Training Turns Into Tow

Kellei at the helm

Kellei and I were on our way to do some CCGA training yesterday - but the pager went off in the Car half way to the base.

One of our new crew had requested some on-water training, and being predisposed to accept such requests as frequently as possible we jumped for the chance. We were planning some docking and maneuvering practise and had a crew of 4 set to go out. One of them lives quite close (he actually does some development work with me from time to time) and so we carpool. So, here we are all three in the Car and off goes the pager...

Now, strangely enough we were not on-call at the moment - so first we tried to contact the on-call coxswain to let him know we were almost there anyway and could take the call. In the end we didn´t manage to connect until we had the Boat prepped and running and he was at the Dock - but he expected we would be there and handed off the call.

The report was just a vessel Adrift off White Islets - so there was no danger and we made our way out to that location. With all the wind and sprint tides there was an incredible amount of debris in the water (logs mainly) and our transit through welcome pass was like a slolom Course (good driving Kellei!)

It took a while to find the Boat - as it turned out he was nowhere near White Islts - in fact he was half way across the Strait of Georgia more abeem Trail Islands. But we had the reporting party from shore on the cell and he was watching us and the vessel through a telescope and giving us directions - it is surprisingly difficult to spot an 18´ vessel in a large body of water even from only 1nm away.

When we eventually found him it turned out he was only out of gas and we towed him Back to Secret Cove to fuel up.

Nothing heroic or staggering - but a great day none the less and far better then training. Towing involves quite a bit of close crew coordination and communications to set-up correctly, and the crew performance was awesome!

The only unfortunate part of the whole thing was that the new crewmember that initially called to request the on-water training missed it all because we left About 10 mins before our training had been scheduled to start... we called her to apologize and she jokingly admitted to learning that sometimes there were benefits to getting there early!