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Disaster Struck!
Friday, March 27, 0745, Underway at ICW mile 285, Near Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina, Onboard Griffin.

Yesterday morning, we were cruising up the ICW drinking coffee and going through our normal morning evolutions. Tom was driving and navigating, and I was sending the update photos and writing the day's journal. We were passing Jeremy Creek, at McClellanville, South Carolina when a small sailboat pulled out into the waterway in front of us. Tom slowed and dropped off plane. We always pass sailboats and trawlers at a slow speed so our wake doesn't rock them around too much.

After wrapping a plastic mesh clamming bag around the port propeller, Tom got to go diving in this borrowed scuba equipment.

Tom eased on by the sailboat and advanced the throttles to get back on plane. There is a satisfying roar from the engines when the turbos kick in at 2,500 rpm and you can feel the shove as the boat starts accelerating briskly. Today, as the rpm climbed past 2,000 we got that horrible vibration that we last experienced at Mosquito Lagoon. A vibration that shook the whole boat. Tom chopped the throttles and both our heads snapped to the depthsounder. 15.6 feet. Dead center of the channel. We couldn't have gone aground.

We tried to accelerate again, in denial that we had a problem. The boat shook like a rag doll in my golden retriever's mouth. We pulled the throttles back again. Which side was the problem. We advanced the starboard throttle. We got to 2,500 with no vibration. We retarded the throttle to idle. The port throttle went forward and we found our problem. It started vibrating at 1,500 so we pulled her back.

The water was so cold, even in this full wet suit that Capt. Dan used under the ice in Rhode Island, Tom couldn't stop shivering. Capt. Dan is feeding Tom hot coffee to try and keep his core temperature up high enough to work at the tangle around the prop.

In this part of the world there are a lot of watermen who make their living taking things out of the waterway. We have seen big shrimpers like the boat in Forrest Gump. We have seen fishermen toss nets held up with floats for 100 yards across the waterway. We have seen numerous buoys for crab pots, and we have seen clammers digging in the shallows.

The water level in the rivers and streams that make up the waterway here have been very high. Lots of rain and the current phase of the tide are the causes. This has done two things. The first is that sometimes the crap traps that are dropped in 13' of water with a 15' line to the float, are now on the bottom in 16' of water. That means the float is below the surface. We have seen many a float visible only from the wake the tide roaring past creates as it flows over the submerged float. It looks like a submerged rock in the rapids of a river.

The other thing we are encountering is that the high water level is floating flotsam back into the river from when it was deposited by the last high water. The river is just full of logs, twigs, and other floating trash.

The culprit. Capt. Dan and Tom admire the strength of the plastic mesh bag that wrapped it's way around the port prop.

With the vibration coming from the port engine, and with both of us certain that we were in deep water we had two possibilities that jumped to mind. The first was that we had caught a crap trap and wrapped her line around our screw. The second possibility was that we had hit a deadhead. A deadhead is a waterlogged log that floats just below the surface. If we had been at cruise speed, that could have bent a prop blade. We weren't going fast so we hoped it was a line that we would be able to clear easily.

We have a practice on Griffin. The Driver is the Diver. When I hit, I had to go into the balmy tropical Florida water. Tom had the bad luck to be driving this time so it was his turn. We slowed down and pulled over to the side of the channel. We dropped our anchor and shut down the engines. The little sailboat came by heading north and asked us if we needed help. We manfully replied we were all set, and then for some reason I added, "...unless you have a wetsuit onboard." Tom was already whining about the temperature of the water, so I at least wanted to make the effort.

We didn't realize how lucky we were! Capt. Dan replied he had a wetsuit, tanks, diving knife, weight belt, etc., etc. He dropped his anchor ahead of us and drifted back to tie up alongside. Tom got into his bathing suit and then donned the borrowed wetsuit. The water was very cold and it took a while to get down to the prop. Tom figured out what was going on, but was having some difficulty with the older scuba equipment. He ultimately preferred to free dive with a snorkel and no tank.

Golfing is such a focus for Myrtle Beach that they even have a cable car that crosses the ICW to take golfers from one side to the other.

When we started this process, the tide had just started to ebb. The current was a little less than a knot, heading back out to sea. The current built swiftly while Tom wrestled with the cold and unfamiliar scuba gear. He started shivering so badly he couldn't get enough air out of the scuba tank, or even gulp down enough while on the surface to dive under the boat holding his breath. Capt. Dan brought over a thermos of coffee. We poured it into Tom to try and warm him up.

The current picked up strength. 1 knot, then 2 knots. It started flowing at something like 2.5 knots at full ebb. Twigs, junk, leaves flowed past the boat. The current eddied around the back of our stationary anchored boat like we were motoring through the river. Tom had several things to fight with. A swimmer in a wet suit can swim at 8 tenths of a knot. The current was now 3 times that. The cold was sapping his strength and air supply, and his energy was being spent trying to hang on to the boat. He had to let go of the swim platform and sprint-swim forward to grab the prop before being washed astern. When he was down there he had only a few seconds to orient himself and saw at the problem, a big white heavy plastic mesh bag wrapped firmly around the prop and shaft.

This Pontoon Bridge at Sunset Beach, North Carolina, is the last of it's type on the waterway. We can see why as it takes a while to open and close.

Tom popped to the surface 2 feet from the back of the boat, being dragged away from the boat fast. I quickly reached for him from the swim platform and grabbed his arm just as he kicked hard and snagged the swim platform. It was close. He almost got swept away. Enough was enough. He climbed back on board. Capt. Dan, Tom and I conferred. About 1/2 mile away was Jeremy Creek. Home to a bunch of working fishing boats. Not really much of a pleasure boat harbor but all we needed to do was get out of the current.

Tom didn't want to turn the port shaft and undo all his hard won work so we motored in with just the starboard shaft turning. This makes maneuvering interesting but we were able to tie up without too much trouble. Tom jumped back in and cleared the prop in about 2 minutes.

We pushed off the pier and got back underway again, after giving Capt. Dan two oranges and his equipment back. We got an address where we are going to send him a replacement wet suit. His original wet suit has been well used over the years and tore pretty badly when Tom put it on.

After all that excitement, we had a pretty uneventful day after that. We pushed north for Cape Fear. The marina there was going to be closed when we got there so we stopped at Dock Holidays in Myrtle Beach for fuel at about 4:15 and made it in to Cape Fear a few minutes after sunset. A quick washdown, shower, Mexican dinner and off to sleep.

Sunset Underway. The sun set about 5 minutes before we pulled into Southport, North Carolina at the mouth of the Cape Fear River.

Today, we have punched out into the Atlantic again. Tom thinks it is safer. No bags to wrap around the props, no logs to hit, no bottom within 60 feet of our keel to scrape. The weather is reasonably calm, and we are running with the wind on our beam, but expected it to shift to our back soon. We are going to pull in at Beaufort, North Carolina and then run up the ICW to Bel Haven, 135 miles south of Norfolk.

We have a decision to make about the route from Bel Haven to Norfolk. We have decided to get your input. There will be a special interactive update coming out today at 2:00pm. It's going to be:

Griffin Special Interactive Update #8-A: YOU are the Navigator!

Look for it after 2:00 in your e-mail box. We want your input!

Warm regard,

The Griffin Crew, Jon & Tom

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