AN UNFINISHED STORY: THE BOUNTY

We have all been waiting to hear the truth of this remarkable tale. In an era of  unprecedented ability to forecast weather; it is hard to imagine that something like this could happen. There is a big difference between being caught at sea by foul weather that could not be avoided and making the conscious decision to leave port an sailing straight into a hurricane. Moreover, this was a boat that could not sail very fast and therefore had no way to avoid the storm. A Volvo 70 capable of 600 miles a day would have had a chance to sail around or at least avoid the worst; although we would still question the decision leaving the dock with the forecast.

 

Shipyard: Rotted Frame in Sunken Ship Not Fixed
By BROCK VERGAKIS
PORTSMOUTH, Va.
abcnews.go.com

 

ABC News

 

Maine shipyard official: Rotted frame in ship that sank in Sandy wasn’t fixed before storm

The Associated Press

A replica 18th-century sailing ship that sank off North Carolina during Hurricane Sandy had a decaying frame with an undetermined amount of rot in it before leaving port, a Maine shipyard worker told federal officials Wednesday.

One member of the HMS Bounty’s 16-person-crew died, and the captain was never found after the ship sank 90 miles off Cape Hatteras during the October storm. The three-mast sailing ship was built for the 1962 film “Mutiny on the Bounty” starring Marlon Brando, and was featured in several other films over the years, including one of the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies.

Officials from the Coast Guard and the National Transportation Safety Board are holding eight days of hearings to determine what caused it to sink and make recommendations to prevent similar deaths.

Todd Kosakowski told the panel that he showed Capt. Robin Walbridge the rot he found in the ship when his workers were replacing several planks at Boothbay Harbor Shipyard several weeks before the storm.

“I told him that I was more than worried about what we found,” Kosakowski said.

Rather than replacing the rotted wood — as Kosakowski said was the only way to fix it — the ship’s crew painted it over, he said.

Walbridge was ‘terrified’ at what he saw, but he decided against removing additional planks to see how extensive the damage was and going ahead and replacing it, he said.

“It was very quickly shot down by the captain,” Kosakowski said. “That would have required a significant amount of time and money.”

Kosakowski said he was concerned about the ship’s condition when it left the shipyard and that he had advised Walbridge to avoid ‘heavy weather.’ The ship would later head directly for the path of the hurricane before taking on water, losing power and rolling over as it tossed the crew into the Atlantic Ocean.

After the ship left the Maine shipyard, it headed to New London, Connecticut. There, it provided a tour for Navy sailors stationed at a submarine base. HMS Bounty officials also met with a potential buyer for the ship before it started making its way to Florida and heading directly for the hurricane.

Before leaving Maine, Kosakowski said that Walbridge had told him that he had told the ship’s owner, Robert Hansen, that he should get rid of the boat as soon as possible.

Hansen has declined to testify at the hearings, invoking his Fifth Amendment right to be protected from incriminating himself.

Although the hearing being administered by the panel isn’t a criminal proceeding, any evidence of wrongdoing could be referred to federal prosecutors.

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Brock Vergakis can be reached at www.twitter.com/BrockVergakis

MORE “HMS BOUNTY” INTERVIEW WITH THE CAPTAIN

I do not want to make a statement that might influence your judgement after watching this video. I must thank Sailing Anarchy for alerting me to it.
What I will add is that the Volvo 70 and many modern designs can sail fast enough to choose where they might wish to be in relationship to a system. A boat like the “Bounty” simply cannot sail fast enough to position itself.

THE “BOUNTY” LOST AT SEA OR WHAT WAS HE THINKING?

Given the magnitude of the carnage left in the wake of hurricane “Sandy”.  The loss of the “Bounty” will likely not get much ink. For those of us who go to sea, we are left shaking our heads in disbelief. The facts are not all in and so far the story is that the skipper left New London, Ct in route toSt. Petersburg, Florida intending to make enough easting to get around “Sandy” . He would have had to leave the Azores to starboard to leave enough room in a boat like the “Bounty.”  we can only wonder what was he thinking.

I cannot say with certainty, but I would guess this boat leaked at the dock and that was fine as long as the pumps were running, which in turn depended on the engine running. She was built as a prop for one movie in 1962. She was never built for a long life. I know that Fall River, Ma heritage festival committee who owned her after Ted Turner finally could no longer keep up with the repairs and sold her.

Seamanship translates roughly into common sense. We all have an idea of what it is. Perhaps that’s the problem. What we know is always framed by what we know, not what we don’t know.

A boat like this probably worked all the time, by that I mean any loading, from the rig or simply rolling in a seaway would cause the boat to twist and the planking to move.

As I said “What was he thinking?”