On July 1, 1990, a day of boating on the Potomac River nearly turned into disaster.\u00a0 We were at Fairview Beach, on the Potomac River, about 40 minutes cruising time south of Quantico, Virginia.<\/p>\n
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Our boat was a 19\u2018 center console fiberglass SEA SQUIRT, with a 115 HP Mercury Outboard and a 10 HP Mercury kicker.<\/p>\n
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Terry, our sons, Joey age 6, and Mark age 4, and I were swimming.\u00a0 We were at anchor, tied to a 24\u2019 cabin cruiser belonging to our friends, John and Diana Long.\u00a0 The boys were swimming and playing with Diana and their dogs.<\/p>\n
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We had been there about an hour when a storm warning was broadcast.\u00a0 I immediately got the boys back in the boat, untied and headed back to Quantico.\u00a0 I didn’t want anything to do with a thunderstorm on the water.<\/p>\n
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The Potomac was glassy and flat.\u00a0 We joked that it was the calm before the storm.\u00a0 I opened the throttle and we skimmed along at about forty-five miles per hour.\u00a0 The boys had frequently asked how fast the boat would go, so I seized the moment and showed them.\u00a0 After a few minutes I slowed back to cruising speed of about twenty-four miles per hour.\u00a0 I wanted to conserve fuel and avoid frightening the boys.<\/p>\n
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About 15 minutes south of Quantico it started to rain and hail.\u00a0 The sky was getting dark, we were not going to beat the storm.\u00a0 I followed the example of a boat ahead of us and turned east, out of the channel, toward the Maryland shore.<\/p>\n
A lot of boats were taking shelter in the same cove, Wades Bay.\u00a0 It was too crowded for my liking so I went south about a quarter of a mile to avoid the many boats and anchor lines.\u00a0 I didn’t get a good look at the shore near our position but it looked like red clay bluffs going straight into rocky water…not too hospitable.<\/p>\n
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About 400 yards from shore I turned west, into a rising wind, and slowly made headway against the waves to maintain control of the boat.\u00a0 I decided to ride the storm out there.\u00a0 We were out of options.\u00a0 It was getting rough so Terry put on a life jacket.\u00a0 The boys, as always, were wearing theirs.<\/p>\n
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In retrospect, I should have run the boat up on the beach.<\/p>\n
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Within a few seconds the wind came up hard, blowing the tops off the waves.\u00a0 Rain and hail grew intense and the waves began breaking like ocean surf.\u00a0 The waves quickly rose higher than my head as I stood at the console.\u00a0 The sky blackened, and lightning began a constant barrage.\u00a0 Between the flashes, the air was a very dark, thick grey-green.<\/p>\n
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Visibility dropped to about ten feet.\u00a0 I could hardly see the bow through the darkness and blowing water.\u00a0 It was a struggle to keep the boat headed into the waves.\u00a0 With the roar of the wind, and the constant thunder, we had to shout to be heard.\u00a0 Somewhere in the course of things Terry handed me a life jacket; I didn’t have time to fasten it.\u00a0 I could barely see.\u00a0 Terry gave me some swimming goggles so I could see into the wind.\u00a0 They blew off.<\/p>\n
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Terry yelled for me to turn on the bilge pump; it was already on.\u00a0 She yelled something about bailing.\u00a0 I looked back and saw the ice chest float out of the back of the swamped boat.\u00a0 The engine drowned.\u00a0 We were going over.<\/p>\n
I grabbed Mark as a big wave broke over the boat, turning us broadside.\u00a0 Terry was holding both Joey and Mark and we inadvertently had the upright aluminum support of the Bimini top within our grasp of the boys.\u00a0 The top was badly wind damaged.<\/p>\n
The next wave rolled the boat.\u00a0 As we went over Terry and I were trying to get the boys out of the boat.\u00a0 We were concerned that someone would get tangled in the top.\u00a0 I kept yelling to her that I had Mark; I could see that she had Joey.\u00a0 She couldn’t hear me.\u00a0 As the wave turned us over, we went under and down with the boat.\u00a0 I pulled Mark out of her grasp and to the surface with me.<\/p>\n
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I was relieved to see that Terry came up with Joey.\u00a0 Terry was frantic, she thought she had lost Mark.\u00a0 She almost let go of Joe to go down looking for Mark.<\/p>\n
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After a brief eternity, Terry saw Mark and I.\u00a0 Things were happening fast.\u00a0 I kept yelling “stay with the boat” but it never surfaced.\u00a0 I swam as hard as I could to get Mark and me over to Terry and Joey.\u00a0 The storm was violent; I knew if I couldn’t assemble us immediately, I never would.\u00a0 By the time we were huddled together and rolling under the next wave, I was physically spent.\u00a0 I desperately needed to rest and regain some strength.<\/p>\n
