One more and I'll stop

kahuna123

Senior Chief Petty Officer
Joined
Jun 2, 2011
Messages
703
Spearfishing Tournament. So we leave after the captains meeting Friday night to head to the Middle Grounds, 80 miles. On the way out its nasty 4 ft chop 3ft apart. Dave and I are diving in a new friends boat. 30 ft Proline (first mistake). We are pounding pretty bad. Tons of spray over the top landing in the rear of the boat. But the buoy at 80 miles is reporting better conditions all time and the weather report looks great. Just gotta get through this. After getting beat up enough we decide at about 3 AM to anchor up, try to sleep and make the last 20 mile run in the morning. When the bow settles down and the Captains buddy goes in the cabin to sleep he comes out wide eyed asking where all the water came from.

I pull the rear hatch and look at a generator and batteries that are under water. I tell M--- to get on the radio and let the Coast Guard know our location and at this time we are not asking for help but be aware of our situation. Thank god they could hear us. At least I felt better. In the grounds there would be plenty of help but we were 20-25 East. WE DO HAVE AN EPIRB but you do NOT want to be in water in the grounds at night.

M--- turns the ONLY aft pump to manual and it throws the breaker. Great, there is one kinda shower sump front bilge 500 rule POS pump in the cabin but the fitting is broken. M-- does not have one way valves on the pumps exhaust hoses so when the water level reaches their exhaust they might as well be holes in the bottom. He does however have a manual pump. I put it in the aft hatch and realize that the exhaust hose on it is two feet long. A long way from the gunnel. But thank God it did reach a scupper that was still above the waterline. We did get it all out between the 4 of us.
 
Top