A bit of excitement at my Marina this morning

Wayfarer · Aug 3, 2015

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I woke up a few hours ago and saw I had a bunch of text messages from my mom and sister. Apparently there was a bit of a fire. Two boats destroyed, three more damaged. I went through several emotions in rapid succession: surprise, dread, insurance fueled joy, disappointment at learning my boat was fine, relief that my boat was fine, very relieved my boat didn't start the fire.

What a way to wake up.

clynn · Aug 3, 2015

very relieved my boat didn't start the fire.[/QUOTE said:
Probably the most important statement... What a nightmare that would be.

GFC · Aug 3, 2015

Link didn't work for me. Maybe it was taken down already for other news.

wayfarer, glad to hear your boat was not involved.

healhustler · Aug 3, 2015

Yeah, I sure would prefer that line of excitement to the other one.

Codger2 · Aug 3, 2015

Wayfarer said:
I went through several emotions in rapid succession: surprise, dread, insurance fueled joy, disappointment at learning my boat was fine, relief that my boat was fine, very relieved my boat didn't start the fire.

What a way to wake up.

I know it wasn't funny at the time but the way you tell it sure gave me a good laugh!

Wayfarer · Aug 3, 2015

It wasn't much of a link anyway. They're still investigating. No one was hurt, thankfully.
Here's the picture from the article:

ImageUploadedByTrawler Forum1438642287.999891.jpg

My mom sent me some pictures. Here's what's left of the 36(ish) foot Sea Ray.

ImageUploadedByTrawler Forum1438642311.846534.jpg

ImageUploadedByTrawler Forum1438642337.559914.jpg

Sea Ray's neighbor, sporting a hot new two tone canvas look.

ImageUploadedByTrawler Forum1438642365.173718.jpg

Not sure what they did with the other boat. I guess it was just as bad as the Sea Ray.

BandB · Aug 3, 2015

Every time I hear of such an event, once I hear no one died or was seriously injured, then I'm very relieved. Losing a boat is one thing, but being caught in a fire is a terrifying thought. Thankfully you and others are ok.

Off Duty · Aug 4, 2015

BandB said:
Every time I hear of such an event, once I hear no one died or was seriously injured, then I'm very relieved. Losing a boat is one thing, but being caught in a fire is a terrifying thought. Thankfully you and others are ok.

Amen to that!
Fire is the one thing, that scares the living crap out of me!
A lot of my friends are firefighters, and they say the same thing about gunfire, but I'll deal with the latter.

Glad you all (and your boat) are ok.
Dealing with the insurance hounds can be it's own kind of nightmare!

Codger2 said:
I know it wasn't funny at the time but the way you tell it sure gave me a good laugh!

Yes it was.
Especially the part about being both happy and sad at the same time, that it wasn't his boat... :rofl:

BandB · Aug 4, 2015

Off Duty said:
Amen to that!
Fire is the one thing, that scares the living crap out of me!
A lot of my friends are firefighters, and they say the same thing about gunfire, but I'll deal with the latter.

Glad you all (and your boat) are ok.
Dealing with the insurance hounds can be it's own kind of nightmare!

You imagine what it's like to be close to a fire, but most of us don't really know. We took a fire fighting course though a maritime school. Part of it involved a facility in which we had to actually fight fires. This was small and controlled and as tough as it was, I can't even still imagine what firefighters face.

psneeld · Aug 4, 2015

Experience does help...towed this explosion from the fuel dock and fought it almost an hour with just a fire hose to a trash pump for an hour till the local fireboat with foam showed up. Once fuel and water are ignited in a bilge...it is rare that you can put it out with other than foam. dry chem maybe....but reflashes seem continuous till buried in foam. (summer of 2013)

Kept the fire away from spilled fuel and the engine the best I could and to keep the boat from swamping and letting more fuel out and spreading the fire.

Like many emergencies, quick, decisive first actions can dramatically reduce dangers and keep damage to a minimum.

Confined space fires are a whole different animal for responders.

Wayfarer · Aug 4, 2015

BandB said:
You imagine what it's like to be close to a fire, but most of us don't really know. We took a fire fighting course though a maritime school. Part of it involved a facility in which we had to actually fight fires. This was small and controlled and as tough as it was, I can't even still imagine what firefighters face.

