read the sea.
-Float plan. It would have been Monday afternoon before anyone realized I was missing.
I hope you enjoyed my story.
