Back to the US? Part 3 of 3

To recap our crossing and in case you missed part 1 and part 2, although we suggest you read them Part 1  and Part 2 We have been up since 4am. It is now about 18 hours later. It is dark. We are about 30 miles off the coast of Miami but out of cell and radio range. We are dead in the water, meaning we have no source of propulsion and are at the mercy of the wind, waves, and the Gulf Stream. Our Captain has now passed out from heat exhaustion 3 times. We have sent out numerous MAYDAY transmissions via the VHF, set off EPRIB’s  and our SPOT tracker, but haven’t heard anything back. And we have a cruise ship heading towards us.

I had just sent out my fifth distress call and asked for anyone to respond. I just needed to know we were heard. The silence was worse than the darkness. It was at that point, I heard a crackle. Did I hear a voice? Did I wish for a voice and heard what I wanted? “Please repeat, I didn’t hear that.” I said into the radio. Crackle, crackle. “Your message has been received.” the voice said. It was static-y but I heard it. It might as well have been from heaven because it sure sounded like an angel. “Thank you!” I sobbed into the radio.

I ran downstairs to tell Steve. “They heard us, they heard us!” I screamed with excitement. He simply smiled. I looked him over. He looked like shit. [Pardon my French, but he did.] He was grey. His eyes, glassy, seemed to be sunken into his face. He looked weak and he sounded weaker. He was in bad shape. I sat with him as we waited. Now we just had to wait. I told him to rest and as quickly as I said it, he nodded off. The relief that someone was going to come and help his family, eased his rest. I checked to make sure he was breathing, the way we did with the kids when they were babies. I couldn’t help but worry. 30 minutes went by before we knew it. I looked at the clock in panic and I ran upstairs to the bridge. The cruise ship was close now. Way too close. I could make out the levels, see the small windows lit up. Wasn’t sure how long it took help to arrive or even if they were coming. If they were, who? All I knew is that I needed that cruise ship to know we were there. I grabbed the box of flares. It’s a large box, full to the top. Flares have expiration dates, and to be Coast Guard compliant, you have to have current flares on your boat. Instead of throwing away our old flares, we just kept them. In our flare box. Just in case we ever needed them. Now was that “just in case.” I grabbed the first pack. I quickly read the instructions and, BOOM, into the sky shot a bright orange trail of sparks. It was beautiful. But could anyone but us see it? I had to be sure so I grabbed another. BOOM. Then another. BOOM. Maybe it was the loudness of the flare igniting, but suddenly I noticed just how quiet it was out here. With no engine noise, no talking, no laughing, no TV or radio, no noise at all. Just the sloshing of the water as the waves tossed us around. The kids came up to see what the light and noise were coming from. I told them I was setting off flares. I knew they needed to help in some way. To distract them from the stress of this nightmare, I asked them if they wanted to set some off. I mean really, when does a kid get the chance to shoot off a giant off-limits firework? Now’s their chance. So we tried the parachute one, the one you load into our flare gun, the one that glows red, the one that glows white. We did after all, have a box full. After about 5 more flares, we sat still. Listening to the silence. Wait, what’s that noise? “Do you guys hear something?” I asked. “I’ll go check on dad.” Dani ran off. Jake scrunched up his face, turned his ear to the sky and said “it sounds like a helicopter.” Really? Could it be? We scanned the sky. We could see lights passing through the sky but we assumed they were planes from Miami. Could they be someone looking for us? Dani came back upstairs and advised that dad was in fact, still asleep. “…and breathing, Mom.” she added when she saw my worry. Jake told her we thought the noise was from a helicopter. She listened and agreed it could be. We squealed and laughed and high-fived. And we waited for our rescue. And we waited. The sound eventually went away. Sadness crept in in it’s place.

By this point, the cruise ship was close enough to us that we could see that it had changed its course to avoid us. But not by much. As we watched it slowly pass, we listened as the music blaring from the party deck broke through our silence. We watched as this huge ship glided noisily past us. Close enough to see the people on deck, looking over their railing. Did they see us? Did they know of our emergency? Did they know of this near miss? Probably not. Probably blissfully unaware of the scared family, floating helplessly around in a tiny sea toy.

