Page 34 - Icebreakers around Cape Breton

ISSUE : Issue 45

Published by Ronald Caplan on 1987/6/1

nice guy, he let the crew go home. He's go? ing down to Port Hawkesbury to tie up for the winter. And he was just taking 3 guys: himself, one engineer, and one guy to steer. A skeleton crew. Holy God--it's not even legal to do that. But he couldn't get the towline aboard his ship. So how were we going to tow him? Anyway, the line broke--this cable that was holding him from going ashore. Then he really started drifting fast. (But now) we had no wire to worry with, when it broke-- so we went right alongside and threw anoth? er line--and he got it hooked up. And there was Cranberry Light. It was flashing so hard you could see it in the ship's side. We got him, got hold of him. So we'd have to turn up into the wind, parallel to the shore. And we were two cables off the rocks when we got hold of him. So the next day I just put down--my mes? sage to Search-and-Rescue headquarters in Halifax--"Taken in tow, fishing vessel so- and-so, in position so-and-so." They plotted it, they said, "What's he doing so close to the shore?" They asked us to con? firm the position. I even gave the bearing and distance off Cranberry Island Light. They said, "My God!" It's just a routine rescue, as far as I'm concerned. The Chronicle.Herald and Mail Star--they came down. "What speed were you going? What about the wind?" And the wind was up to a 50-knot wind when we got ahold of him. And snowing like mad--snowing, drifted. Well, visibility was less than a mile. But it's the sea more than anything else--the sea was just breaking in there. I was try? ing to get that towline--well, the crew aft were awash--trying to get the line out--our crew. There were seas coming over. And they were actually tying themselves on to hold onto this line, to pull this, to make it fast. We had to go astern a couple of times, too. When we went astern, the sea was coming right over the stern. So it was a quite exciting time. Your hair turned gray overnight, you know. "Holy geez, what if you had a failure, a power failure?" They wanted to know when would you have thought about giving this thing up? I said, "Well, if we didn't'make that turn, I was going to chop the line. Be? cause I wasn't going to endanger my ship and his too." When we got back to the base, the lieuten? ant came down, our boss came down. He said, "Did you ever consider that your ship could have been in danger?" I said, "Geez, the rescue--we could let go at any time. They have axes back there. We could chop the line. And then call the R.C.M.P. to pick up the bodies." Capt. Green: We have an ice reconnaissance aircraft that flies over the Gulf, probab? ly every second day. And they look at all the ice, and then they send us a map. And they show us the types of ice that we can encounter in various areas, the concentra? tion, size of the floes, things like that. Every day we get a (satellite) map. It just tells you what the ice is. You know what the various thicknesses are, when they give you the "first-year," the "gray," "gray-white," "new"--and all that. You know what it is. We have our own helicop? ters that fly out from the ship. They fly ahead of the ship and they'll call back by radiotelephone td tell us which is the best way to go, where we're going to exper? ience the worst ice, where we're going to get the better leads. CONTINUED NEXT -PAGE PIPER'S TRAILER COURT Featuring: Fully Licensed Dining Room * Guest House * Swimming Pool Ocean-Side Campsites * Laundromat * Mini-Mart 929-2233 Indian Brook on the Cabot Trail ''' ''OvJ Halfway Between Baddeck and Ingonish BATTERED WOMEN AND THEIR CHILDREN. IF YOU NEED HELP, CALL: 539-2945 TRANSITION HOUSE Morrison' Stores Ltc Home iHome Hardware Hardware r General Merchants Celebrating over 100 Years of Service St Peters Richmond County, Nova Scotia BOE 3B0 (34) Cape Breton Tours operated by Briands Cabs Ltd. DISCOVER THE BEAUTY OF CAPE BRETON! Cabot Trail Miners' Museum bri [?? DISCOV Cabot Tr: Cape Breton Highlands Taxi Fleet ?? Limousin 564-6200 24 Kings Rd., Sydney Taxi Fleet Airport Service Limousine Service Parcel Pickups BRETON! "Tj Museum I Fortress I Louisbourg I Service I d Pickups • • THE# 24 HOURS

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