I've done basic and advanced firefighting several times now, and being in a burning room is something I will never get used to. It's a hell of a thing.
Actually, I've had a lot of fun at fire school. Its literally a blast. It's something I'd recommend to anyone. Lots of very useful information that could very well save your life.

Off Duty · Aug 4, 2015

psneeld said:
Experience does help...towed this explosion from the fuel dock and fought it almost an hour with just a fire hose to a trash pump for an hour till the local fireboat with foam showed up. Once fuel and water are ignited in a bilge...it is rare that you can put it out with other than foam. dry chem maybe....but reflashes seem continuous till buried in foam. (summer of 2013)

Kept the fire away from spilled fuel and the engine the best I could and to keep the boat from swamping and letting more fuel out and spreading the fire.

Like many emergencies, quick, decisive first actions can dramatically reduce dangers and keep damage to a minimum.

Confined space fires are a whole different animal for responders.

Great job on that my Coastie brethren.
Your actions and quick thinking may have saved more than you realized.

Art · Aug 4, 2015

180 degrees in respect to marine doings/boats... but, still a catastrophe as well as insurance nightmare:

6 PM, Sunday 7/26/15 we had a 200 yr White Oak unexpectedly let go and crash a 20 ton piece (it's largest of five shoots off the main trunk) into porch side of one of our houses. Entire 125 tall tree became compromised and needed falling. Estimated to be 50 tons in its entirety. Our dealings with CA AAA Insurance is just getting underway... what fun this is already becoming and will be for a while! Luckily no one was injured. I'll include a few picts. Due to the equipment use, tree's impact area and extensive branch coverage, as well as more than ten workers trampling everything for a week... The Oak used to cover and shade entire area... landscaping is now GONE! :trash:

First two picts show the area of split off main tree and tree on house.

Next few are procedures, i.e. 70 ton crane on our property

Last pict is how we feel about this! - LOL

We'd Rather B Boaten! - :speed boat:

Off Duty · Aug 4, 2015

Good Gosh man!
You guys are lucky fortunate no one was injured.

GFC · Aug 4, 2015

Amen to that. Was it a strong wind that brought that limb down or just old age and its weight?

Marin · Aug 4, 2015

A few years ago a condo boathouse (30 boats under a common roof in slips owned by the individual boat owners) caught fire from an electrical short and burned completely taking all 30 boats with it. These ranged form older cabin cruisers to a newish Grand Banks 42.

The boathouse was an acknowledged disaster waiting to happen; I was told later that during the winter when the power draw of heaters was high the cables connecting the boathouse to the harbor's power system got so hot (they were underwater) that they would be boiling the water around them and the bubbles would stream up to the surface.

All the boats were unoccupied except one. A couple lived on board year round and I believe were asleep when the fire started. The noise woke them up but by then they could not leave the boat by the main cabin door because the fire was right there. They tried to open the hatch in the rear cabin to get out that way but they had piled stuff on or against the hatch--- the kind of stuff that accumulates as a result of boat projects--- so the hatch could not be opened.

They called friends on a cell phone and were pleading for help as they burned to death in the aft cabin of the boat.

The harbor's boathouse requirements changed after this event. Today, all the boathouses, condo or individual, must have working and regularly inspected sprinkler systems installed, the power connections to the port's power network have to meet vastly upgraded standards, and so forth.

Of all the things one can be concerned about if they have a boat in a harbor, fire is the one that we are most concerned with. Even in open slips, fire can rapidly spread from boat to boat, particularly if it's windy, which it usually is in our harbor.

BandB · Aug 4, 2015

Wayfarer said:
I've done basic and advanced firefighting several times now, and being in a burning room is something I will never get used to. It's a hell of a thing.
Actually, I've had a lot of fun at fire school. Its literally a blast. It's something I'd recommend to anyone. Lots of very useful information that could very well save your life.

I wouldn't have referred to "fire school" as fun. Blast maybe. However, potentially an invaluable experience. We had some of these, "are we really going to do this" kinds of thoughts but then we had a lot of wow's and eye opening once we did it. Sure hope never to have to use anything we learned.