As the ship passed, my anxiety died down. I thought about our situation. We were floating just fine. We were not taking on any water so we could continue to float forever. We had power, both through our generator and solar by day. We were not in the path of a giant, Miss Daisy crushing ship – at present. Steve was in poor shape, but he was breathing and conscious. Things could be a lot worse. The kids and I had been praying a lot over the last several hours. We took the time now to thank our Lord for keeping us safe. We thanked Him for all of the blessings we did have and I listed them out loud for the benefit of the kids. We would be okay and it might be a long night, but things would look better in the morning when we could at least see beyond our boat. It was at that point that I begun to question calling for help. Had we panicked unnecessarily? If someone was coming, was this all a waste of time and money? Just then, in the distance, we saw a light. Flashing lights to be more exact. Several of them and then we heard it. We heard the sound of the engines roaring. THEY FOUND US! THEY WERE HERE!

The next 30 minutes was a bit of a blur. Before we knew it, 2 boats were lashed to each side of us. One, the Coast Guard. The other, Miami-Dade fire and rescue.

Several men and women jumped aboard and as several tended to Steve, two spoke with the kids and I. We told them what, and how everything happened. They told us they had been looking for us for awhile. They even had the helicopter out trying to find us. It wasn’t until they saw the flares, that they knew exactly where we were. You see, when I had been giving the GPS coordinates out over the radio, I had inadvertently been giving out the same ones over and over. The coordinates from our initial location and we had floated several miles away from that location. They saw the flares and headed our way. It was a helicopter we heard, they had gotten close enough to verify it was us and sent the new coordinates to the rescue boats. I apologized for setting off so many flares, telling them that I was scared the cruise ship didn’t see us. Turns out the ship saw the flares too, changed it’s course and radioed the CG as well.

With all the action going on, I hadn’t thought about the toll it might have had on the kids until now. Jake had somehow held it together very well until now. With all the noise, people, action, and lights, he was quickly heading into an autistic meltdown. As I noticed his movements that always come before an episode, I quickly explained to the Coast Guardsman I was speaking with, what was going on and grabbed Jake’s hand. I led him down to the salon. I told him everything was okay now. I grabbed his favorite blanket and wrapped him in it. I grabbed a book he was reading and told him to read 10 pages for me and not think of anything until I came back. Distraction is a powerful tool with Jake. So are books. Sometimes I don’t catch the signs soon enough. This time I did. This time, it worked.

I ran back up to check on Dani. She was upstairs where a young CG was telling her she was brave and had done a very good job. She was blushing. She was actually gushing. He was cute. I knew she was just fine.

I headed in to check on Steve. They had him on our settee, drinking and trying to get him to eat some of the rice we had left over. One of the CG told the EMTs to get Steve outside. We had gotten so used to the heat that we hadn’t noticed. He said it was hard for him to be in there, let alone Steve. They needed to get Steve outside with fresh air. They half carried him out to the bow.

Miami-Dade Fire and Rescue on the bow with Steve

Miami Dade Fire and Rescue told Steve he needed to go with them so they could get him to the hospital quickly. He told them he wasn’t leaving his boat. They told him he needed more medical help then they could give him. He told them he wasn’t leaving his boat. He looked at me and I knew right then, he wasn’t moving. I told them, I’m sorry but he wouldn’t be leaving his boat. The Miami Dade Fire and Rescue is an amazing group of people. They were amazing for coming out to help us and we are so very thankful they did. But by this point, stubborn Steve was awake, alert, and needed more than EMTs could provide. And since it was agreed upon that he wasn’t leaving his boat, MDFR decided they would leave. We thanked them profusely. They had Steve sign the “refused treatment” paperwork and they headed out. The CG and Steve had agreed together that that was the best for everyone.

Now with just the CG left, two of them asked if they could do a vessel safety check, it was a mandatory procedure with a rescue. I had given them our paperwork, along with our passports so they could fill out their papers. They agreed we did in fact, have flares. We laughed about that as I told them I never even made it to the “good” ones. We all had our life vests on, so we were good there. I told them they had full access to the boat so they could go check anything they needed. Off they went. Then the commander joined Steve and I, along with the other CG, who was tending to Steve. He told us what would be happening next. He said they would put out a call for any vessel in the area that could assist in towing, to speak up. Basically, if TowBoat or SeaTow or another salvage company was in the area, they could come help us. The commander also told us that we were 25-30 miles offshore and that unless someone was already in the area, it would take a long time for someone to get there. I asked him what happens if no one comes to tow us? “Then we tow you home.” he said. I let out a little cry, I couldn’t help myself. No matter what, we were going home. 

