We had interesting experience about 2 years ago that definitely falls under this category.

I posted this previously on this site and received some good advice including using the Pan Pan call next time something like happens.

We were having a smooth trip on a Marine Max 48' Power Cat. We were on the Bitter End docks and attempted to run both our engines to heat up water for showers and the starboard engine would not turnover. Our charter company spent several hours working on the engine but it was determined that the error code resolved in having to replace the controllers which required parts to be shipped in. The charter company agreed to meet us to swap boats once we were closer to base.

As a result we limped out of the BEYC docks on one engine and headed back towards Tortola with some ominous weather heading our direction. To this day I still remember telling Nick at Bitter End (and now at Oil Nut) that he must see things like this all of the time and having him tell me that he can't remember even one case.

We slowly made our towards the base and eventually came along Beef Island towards the Drake Channel. A power boaters worst nightmare hit us right at the Southeastern tip of Beef Island next to an area called the Bluffs when we lost our Port engine and had no power to the boat. At this point we were about 300 feet from shore and still experiencing heavy seas since that area is not well protected and we were still hitting the rougher weather from the storm system. My wife (also our captain) attempted to re-start the boat but the controllers were not engaging the engine at all. We were able to get an anchor down in about 70' of water but drifted back until we obtained a good scope on the anchor.

We called our base which was relatively close and requested emergency assistance. I am not sure exactly how long it took for cavalry to arrive with a boat to tow us back but it must have been the longest 30 minutes of my life even though our anchor was holding once it reached about 40' of water and we had drifted to within 100 feet of the shore.

The tow back was a little challenging given the need to get lines across in rough seas and the issue of towing a relatively large boat. Our crew and the charter base manager did a great job and aside from a couple minor scrapes from the tow everyone was in good shape.

What we did correctly:

- Once we lost the first engine we stayed as far away from shore as we could unless we did not have another choice. We did get too close when heading around Beef Island and should have stayed off another 300 feet but we still had time to react and were much further off then we have been in the past.

- Our charter company does a very good job during the boat briefing on how to use the anchoring equipment so when we were scrambling to avoid drifting into the shore we were trained well enough to get it down. The scope was not ideal since we started in 70 of water and could not get a good ratio but as we drifter closer to sure we caught once we hit about 40 of water. The key message from this one is always make sure you understand exactly how the anchor works with and without power. We tend to use mooring balls exclusively so we were not well versed in the anchor but remember our training well. If we had not been able to get the anchor down then this likely would have been a story about salvaging a boat instead of one about a tow back to the marina.

- We also had a backup anchor ready to go in the event that the first one failed but we would only use that if we decided to abandon ship.

- We were able to give our non-boating guests clear direction to help with things like pulling out life jackets, getting the portable VHF ready, and detangling the rear anchor as a backup. Looking back on the boat when we got back I can honestly say that there is not one piece of safety equipment that was not ready to go and within arms-reach if we needed it.

Lessons Learned:

- We will use the Pan Pan command over the radio next time to line-up potential help since we were not in a May Day situation but could have end up in one quickly.

- My wife and I were the only experienced boaters on this trip and we should have done a better job training our crew. We had a couple of people step up and really help save the day but several thought this emergency was nothing to really worry about until after the event. Making sure your crew understands what can go wrong and that emergencies can occur is definitely something we learned from this experience.

- Some people on our group did pack-up key documents and other possessions. I should have given them better direction to leave everything and not worry about things that can be replaced. I don t think they realized at the time how close we were to abandoning ship or ending up on the rocks.

- We ran an initial error code from checkout by one of the mechanics before we left the dock and were told it was nothing to worry about. Hindsight is always 20/20 but I am pretty sure the error message was a pre-cursor to the problems we ran into. We have never had a single engine problem in 5 years with this exact boat but something was clearly not right throughout the trip and we should have known better.

- We did cut the last turn a little too close and I wish we had more distance available to the shore. We did not an excellent job keep in a safe distance on the rest of the trip and still probably had at least 20 of drift time until we would have hit. Time to plan is your best friend is situations like this and we could have used more especially given the rough seas and unprotected location.

- Always know where all of your safety gear is at. Given our experience on the vessel we knew where everything was stored but on other boats I may not have paid as good of attention and not known since I never would have thought they would have been needed.

- Understand exactly how your anchor works with power and without power. Also make sure you understand how much chain you have so you know what the shallowest water depth that you should be able to anchor in. This means knowing the amount of chain/rope and the desired scope given the areas you are in. Given that we were quickly drifting towards shore I was most concerned about catching something and should have care a little more about scope but our distance to shore and water depth made that more challenging.

- Make sure you understand how to deploy the dinghy and/or life raft especially in rough seas. We had several older guests on the boat and it would have been challenging to get them into the dinghy in 6 foot seas but we would have figured something out given the alternative.

- We were a little too complacent with the perceived safety of the area. The rough seas definitely compounded our ability to get the boat set but at times I feel like we are boating on our inland lake and not on a body of water that can turn quickly on you. The storm exasperated this situation but that is always how Murphy's Law turns out so I should not be surprised. We will definitely respect our surroundings more on future trips.

- I know it is a challenge for the charter companies to balance boating experience with the need to have boats rented but I am not sure we would have reacted the same if we had not docked in the past with a missing engine or thruster. Most of our boating experience is on freshwater lakes so this was certainly more terrifying but having 40+ years boating experience between the 2 of us helped. We also own 3 personal vessels ranging from a PWC to an 87 houseboat so we are on the water quite a bit. I can t say that one of the so called credit card captains would have been as lucky as we were in this situation but it is another reason to make sure people with less experience think through the worst case scenario at all times.

- If you are down to 1 engine and suspect any problems that could lead to the 2nd engine going out then stay where you are at if you are at a dock or mooring ball. We should have waited for the parts to arrive and worst case left the boat at BEYC if it could not be fixed before we had to fly home. With that said we spoke to a couple of professional captains and we were told that losing both engines is almost unheard of and also almost always caused by a user error such as wrapping a prop with lines. In our case it was simply equipment failure.

- If you need to tie up two boats in rough seas be extremely careful. Given the sea conditions it was very challenging to tie up the boats and someone on either boat could have severely injured a hand. This is especially true for inexperienced boaters that may feel that you can simply push two boats apart which is very difficult in heavy seas and with larger boats.