Suddenly Overboard

by Tom Lochhaas

  Paul was studying the shoreline in three directions. The sound continued on to the east—nowhere to go that way. The south shore was nearest but impossible to get to. The marshes to the west were closer than the north shore, but to go west they’d have to tack or jibe, and the wind was strong enough now to make either a risk.

  “We have to go across the sound,” he said. “It’s farther but easier to sail, and maybe we can stay ahead of the storm.” He tried to sound optimistic but could practically hear her doing the math in her head. It was maybe 5 or 6 miles across the sound to the safety of the bay near Edenton, which would take almost an hour.

  The thunder grew louder and the wind gustier as they sailed on a fast plane north. The wind had shifted slightly to the west at least, giving Paul hope they could make it into the bay without having to tack.

  Then another gust hit just as the starboard side was slapped by a large wave, and the Sunfish was knocked over. In the water beside it, they watched as the wind and waves turned the boat all the way over, inverting the hull.

  The first thing he noticed, once he was sure that Karen was okay, was that the daggerboard was not jutting out of its slot in the hull as it should have been. Something must have broken, or perhaps the force of capsizing had somehow slammed it out the other side. He could only hope it was still held to the boat by the bungee cord. Then he might be able to go underwater and insert it to provide the leverage to right the boat.

  Karen was not thinking about the daggerboard but was watching the sky overhead, and worrying about lightning. Angry clouds swirled overhead and rain was just beginning. What happened if lightning struck the water near you? She knew water conducted electricity—a terrifying thought.

  Her fingers were already sore from gripping the boat’s slick hull. The waves were making it harder to keep her face out of the water.

  “You think the life jackets are still in the boat?” she shouted at Paul.

  Paul looked at her, then dived under. After about 20 seconds he emerged with both life jackets.

  They got them on and were hanging on to the hull a minute later when the thunderstorm struck. Hard rain pelted their heads and shoulders and stung their eyes with the wind. The waves slamming the little Sunfish around made it hard to hold on.

  They hoped the storm would blow by as quickly as it had come, but no such luck. Paul looked frequently at his waterproof watch. After an hour they were still in the thick of it, the air full of water, blotting out the dark clouds overhead. Lightning was all around them, and they wearied of counting seconds between flashes and the following booms to see how close the strikes were. Once there was a deafening crack almost simultaneous with the flash and Karen steeled herself, expecting a shock, but nothing happened. The storm just kept raging, the waves growing higher. After the first hour they stopped talking and kept their mouths closed against the chaotic splashing against and over the hull. Each kept their own thoughts; Karen was frightened by the lightning and wondered how long it would be before they could get back to shore when the storm passed, and Paul was vowing that next time he’d check the radar with his weather app before setting out. He also thought about buying a dry bag to bring along a cell phone.

  Finally, after some 2 hours, the rain and wind slowly diminished, and eventually the rain stopped. But the boat was still being tossed about by the waves. It took another hour for the water to calm enough for them to try to climb up onto the inverted hull that offered no handholds. Even though the water temperature was in the low 80s, they were chilled after being in the water for 3 hours, But they warmed up a little as their skin dried.

  By now it was dusk and they could see lights coming on along the shore. Paul guessed they were 3 or 4 miles from the nearest shore.

  “Can we get the boat upright now?” Karen asked.

  Paul shook his head. “I felt around in the water when I went under for the life jackets. The daggerboard’s gone.”

  She stared at him; she hadn’t expected this. “So we can’t get back? There’s nothing at all we can do?”

  He shook his head again and mumbled, “Sorry.”

  They sat in silence as it grew darker, and eventually the stars began coming out. After about an hour they heard the distant sound of a boat engine and at last spotted its running lights at least a mile away, but it wasn’t coming in their direction.

  “Maybe someone will see us,” she said.

  Paul was thinking he should also get a strobe light to keep in the dry bag he was going to buy. And they should have told someone they were going sailing, someone who would have noticed when they were late getting back.