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I couldn’t believe the boat was gone.\u00a0 In retrospect,\u00a0 we were lucky.\u00a0 If we had been with it, the waves would probably have thrown several tons of boat and water on top of us.<\/p>\n
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The speed and violence of the storm was astounding.\u00a0 I believe only two to three minutes elapsed from the time the rain began, until the boat went over.\u00a0 I was exhausted; Mark and I were in real danger of drowning.<\/p>\n
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Terry and the boys had their lifejackets on securely but mine was not fastened.\u00a0 I was holding onto the belt of Joey\u2019s life jacket with one hand and Terry with the other.\u00a0 Terry was holding onto the boys.\u00a0 Mark was holding my face against his chest with his legs under my arms.\u00a0 His feet were pushing my life jacket behind me, which negated much of the vest’s floatation.\u00a0 Luckily, he had on a new life jacket that was designed to hold children that were fifty pounds heavier that he weighed; that helped a lot.\u00a0 The waves grew larger and kept breaking over us.\u00a0 We were under water most of the time.<\/p>\n
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Mark was taking on a lot of water and I was having trouble getting air.\u00a0 We were huddled together, which gave us some added buoyancy.\u00a0 I wanted to let go of everyone and try to fasten my vest but I wasn’t sure we could stay together if I did.\u00a0 I knew that if we gave up, or made a single mistake, we would surely drown.\u00a0 I needed to conserve strength as much as possible.<\/p>\n
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A full, six gallon fuel tank; floated within my reach.\u00a0 It was unorthodox, but offered buoyancy.\u00a0 I grabbed it and put it under Mark.\u00a0 With the gas tank supporting him, I was finally able to keep my head out of the water between waves and get enough air.\u00a0 Later a seat cushion floated by, I caught it and replaced the gas can with it.\u00a0 Several more life jackets eventually drifted within reach and we retrieved them for extra flotation.\u00a0 I began to believe that we had a chance of surviving.<\/p>\n
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As the waves continued to grow and break over us; we held together, and drifted, conserving strength.\u00a0 I knew that panic would kill us, and kept verbally minimizing our predicament. Terry and the boys held up well.<\/p>\n
It was forever before the worst of the storm passed.\u00a0 Visibility slowly improved.\u00a0 The waves were still huge, but turned to swells and stopped breaking over us.\u00a0 At one point I felt something under my feet and thought it was the boat.\u00a0 Terry felt the same thing, she said it was slimy, maybe an old tree trunk.<\/p>\n
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As the water calmed, I began to touch the bottom between waves; and was eventually able to walk.\u00a0 I could barely see the shore through the mist.\u00a0 I was concerned that the waves would pound us into the rocks and cliff.\u00a0 Luck was with us, there was a narrow rocky beach between the water and a high vertical bluff.<\/p>\n
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Terry had lost her glasses and her shoes.\u00a0 She could neither walk nor see well.\u00a0 I left Joey with her, walked Mark up to the shore, left him in a safe place and then made the same trip with Joey and Terry.\u00a0 Our gear littered the shore.\u00a0 I found the ice chest and a waterproof bag containing dry clothing, and towels.<\/p>\n
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We bundled up the boys and sat them on the ice chest at the base of the bluff to shelter them from the rain.\u00a0 I began looking for a way out.\u00a0 The bluffs were too high to climb with Terry and the boys.\u00a0 The rocky beach petered out into water against the bluff on both sides of us.\u00a0 We were not sure what condition the boys were in but they seemed of sound mind and body.\u00a0 Terry and I were exhausted but ok.<\/p>\n
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As the storm dissipated, a boat became visible offshore.\u00a0 I waved the life jackets in hopes of getting their attention.\u00a0 I thought they didn’t see us.\u00a0 They did, but their anchor was hung-up in the rocks.\u00a0 They finally cut the line, picked us up; and took us to Quantico.\u00a0 They had watched us go down and were determined to find us once the storm passed.<\/p>\n
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On the way back, Joey and Mark huddled together down in the cabin.\u00a0 Terry and I sat in the stern savoring the rest and the breeze.\u00a0 It was over.\u00a0 We had survived.<\/p>\n