They advised us that they had put the call out and now we would just wait the pre-determined amount of time. [half an hour was the response when I asked how long.] 

Not 5 minutes later, the commander came over again to tell us they waited, no one responded, and they would be getting us home. “But it’s only been…” I was cut off when he smiled and said, “Ma’am, we’re going to get you home now.” I looked around and they were all smiling. The commander dished out orders to ready both vessels for the tow and everyone jumped into action.

They had readied the lines, they were tossing fenders, lines, commands back and forth between Miss Daisy and the Coast Guard rescue vessel. This was no easy task, since the waves were crashing over the bows and the boats were crashing together. Once we were ready to detach Miss Daisy from them, there seemed to be a discussion among them. I went over to see if something was wrong and when I got close, I heard them trying to decide who got to stay aboard Miss Daisy. It turns out, several of them wanted to stay, but only two got chosen. They asked me if it would be alright if two stayed on with us. “Absolutely!” I agreed. The chosen two, boarded and we released the lines holding us together. After a rough jolting start, we were on our way home!

“Now what?” I asked the pair. “It’ll be a couple hours, so you can just relax now.” One of them said. A couple hours? At this point it was almost midnight and we had been awake for over 20 hours. Several of those being the most stressful hours I’ve ever experienced in my life. I told them I wasn’t sure we could stay awake for a couple of hours. They smiled and one of them told us to go rest, it would be just fine. “You must be angels,” I smiled at them. “I just don’t see any other possibility.”  

With that, Steve and I went back to our stateroom to shut our eyes for just a moment. The next thing we knew, our angels were waking us up. We went upstairs and saw the lights of Miami Beach. We were home.

  

Miami Beach in sight

They helped us drop our anchor and tied up alongside again. We thanked them again and again. I told them I felt bad, that we had wasted their time, kept them from home. The commander just laughed. “Absolutely not!” he scolded me. “This is exactly why we are here. You did everything right tonight, don’t ever think anything else.” They gave us back all of our paperwork and passports. We signed some papers. The familiar, young, [and cute] CG came up and asked if Dani was awake. I called her over and he told her he had something for her. He reached across between our vessels and handed her a pin. “Its for your hat.” he told her, pointing to his head. It was then that I looked at her and noticed she had been wearing her weathered USCG hat the entire time. She took the pin from him, smiling ear to ear, blushing crimson red. As she thanked him, she ran off, embarrassed. “You just made her year.” I grinned to him,  “thank you so much.” I believe I caught the same crimson red in his smiling cheeks as he turned away.

 

They asked us if we would be okay. We told them we were perfect. They made me promise to get Steve to the doctor as soon as I could and I agreed. I would certainly try. After professing more endless thanks, they told us, again, that it’s what they are here for, and with that, they unlashed the lines. The last thing the commander said to us was, “If you need us, remember, we are just around the corner. Don’t hesitate to call.”

It was after midnight. The surf was rough. We dropped a second anchor, just in case, and then we all crashed into our bunks.

We woke up about 6am, with the waves tossing us up and down. At least it wasn’t side to side and because of that, we knew we were at least still at anchor. We went up to see that we were indeed, just off shore of Miami Beach. Not wanting to stay there long, Steve went down to the engine room, to once again, work on the motors. I took him some coffee and oatmeal. As he drank and ate his breakfast, he had an epiphany. Maybe it was the rest, the coffee, the brain fuel. Maybe it was the combination of all three but at that point, the proverbial light bulb went on above his head. “I can not believe I was this stupid.” he scolded himself. “It was right in front of me the whole time!” I asked him what it was, he said he didn’t want to tell me and jinx it. He wanted to see if it would work first. 20 minutes later, he called to me from the engine room. “Fire up starboard.” I went to the helm and prepared to hold the starter down while the engine just waaaawaaaawaaa’ed as usual. “I need to bleed it first.” he prepared me. We have done that dozens of times so I knew what that called for. I held down the starter, as he opened a valve, until the fuel filled the line. There are 6 valves so we usually repeat this 6 times. But half way into number 5, the starboard engine, engine #1, roared to life! Merrily chug-chugging like the last 24 hours never happened. “What did you do?!” I demanded he tell me. “Let’s just see if the other one will run too.” he responded. He mirrored the repairs he made on the other engine. Then we went through the bleeding process with the port engine, engine #2, and just as her sister had done, she too roared to life.