  Another hour passed. They watched planes flying far overhead and looked for more boats, maybe someone coming back late from a fishing trip—but who would have been that foolish to stay out in such a storm?

  They had given up hope of rescue and were thinking about how they’d make it through the night, whether they’d be able to stay on the hull that long, and what would happen if there was another thunderstorm. They were common this time of year.

  Then a few miles to the west Paul saw a light low in the sky that he thought might be a helicopter. The light moved north a few miles, maybe to the edge of the sound, then went back south. Eventually it turned and went north again.

  He didn’t mention it at first, as if he’d jinx it by saying aloud that it was running a search pattern. But it kept going back and forth along a line a long way to the west of them. Then Karen spotted it too. Was it getting closer? They couldn’t tell.

  Then it disappeared.

  Sometime later it was back, traversing the same route back and forth. Now it looked closer. Paul pushed the button on his watch to illuminate its face: almost midnight. They’d been out here for almost 8 hours.

  Back and forth. Back and forth. Now they could hear its chopping blades in the distance. Yes—closer!

  But by 1 A.M. it still seemed far away. Paul was worried: Karen was shivering hard and her voice was getting shaky; what if she slipped back into the water? They should have kept jackets or something in the boat cubby, he thought. He moved closer to her on the hull and carefully worked his arm around her to warm her.

  Back and forth. As the helicopter banked in its turn Paul caught a flash of light, a searchlight being played over the water. They were searching!

  Soon they could see it really was coming closer, although painfully slowly. The searchlight swung back and forth as the craft flew its straight lines.

  “They’ll be here soon,” he said at last, silently praying they wouldn’t have to turn back for more fuel first.

  Finally they could actually see the searchlight on the water as the helicopter passed and again flew on to its northern turning point. Back it came, now almost directly overhead, and the light flashed on their upturned faces, blinding them. But then it passed over them and went on. He heard Karen gasp in dismay.

  But the light was back almost immediately, and stayed on them. They had to look away from the bright light but waved frantically. They heard the engine grow louder as the helicopter descended and hovered.

  Very soon a Coast Guard swimmer came down a cable with a rescue basket and, after checking their condition, radioed the pilot and helped Karen into the basket. He assured Paul a boat was almost there and then ascended with Karen. The helicopter remained at hover until a fast cutter arrived a minute later and took Paul aboard.

  “You can thank your neighbor for this,” the guardsman told him then. “He saw you go out this afternoon and not come back. He called us around eight o’clock and we’ve been searching ever since, but we thought you were a long way west of here. Lots of water to cover.”

  Paul nodded, adding another item to his mental to-do list.

  Later, as the cutter motored back toward the Coast Guard station, they radioed in and then told him that Karen had been checked and was just fine. “Pretty lucky, you two,” the guardsman added.

  The Inverted Cat

  Day 1

  He co
uld not believe the sun would set on him out here, was setting. All afternoon Juan had sat precariously on the catamaran’s inverted hull, legs in the water, watching one horizon, then another. He mostly watched to the east, back toward Culebra, waiting for a fishing boat to pass by and see him. There should have been dozens of boats by now, not just one or two on the far horizon headed he knew not where. The boats going back to Fajardo should have come right by him.

  What scared him most was that Culebra had disappeared sometime in the afternoon, just slipped away as if the island had sunk into the sea. Without its smudge on the horizon he felt disoriented. Not until the sun was dropping could he even figure out directions. How can an island just disappear? But he knew he was not crazy, that he had to be moving away for the island to disappear, but with the boat turned turtle and the mast and sail in the water like a giant sea anchor, it should not have been blown far. Besides, the wind was very light now and had been most of the day, once the morning squall had passed, that gusty squall that had flipped the Hobie only an hour into his sail.

