Read Online Rescue of the Bounty: Disaster and Survival in Superstorm Sandy by Michael J. Tougias, Douglas A. Campbell - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Michael J. Tougias, Douglas A. Campbell
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and four feet, the wind ranging from ten to fifteen knots, but by now, everything aboard Bounty was lashed in place and prepared for the coming storm. The big diesel engines thrummed two decks below the helm. Those on watch rotated through all four positions during their four-hour duty. Up front, the person standing forward watch had a clear view ahead of the gathering darkness. Another watch stander spent an hour in the bowels of the ship, checking the bilges and monitoring the engines. The fourth person was on standby, and this evening that duty called for little effort.
Dan Cleveland, twenty-five, the watch captain, had served aboard Bounty longer than anyone else except Robin Walbridge. He boarded her in 2008 with little sailing experience—a few daysails on schooners—and became a deckhand with no authority except to take orders. He found his skipper quiet, not much of a yeller. Walbridge never got excited, even when problems arose, never showed nerves or fear. In Cleveland’s view, the captain was a problem solver, always two steps ahead of anyone else.
Cleveland stood his watch, observed, and learned. At the beginning of the 2009 season, he was promoted to able-bodied seaman—AB—of the watch, and halfway through that summer, when Bounty needed a bosun, he applied for the job and got it.
The bosun was in charge of the deck in all-hands situations—sail handling, docking, or leaving the dock. Cleveland was twenty-one years old and had major authority on a storied tall ship. In the winter of 2011, Cleveland earned a hundred-ton coast guard license, which qualified him to be captain of a substantial vessel. On Bounty , he was promoted to third mate.
Anna Sprague, twenty, had been on the sailing team at Auburn University when Bounty arrived in her hometown of Savannah, Georgia, for the Tall Ship Festival in the first week in May 2012. Her mother, Mary Ellen Sprague, a Savannah alderwoman, was working on the event and had an extra ticket that she gave to Anna.
Sprague had been sailing her whole life. The family had small boats—Sunfish and Lasers—that they sailed in the Savannah River. One time when she was much younger, her father, Larry, took her sister and Anna out on the river and threw them overboard so they would be comfortable off a boat in the water. The family chartered catamarans in the Caribbean islands from time to time as well.
Anna Sprague, then, was no novice in sailing and salt water, and that gave her the confidence when she visited Bounty , moored dramatically along Savannah’s picturesque waterfront promenade in the center of the fleet, to ask how the ship selected crew.
The answer: we’re looking for three new crew members. On Saturday, she was interviewed by John Svendsen, the chief mate, and on Monday, when the festival was over and the dock lines were dropped, Anna Sprague sailed down the river, the youngest member of Bounty ’s crew.
Drew Salapatek, twenty-nine, boarded Bounty at about the same time as Sprague, but it was for his second season. He’d been a deckhand in 2011 and had sailed across the Atlantic and back. When he boarded that first time, he had no maritime licenses, but in the fall of 2012, while Bounty was hauled out for repairs, he went to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, and earned both an AB certificate and a hundred-ton license. When the Chicago native returned, he was the AB on the C-Watch.
While Salapatek was aboard Bounty crossing the Atlantic, his father, Jim, sitting in his television repair shop in Chicago, was curious. “It just grew interesting, and as I went more and more digging into it, I found Bounty ’s Facebook page,” the father recalled. “I was just a regular person who liked the page. I kept posting, asking some questions. There were a lot of parents who were concerned. Their children were sailing on the ship. When [my son] got to England, I found pictures from people who had toured the Bounty [and were posting] on their Flickr pages.”
In time,
Dan Cleveland, twenty-five, the watch captain, had served aboard Bounty longer than anyone else except Robin Walbridge. He boarded her in 2008 with little sailing experience—a few daysails on schooners—and became a deckhand with no authority except to take orders. He found his skipper quiet, not much of a yeller. Walbridge never got excited, even when problems arose, never showed nerves or fear. In Cleveland’s view, the captain was a problem solver, always two steps ahead of anyone else.
Cleveland stood his watch, observed, and learned. At the beginning of the 2009 season, he was promoted to able-bodied seaman—AB—of the watch, and halfway through that summer, when Bounty needed a bosun, he applied for the job and got it.
The bosun was in charge of the deck in all-hands situations—sail handling, docking, or leaving the dock. Cleveland was twenty-one years old and had major authority on a storied tall ship. In the winter of 2011, Cleveland earned a hundred-ton coast guard license, which qualified him to be captain of a substantial vessel. On Bounty , he was promoted to third mate.
Anna Sprague, twenty, had been on the sailing team at Auburn University when Bounty arrived in her hometown of Savannah, Georgia, for the Tall Ship Festival in the first week in May 2012. Her mother, Mary Ellen Sprague, a Savannah alderwoman, was working on the event and had an extra ticket that she gave to Anna.
Sprague had been sailing her whole life. The family had small boats—Sunfish and Lasers—that they sailed in the Savannah River. One time when she was much younger, her father, Larry, took her sister and Anna out on the river and threw them overboard so they would be comfortable off a boat in the water. The family chartered catamarans in the Caribbean islands from time to time as well.
Anna Sprague, then, was no novice in sailing and salt water, and that gave her the confidence when she visited Bounty , moored dramatically along Savannah’s picturesque waterfront promenade in the center of the fleet, to ask how the ship selected crew.
The answer: we’re looking for three new crew members. On Saturday, she was interviewed by John Svendsen, the chief mate, and on Monday, when the festival was over and the dock lines were dropped, Anna Sprague sailed down the river, the youngest member of Bounty ’s crew.
Drew Salapatek, twenty-nine, boarded Bounty at about the same time as Sprague, but it was for his second season. He’d been a deckhand in 2011 and had sailed across the Atlantic and back. When he boarded that first time, he had no maritime licenses, but in the fall of 2012, while Bounty was hauled out for repairs, he went to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, and earned both an AB certificate and a hundred-ton license. When the Chicago native returned, he was the AB on the C-Watch.
While Salapatek was aboard Bounty crossing the Atlantic, his father, Jim, sitting in his television repair shop in Chicago, was curious. “It just grew interesting, and as I went more and more digging into it, I found Bounty ’s Facebook page,” the father recalled. “I was just a regular person who liked the page. I kept posting, asking some questions. There were a lot of parents who were concerned. Their children were sailing on the ship. When [my son] got to England, I found pictures from people who had toured the Bounty [and were posting] on their Flickr pages.”
In time,
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