BOATING TIPS -- FEBRUARY 1995
Watch Out for Logs

Trouble always seems to come in three's. At least, that's what they say!

Bud Swanson and I were delivering a boat to LaConner in the late fall on a day when the seas were running fairly hard, and as we hummed along in this faster, express cruiser with its two engines, we hit a submerged log. It was a loud "bang", and it sure got our attention! Well, one side really did the shimmy when we re-engaged the gearbox, so we went the rest of the way, very slowly, on just one engine. It turned out we had bent a prop, bent a shaft slightly, and even put a very small dent in the gelcoat. The culprit was a nearly-waterlogged small log about four inches in diuameter, five feet long.

Then, over the Christmas holiday, a charterer lightly "dinged" a prop on my boat and twisted a transducer a little bit when he ran over a log on a very rough day. Here, the damage was so slight (no shake at all) that it took a diver to discover why the speed readout slowed down so much!

The third strike came, but was averted. On January 3, I was returning from the fuel dock when I came upon a very large, straight-up-and-down deadhead about 50 yards outside the east harbor entrance. The seas were glassy, and this log's end was flush with the surface. A tip-off to its size was the fact that a passing boat's wake would alternately cover the end, then expose four-six inches of it. (When a log doesn't move in moving water, you can bet it's heavy!)

Well, I called the Coast Guard Station - Bellingham, and reported it. I asked if they were going to tow it out of the channel, or at least flag it. The communications officer on duty (apparently after some consultation for he left the air for a few moments) reported that, "No, we don't do that anymore. We got so many reports of logs that we just couldn't keep up with them. We report them to the Corps of Engineers."

Frankly, I've been a booster of the Coast Guard for years, through thick and thin, and all their service reductions in the name of "drug interdiction" and small budgets. But having just seen what much lesser logs had done, I could just imagine what this baby could do, especially when the sea blew up. This was not a Coast Guard action that was promoting safety on the sea!

Well, I decided to haul it in myself, and did so. It was a whopper: it's weight had to be in the one-thousand-pound class, maybe fifteen inches in diameter and 12 feet long; my boat really "bore down" when I started towing it, and because as soon as I slowed, it went into its vertical position again, it was sure easy to stop!

By coincidence, when I got it secured on the beach, the Port of Bellingham log-clearing boat came by (I had called the Port on my cellular phone) and they delivered it to its final destination, wherever that was. Thanks to the Port folks!

In the Pacific Northwest, I suspect the principal causes of accidents are stupid boaters, rocks, and logs. It seems a shame that the Coast Guard is only able to deal with the first problem on a regular basis. Perhaps it's time for them to re-evaluate their role in service to the citizens who pay the taxes --- that includes us, folks!

Now let me add one more thing: I'm sure that the Coast Guard Station - Bellingham didn't adopt this service restriction on their own. Don't kill our local messengers because of their message! But you might want to write to the Coast Guard Group, Seattle, and let them know how you feel. Maybe with the "new look" in government someone will be listening, and this organization can become a "service" again instead of a bureaucracy . . .

Naturally, these opinions are mine alone, not those of the Club. I hope that you'll join me in doing the Coast Guard's work for them if a situation warrants it, just as any decent boater would do! It's not hard, and the 30 minutes you spend could save thousands of dollars, or a life.

Have a safe and happy Spring boating season! And watch out for logs!

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