  His mother was going to kill him. She’d ordered him not to try this crossing in his little boat, but he was old enough now to decide for himself and had just smiled at her fear and told her he was spending the weekend with friends.

  Again he tried to calculate the distances. It was about 30 kilometers from Culebra to Fajardo, just an adventurous trade-wind sail of only 4 hours or so. Had he sailed maybe 8 kilometers before the squall struck? Until near the end he was sailing the compass course of 290 degrees. When the squall struck the wind abruptly went south, then southeast, and he had hauled in the sheets tight and shot forward like a rocket, until that gust.

  Next time, he kept telling himself, repeating the phrase all day like a mantra, next time he would tie a lanyard on the compass. Thankfully his water bottle floated and had bobbed up close by where he could swim to it, but he had lost everything else. He had dived under and found the boat bag still tied to the trapeze, but everything had spilled out: his watch, his cell phone, the sunscreen, his lunch . . . and his compass.

  Next time, too, he would repair the broken mast float so the boat wouldn’t turn turtle and he could right it as he had been taught long ago.

  When the sun was gone, he had a moment of fear and raised his legs as far as he could from the water, but it was difficult to balance with only the rudder to hold on to and eventually he put them back in the water. Where were the boats? Where was the island?

  Day 2

  He should not have drunk so much of his water yesterday. He had been so sure a boat would pass soon. Now he had only a little left, and by midmorning the hot sun was drying his sweat almost as soon as it appeared and his mouth was dry cotton. He took a sip only occasionally, but each time the water seemed to soak into his tongue and cheeks before he could swallow. His dry throat ached.

  His mind was getting fuzzy, too, but that was probably from the heat and lack of sleep through the longest night of his life. The stars had been so bright they made his eyes sore. All night he kept reminding himself to keep watch. There was nothing on the horizon where Culebra should be, judging direction from the swell, and the distant sky glow that ought to be Fajardo was not quite where it should be either.

  Sometimes he thought there were lights of boats on the horizon, but usually they were just stars that rose brighter or dropped into the ocean.

  He was so thirsty. He stared into the sea and thought of water, his thoughts drifting, and then he would jerk out of his fog and remember to look around again.

  The sun was very high when he found himself staring at his arms, noticing he wasn’t sweating. That seemed odd. He touched the skin and pulled his hand back; it was hotter than he felt on the inside.

  With both hands firmly grasping the rudder that pointed absurdly at the sky, he slipped off the hull into the water, easing in down to his neck. The cool water felt wonderful. A little wave slapped his face and wet his lips, and his tongue went out to lick them—but he caught himself in time. Drinking salt water kills you; first it makes you crazy and then it kills you.

  Chart section showing the catamaran’s intended course west to Puerto Rico and how it drifted to the northwest in the current.

  He thought again of the canvas boat bag beneath the catamaran. Maybe he should check it again for his compass. Maybe it was wedged in a fold at the bottom and he had missed it yesterday.

  Then he got angry at himself. What good was a compass? He was not going anywhere.

  He realized that with his eyes so low to the water he could not see far, and then only for a moment on each wave crest. He had to get higher to see farther. But he did not want to get back out in the sun.

  Maybe he should try again to right the catamaran. There must be something more that he could try. By himself he was not heavy enough to push one hull far enough down to lever the other up. Think! But he could not think of how, and he was too tired to make the effort.

  He climbed out and crouched as high as he could on the hull, balancing with one hand on the rudder, and looked around.

  Back in the water. Back up to look. The last of his water was long gone. A dull lethargy settled in, his thoughts drifting, until suddenly he would remember to look again.

  He saw boats sometimes, a long way off. Late in the day a big sport fisherman with a high flying bridge seemed closer and he tried to stand to his full height and wave his arms, but he slipped and fell into the water. Stupid! he tried to shout at himself, hearing only a dry croak that startled him. But it made him realize he needed some way to signal a passing boat. He thought for a while, then dived under the boat and removed the tiller extension to use as a pole that he could tie his shirt to. It took him several attempts to get it free, but eventually he sat again on the hull with the pole across his lap, panting, his head aching, but feeling more hopeful for a time. He looked for boats again.