BandB · Aug 4, 2015

Art said:
180 degrees in respect to marine doings/boats... but, still a catastrophe as well as insurance nightmare:

6 PM, Sunday 7/26/15 we had a 200 yr White Oak unexpectedly let go and crash a 20 ton piece (it's largest of five shoots off the main trunk) into porch side of one of our houses. Entire 125 tall tree became compromised and needed falling.

I'm not knowledgeable of trees but growing up in NC we never worried about the oaks. Pine trees obviously. And the one hardwood that destroyed houses was Poplar. We had one destroy our front porch when I was very young.

Art · Aug 4, 2015

Off Duty said:
Good Gosh man!
You guys are lucky fortunate no one was injured.

GFC said:
Amen to that. Was it a strong wind that brought that limb down or just old age and its weight?

Thank you both for good vibes!

It takes a bit to explain just what happened in the couple minutes before the actual fall took place. As well it takes some time to explain how our CA drought assisted in this and other tree falls occurring all around. I've learned a lot in the last week.

Suffice it to say... I was in lower section of property and heard it begin to suddenly give way. Bellowed up to my wife on the top and most affected porch to run for her life out of the house. She was missed by seconds. If I had not been where I was... well let's just say... Oh Shat!!!

Marin · Aug 4, 2015

My wife was on the crash crew at Whidbey Island Naval Station for the last portion of her enlistment. Among other duties she was the turret operator on one of the base's big Oshkoshes. To this day she can look at a plume of smoke coming up from a distant fire and tell me what materials are burning.

They did a lot of aircrew fire training including putting aircrews into a big pit with a lot of oil and setting the oil on fire. She and her crew also had real fires to put out as a result of aircraft problems during operations at the NAS itself and the Coupeville training strip farther down the island. The planes were A-6s and EA-6Bs.

While she has never talked much about the details of her fire experience she has said that fire is, in her opinion, the most underestimated thing in the human mind, and until one deals with its reality--- not in training classes or exercises but in actual, life-threatening, out-of-control fires-- it's impossible to begin to fathom what it's like and what it can do to you.

BandB · Aug 4, 2015

Marin said:
in actual, life-threatening, out-of-control fires-- it's impossible to begin to fathom what it's like and what it can do to you.

My mother had a friend who survived a home fire with minimal physical injury. The emotional injury never left. Decades later she still had tremors. She said that she could never feel truly safe again.

Art · Aug 4, 2015

BandB said:
I'm not knowledgeable of trees but growing up in NC we never worried about the oaks. Pine trees obviously. And the one hardwood that destroyed houses was Poplar. We had one destroy our front porch when I was very young.

Oaks have gone into water storage panic mode due to 4 yr drought in CA. Their DNA is forcing crisis water storage into all portions; including outer limbs. Unusual weight is what ruined this 200 yr. old oak tree. Wherever they can oaks are pocketing water. I watched at about 150' feet away as the Oak went down. At the hub where five big stems came out of the huge trunk, when the largest cracked off toward house, there was an immediate splurge of water that fell to ground... looked like a 55 gallon drum had been tipped over.

Decades experienced tree cutters, an arborist, and the county fire chief were who wised me up on cause and effect we just experienced. As well as how often this same scenario is beginning to happen. Predictions are for a crazy wet "el nino" winter season this time around... we shall see!

We'll be planting new trees soon!

Blissboat · Aug 4, 2015

Agree that fire aboard is the worst news a captain can get. During my twenty-plus years skippering inspected passenger vessels, only once did I experience the taste of near panic. During a loss-of-power incident (caused by a failure of twelve-volt power to my Mathers MicroCommander controls - a story for another day), I had 120 pax aboard. Half my brain was evaluating possible risks to their safety while the other half tried to diagnose the immediate problem. Then the mate announced that he smelled smoke coming from another compartment below the waterline. That, thank God, turned out to be a false alarm, but the three minutes it took to confirm were the most adrenaline-fueled of my career. The sequence of incidents added up to a non-event, but I still ponder the what-ifs.

A bit of excitement at my Marina this morning

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