Sunday, November 19, 2006. Third day out of Road Harbour, two boats cruising in company having cleared USVI Customs and were lying on moorings at the Caneel end of Honeymoon Beach on the north shore of St John. Ours is an Athena 38 cat from Conch Charters, 2 males, 5 females on board.
A few hours’ snorkeling and limin’ on the boats, then two dink loads head back into Cruz Bay for dinner and nightlife. Both crews scattered and agreed to meet up later. I hit my usual haunts (the Quiet Mon Pub and the Inn at Tamarind Court) before settling on a bar stool at John-Paul’s Roadside Beer Stand just downhill from the police station.
Stayed there WAY too long before being summoned by the rest of the crew. Back into the dink and found the boats (the glow sticks helped). My wife Jenny slipped off the side of the dink into the water. We fished her out and all had a good laugh. Some snacks and a nitecap before retiring to my cabin around midnight.
What seemed like 3 minutes later (actually it was 2:00am) I was awakened by one of my crew pounding on my cabin door saying, “Chuck, I don’t mean to alarm you, but I think we have an emergency”. All I could think of was, ‘well, ain’t this a revoltin’ development’.
I shook Jenny awake and swung my legs too the floor. I found that I was standing just over knee-deep in water. Temporarily couldn’t open my cabin door because it swings in and the floorboard had floated up and blocked it. Fog clearing fast in my brain as the other male member of the crew, my bud Joey, joined me to assess the situation. Jenny is climbing the companionway stairs, slips, and falls back into the water now 3 feet deep in the hull and rising. Not a scratch. She climbs out.
After some searching we found the leak: In the starboard-side head, the outflow hose from the head unit, attached to a through-hull fitting below the waterline, had parted. The boat was rapidly filling with water. We had shut the thru-hull as a precaution because the head was filling with seawater while the boat was underway. The water was coming into the boat THROUGH the head unit.
Strategy: First, stop the leak. I grabbed my dive light and located the roll of duct tape we had brought (I ALWAYS bring a roll of duct tape). Got the hose re-attached to the fitting, about 2 feet under water. Now I’m fully awake, and church-mouse sober.
Next, get the water out. Hit the sump pump button: nothing happens. Not a sound. Okay, get to the emergency bilge pump in the lazarette. Hose hasn’t been used in years, is buried under a ton of other stuff, and is bound with wire. Clear the stuff, cut the wire, and extend the hose into the starboard hull. Can’t find the pump handle. Okay, use a long-handled screwdriver. Pump moves up and down, but does not pump water. Sheesh.
Back into the partially-submerged starboard head. I notice that the water level is about 3 inches above the lip of the ‘throne’. Okay, it’s a pump too. Flip the valve to ‘out only’ and begin pumping the handle. Finally, water starts exiting the boat. I continue this for awhile, noticing a bit of electric current tingling me while pumping. Kept pumping until the water was level with the rim of the head unit. Now what?
Meanwhile, in the other hull, someone had noticed that the escape hatch in the starboard head was now (just barely) above water level. We grabbed a bucket, opened the hatch, and all aboard took turns bailing water through the escape hatch while getting zapped by electric current.
This continued for about two hours until the water level was back below the floorboards, which had all floated around for awhile. We found the sump pump had shifted due to being submerged in the sloshing water and the hot lead had come loose. That’s where the current was coming from. We re-attached it and the pump worked (not that we really needed it any more).
About 5:30 am we had things back to “normal”.
The water level had been high enough to flow over the watertight bulkhead into the starboard engine compartment, so we had to bail that, too.
A few things to ponder. First, that the builders at Fountaine-Pajot didn’t have enough sense to loop the outflow hose above the waterline to form a ‘trap’ against the inflow of water. Second, that the emergency bilge pump didn’t work. Third, that the sump pump wasn’t mounted, just sitting on a shelf. Fourth, that water could pass through the head unit that fast. And finally, that the sump pump breaker didn’t pop even though there was a direct short to the seawater in the boat.
The rest of the trip went without incident. More trip report to follow, including a delightful Thanksgiving on Anegada with Walker and Nancy. We eventually had a good laugh at my wife’s expense when we discovered that she is the only person we know that has fallen into the water both INSIDE and OUTSIDE a boat in the same evening.
Best,
Chuck
