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Back to Captain Logs 2001

What a day aboard Pride of Baltimore II! We have just learned of the horrific acts that destroyed the World Trade towers in New York and part of the Pentagon. The crew is in quiet shock. There is a distant numbness. We are, after all, insulated from the populated world by the needs of the ship and because we are at sea. Perversely the current weather is perfectly sublime. Mostly clear skies with all sails up in a light breeze from the northwest. The sea is quiet and pretty.

I discovered the news via a service provided by our satellite communications service called COMSAT. They send out via satellite a consolidated world news summary. I was unable to get Tuesday's report – it could well have been an onboard computer problem. Tuesday's summary probably would have been written before the disasters. But today's report (Wed, Sept 12) was clearly stunning for its content. It was also clear by reading between the lines the potential magnitude of the event. Particularly disturbing was the scope of the premeditated plan that succeeded. Highjack plans with no regard to innocent passengers. Innocent building occupants including tourists looking over New York City at the time the planes crashed as well the civilian and military victims in Washington.

I convened an all-hands muster and read word for word the news flash. Included were the flashes regarding international response and that of President Bush. It is hard to describe the feeling of unreality the crew demonstrated as I read. I offered that if anyone had any reason to be concerned about family with this disaster I would try and figure a way to get some information. As it turned out, one crewmember used to work in the Pentagon and has relatives that have a home next door to the Pentagon. My sister works at the Pentagon now, too. We spent a half-hour talking about it and dissecting the minimal details offered by the news flash. After dispersal I went to the ship's e-mail service to let the office know of our knowledge of the event and how I had handled it with the crew, and to ask after family ashore that may have been affected. I discovered e-mails from my wife, Leslie, and my partner, Captain Dan Parrott. Dan's was short and told me that the disaster had happened and that my sister was OK. He said that building in which Pride, Inc, is headquartered was being evacuated because it is also a "World Trade Center." Leslie's e-mails also notified me that my sister was OK and provided some extra details on the disasters. I shared these tidbits with the crew. It was then that the scope of the disaster began to have a sense of reality.

I have not been able to sit down to the log due to a strong sense of ambivalence. We arrived here last night about 2100 hours and most crew went ashore for a couple of hours. I went for ice cream and a long phone call home. Today it is "field day" aboard Pride II. Every nook and cranny below is being cleaned and wiped down. All bunks are being aired out. Order is being returned to what had become a bit chaotic while underway. As I write the coup d'grâce is being given in the form of a thorough deck wash. This afternoon it is all hands time off.

I went ashore for the Sunday papers and got two copies each of the Boston Globe and New York Times. What an unholy mess! Death, destruction, talk of retribution and revenge. It is clear that life in America will never be the same. All this and a lot of signs of renewed pride for being American and a lot of words of condolence and support from around the world. As well as words from others who might be supporters of the destruction and murder.

"Welcome back to port, Pride II! We have been very active while you have been at sea. What do you think?"

I don't know what to think. Obviously now that we are back, we will be learning what to think at the same pace as everyone else. One small consolation is no one aboard has any immediate family affected by the tragedy.

Meanwhile my reflections on our trip out of the Great Lakes and onto the US eastern seaboard dwell on how minor this trip of over 1,600 miles was. Sure, we had to negotiate a lot of locks as we went from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario crossing the Niagara Escarpment and falling some 250 feet in water level. Sure, we sailed deep into the Thousand Islands at the eastern end of Lake Ontario in the dark of night since we had a favorable wind and there were no other ships in the sea lane to be bothered by a sailing vessel where there usually is none to be found. And sure, we had a fast six-hour, turn-a-round in Ogdensburg, NY, for fuel, food, and laundry. Then we went on a long 18-hour transit of more locks to get to Montreal and a further drop in water level of some 220 feet. From there we had a string of four pilots who guided Pride II during the next 30 hours down river, one of whom was a woman. One pilot brought a laptop computer with digital charts for the helmsman to view and use to stay in the channel while he merely stood by (virtual piloting it was). Meanwhile those 30 hours took Pride II down the next 20 feet of water level practically to sea level as we proceeded past Quebec City and on into the lower St. Lawrence River. And sure, we had a pretty wild sail dead downwind around the Gaspe Peninsula with winds as high as 35 knots in the Sound of D'Hohguedo between Anticosti Island and Gaspe. Then there was the very pleasant sail with full canvas including gant'sl and studdingsail across the Gulf of St Lawrence to the Straits of Canso in Nova Scotia and the last lock of the year. With the news of the tragedy in our minds, we went west along the southern shore of Nova Scotia and then out across the Gulf of Maine. Not much clean sailing there due to changes of wind strength caused by the conflict of weather generators. On the one hand, there was Tropical Storm Erin in the Atlantic, and on the other approaching cold fronts coming from the west.. So there was a bunch of motor sailing mixed with real sailing. The last miles were in a virtual calm and a flat sea as we rounded the same Cape Cod that the Puritans rounded on their way to the rock at Plymouth, Massachusetts.

We now have some time on our hands as we don't have to be in New London, CT, till Friday next week. I don't know what we will do. This afternoon after the cleaning is complete, the crew will have the rest of the day off. I will watch the ship at anchor and see if the heightened security in American Ports will impose significant prior arrangements for Pride II prior to entry. Already Boston has announced that no commercial vessel is permitted into that harbor till an application for permission is given and approved. This poses no problem for Pride II if she were to try to enter Boston as they also said this policy does not include recreational craft, commercial fishing vessels, or small passenger vessels, of which Pride II is one. Meanwhile late last week New London, CT, announced it was closed to all vessels. Did they mean to include recreational vessels, commercial fishing vessels, and small passenger vessels?

Or as Kurt Vonnegut said, "And so it goes."

Captain Jan Miles