Steve hopped out of the engine room, lowered the hatches as we listened to the beautiful hum of two big old 200hp Cummins diesels. “It was the secondary  fuel filter.” he finally confessed. “I didn’t even think about the secondary filter. I got so focused on the primary, Racor  filter, changing it, cleaning it, changing it, cleaning it, I never even thought of the filters on the engines.” We let them run a few minutes but the surf was so rough that we wanted to get to a calmer area as soon as possible. We raised our anchors and headed in to the channel into Miami. As we rounded the first corner, just as promised, was the Miami Coast Guard Station. They weren’t lying when they said they’d be right around the corner. We cruised right on past them, with two engines running just as they had always run. Almost as if they had heads held high, chest out, showing the CG, “We can do it. We’ll get them from here.”

And so they did. They ran all the way to Key Largo. They’ve run every time we started them up since. They earned the trust back they never should have lost in the first place.

Entering our protected Key Largo anchorage

We anchored in Key Largo where we decided to stay and gather ourselves. The morning we woke in Miami, we realized there were a dozen messages on the cellphone. We quickly called our concerned family back and pieced together the story of the day before. Turns out, SPOT did its job perfectly. Once they got ahold of my brother, who was able to get ahold of our son, who knew our route and passage information, they had the CG contact our son directly. He was able to tell them where our route was and the fact that we had been having problems with engines prior to leaving the Bahamas. The CG commander closed out his call to our son by telling him not to worry, they would get us home safe and sound.

Steve wouldn’t go to the doctor like he said he would. Sometimes he’s too stubborn for his own good. But as it turns out, his body had a way of over-riding his stubbornness. Two weeks after we arrived in Key Largo, Steve was in the hospital with a severe kidney infection. Any more time and the damage would have been irreversible. He’ll listen next time. I hope.

Dani wore her USCG hat almost every day for a month. Proudly displaying her newly acquired pin. I wish I had gotten that sweet young man’s name. I would love for him to know the impact his simple action had on our family.

So just as Monday morning quarterbacks often get to do, we had plenty of time to now analyze everything that had transpired before, during, and after our crossing. We have learned so much and have so many things we would have done differently. Some things we were glad for, some things were huge mistakes that never should have happened.

1. We never should have pushed our fuel level so low. It was risky and it will never happen again.

2. We never should have left the Bahamas with a known engine issue. Even though we had no reason to think they weren’t  fixed and would run just fine, we now know differently. We won’t take that chance again.

3. Dehydration is no joke. Neither is severe heat. The combination can be deadly. Know your body and know when you need to stop and do something about it.

4. We will never go out of range without our SPOT tracker and our EPIRB. They both had an pivotal part in our rescue.

5. We are very thankful that we had prepared for just such an emergency and that we had plenty of flares and EPIRBS.

6. When we make any crossing of distance, we need to let more than one family member aware of our float plan. It took time for them to track down Brandon, even though he was on our list of contacts. We have updated our list of contacts and we will make sure those on the list have our route.

7. We are so thankful to my brother, who took charge, and followed through to get to Brandon and 

didn’t stop until he knew we were okay.

8. We are thankful to our son, even though he said he was never worried, for actually listening to us, when we told him our route.

9. We are thankful to whomever radioed the message to me that my message was heard.

10.We are grateful to the Miami Dade Fire and Rescue for coming out to help a stubborn, set-in-his-ways, retired firefighter.  

11.We owe a lifetime of gratitude to the Miami Coast Guard station. They will forever hold a special place in our hearts.

12.Never ever forget about the secondary fuel filter on the Cummins BT6 diesel engines.

And finally, does anyone know of a nice RV for sale?