Prisoners-of-war visit to Duncan in 1945 memorable event for everyone Cowichan LMG soccer team emerges victorious despite sluggish start
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WEDNESDAY
‘NUNSENSE’ PACKS THE HOUSE /19
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Wednesday, December 9, 2015
Storm downs lines and boats, closes road SARAH SIMPSON CITIZEN
The MV Gravoleen II partially submerged but on the hard at the Hecate Park boat launch Sunday. It was one of two boats that sank during Saturday’s storm. [SARAH SIMPSON/CITIZEN]
Pockets of power outages, Cowichan Bay Road closed, and not one but two boats sinking in the bay: three telltale signs a storm hit the Cowichan Valley over the weekend. While many didn’t see much more than driving rain, wind swept through some parts of the region, but nothing like elsewhere on the Island and in the Lower Mainland. According to BC Hydro’s statistics, fewer than 450 customers were affected by the foul weather — all on Saturday, Dec. 5. That’s the same day the motor vessels Gravoleen II and Mixed Emotions sank in Cowichan Bay. A third boat, a sailboat, also demasted at some point and was adrift in Cowichan Bay, according to Christopher Wickham of Royal Canadian Marine Search and Rescue Unit 34 (Mill Bay). It ended up stuck on the beach. Wickham’s crew was dispatched to assist the two power boats taking on water. “It was weather related,” he confirmed. Gusts of 20 to 25 knots, (37 to 46 kilometres per hour) and a two- to three-foot swell were recorded at Cowichan Bay on Saturday. “It was mostly the swell,” Wickham noted. “Just the way that
bay works, it shallows up there so much, if there’s any swell there at all it just builds up and if a vessel is not ready for that or is compromised in any way, it’s hard to recover.” RCM-SRU #34’s priority is to take care of people first and that’s what the crew of four did. A man was on board the MV Mixed Emotions, a 45-50-foot power boat, that was quickly filling with water. “We did extract him and get him to the shore,” Wickham said. “When we got there it was an unstable situation. It was taking on water faster than pumps could manage. Our crew assessed it and realized that even adding our pumps was not going to be able to keep up with the rate of water coming in.” The hull at that point, Wickham said, had been compromised due to the weather. As far as the Gravoleen II went, nobody was on board but it’s owners were aware of the goings-on. Wickham said RCM-SRU #34 assisted the owners of both vessels to make sure that they were safe and cared for some of the assets that they had, and also made sure the boats weren’t endangering anything else in the area. See BOAT MAY, Page 5
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