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It was a miracle.\u00a0 The magnitude of the storm was apparent everywhere.\u00a0 Two of the large motor boats that had been anchored in Wades Bay, about fifty feet and sixty-five feet in length respectively; had been blown up on the beach about a mile from where we wrecked.\u00a0 It looked like their bottoms were badly damaged and they were a remarkable distance from the water’s edge.<\/p>\n
When we arrived at the Quantico Marina, it was a mess.\u00a0 We learned that many boats on the Potomac River and Chesapeake Bay were capsized and a lot more were damaged.\u00a0 The staff told us the storm winds at the Marina blew between 50 and 80 miles per hour.\u00a0 The Harbor Master opined this was one of the worst storms he had ever seen at Quantico.<\/p>\n
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It seemed like years since we had left Fairview Beach.\u00a0 John and Diana’s boat was not in their slip.\u00a0 We had lost our keys and waited for them in hopes they were ok and could take us home.\u00a0 I wondered if they were in trouble and had not been as lucky as we were. \u00a0 Finally, I saw them coming up-river.\u00a0 John was hunched over the wheel and looked like hell.\u00a0 Diana was sitting behind him looking dazed. \u00a0They too, had been through an ordeal.<\/p>\n
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John had big rope burns on both of his hands, a finger that looked broken and ribs he thought were broken.\u00a0 He had been standing halfway out of the bow hatch trying to set the anchor when it hit.\u00a0 He held on, half out of the hatch, through much of the storm; wrapped in the anchor line.\u00a0 Diana was shaken but ok.<\/p>\n
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Diana took Terry and the boys home.\u00a0 John took me back to look for the boat.\u00a0 As we approached Wades Bay we could see there were several boats. \u00a0 The Maryland Natural Resource Police, Coast Guard and a Virginia Game Warden near where we had wrecked.\u00a0 I could hear them on the radio saying that they had just righted a boat and had not found the bodies.\u00a0 I got on the radio and let them know it was my boat and that I was inbound to their position.<\/p>\n
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One of the Maryland State Officers brought his boat alongside and took me aboard.\u00a0 John went back to Quantico to tend to his boat and wait for me.\u00a0 The Officers were ecstatic to learn that we had all survived.\u00a0 They had found children\u2019s clothes, my wallet, keys,\u00a0 FBI Credentials and revolver.\u00a0 With the wrecked boat and gear scattered along a half-mile of shoreline; they believed we were probably drowned.<\/p>\n
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The boat was badly damaged.\u00a0 The hull was repairable but the railing, console, engines and electronics were destroyed.<\/p>\n
The Officers were great and could not do enough.\u00a0 They retrieved the boat from the Coast Guard, which was already towing it away.\u00a0 Several of them waded along the shore with me and helped salvage our scattered gear.\u00a0 We recovered very nearly everything.<\/p>\n
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They towed the boat back to Quantico; where we could fill out the accident reports.\u00a0 John was waiting at the Harbor Master’s office.\u00a0 It took about an hour to finish the reports.\u00a0 I thought John was going to get sick when I told the Officer that I had no casualty insurance on the boat.<\/p>\n
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When we were finished, the Officer volunteered to tow the boat around the point, to the boat ramp, where my pickup was parked.\u00a0 Diana had returned with some dry clothes for me.\u00a0 John and Diana drove my truck and boat trailer to the ramp.<\/p>\n
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I rode in the boat, to steer it back to the ramp.\u00a0 It was full of water and riding low.\u00a0 I found myself relishing a cool, calm evening.\u00a0 The sunset was beautiful and the world was at peace.\u00a0 I couldn’t believe we had survived.<\/p>\n
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Neither Terry nor I slept that night.\u00a0 We held onto the boys and each other for weeks; giving thanks for our survival.<\/p>\n
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To this day, we still savor the little things, the family things; that are so easily taken for granted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On July 1, 1990, a day of boating on the Potomac River nearly turned into disaster.\u00a0 We were at Fairview Beach, on the Potomac River, about 40 minutes cruising time south of Quantico, Virginia. Our boat was a 19\u2018 center console fiberglass SEA SQUIRT, with a 115 HP Mercury Outboard and a 10 HP […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=104"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108,"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions\/108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tagesuppe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}