  Then the sun went down.

  Day 3

  During the night he had strange thoughts and wondered if he was asleep and dreaming of stars or was still awake. How could he tell the difference? When the first light of dawn showed him the sea around him, at first he wasn’t sure where he was.

  He found the tiller extension pole still wedged tightly through his belt and stared at it. What was that doing there?

  He was beyond thirst now, his mouth a clot and his lips stuck together, though he thought of water continually in an abstract way. Like the sea. Like boats. Like the sun. All just vague abstractions. He numbly went in and out of the water to stay cool, but he had all but forgotten why he got back out.

  This last time he had great difficulty climbing out, and he felt dizzy as soon as he sat up. His head throbbed with a fast beat, and his heart raced in his ears and throat. Nausea and cramps bent him double; he just wanted to drop back into the water.

  Maybe he could tie himself to the hull with his belt and close his eyes for a while.

  Maybe he could just let go and drift away peacefully. But he did not feel peaceful. He felt dizzy, sick, and angry.

  Then the sun went down.

  Midnight

  He dreamed of being lost in the stars, swimming in the Milky Way. The stars were bright all around him, and the giant moon at his side was so bright he narrowed his eyes. He heard music above the slapping waves, music like heaven. The moon was so close he could touch it.

  He raised one hand toward the moon and saw it silhouetted in the light, many lights all along the water, lights between his spread fingers. He felt a deep throbbing in the water as if his heart had swollen and was beating so fast it was a continual thrumming. The sound grew suddenly louder and startled him, and then his eyes focused and he saw row after row of lights past his hand—a ship!

  It was approaching obliquely, a massive ship, so lit up it looked like a ship of souls bound for heaven. Then recognition: it was a cruise ship. Coming almost right at him!

  Adrenaline shot through him as he ripped off his shirt and hastily tied it to the pole and bega
n waving it as high as he could. Surely they would see him; the ship was so close he was bathed in its light. He saw shapes of people behind the windows.

  He tried to shout but his throat was too dry. He cupped a hand in the sea and splashed it into his mouth, then spat. “Help!” he screamed into the roar of passing engines. He waved his shirt frantically and searched the empty deck rail for someone to see him.

  As the ship passed he slipped and fell back in the water. By the time he climbed back up and discovered he had lost the pole with his shirt, it was already moving away.

  The stars all went out as the music faded.

  Much later, they told him it had been only another hour before the helicopter found him, but he had no memory of it. They said he looked straight up into the searchlight but did not wave, did not even move his mouth or blink. Where had he been?

  He did not remember the helicopter and only barely recalled the rescue boat. What he remembered best was waking in the hospital and being given a single ice chip to suck on.

  You were very lucky, they told him still later. A passenger saw you as the ship passed, but no one believed him until they reviewed the security camera tapes, which showed a quick flicker in the dark waves. By then it was too late to turn back, but the captain radioed the Coast Guard.

  They showed him the chart and where they had found him, 8 kilometers north of Loiza. Loiza! That was 30 kilometers beyond Fajardo and far to the north, over 50 kilometers from where he had capsized.

  “The current,” they told him. In a week he might have washed up in the Bahamas. He had been very lucky.

  Briefly

  Hog Neck Bay, New York, August 2011. A brother and sister in their early twenties were sailing their Sunfish offshore when it capsized. They were wearing life jackets and stayed afloat but were unable to right the boat. They had no way to call for help. They stayed with the overturned hull for a time but eventually decided the odds were against anyone happening upon them. Although they were at least 2 miles from shore, they set off swimming. Soon they were exhausted and cold, but good luck was with them. Their mother had gotten worried and called the police. They were found still a mile and a half offshore.