10 minute read
A Drawbridge Encounter
from 2020-04 April
By Ken Wikle
When I was 14 my Dad got interested in sailing and decided to buy a sailboat. We lived about 10 miles from Port Clinton on Lake Erie, an area of sailing activity well known in the Great Lakes Area.
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Our first sailboat, a Nipper, was a 12 ft. catboat, and my sailing career started as first mate to my Dad. He first docked it on the Portage River near our home and we began sailing up and down the river on weekends.
After about a year of sailing the Nipper in the river my Dad decided to buy a bigger boat. One day he showed up with a Lightning on a trailer made out of stripped-down car frame (four wheels) painted robin’s egg blue. He traded in the Nipper for the used Lightning. The trailer came with the boat and was a sight to see. A Lightning is a 19 ft. sloop that is an internationally recognized class. At this time it was a heavy boat made out of Mahogany. Once we sailed it we discov
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ered that the centerboard well leaked, meaning we had to watch the bilge to make sure we didn’t take on too much water while we were sailing. We didn’t care initially because we were having fun in our new boat. Pumping out the bilge regularly was just part of a day on the water. Sailing this boat in the river proved to be a little too confining. Lake Erie seemed to be a better place to sail now. My Dad joined the Port Clinton Yacht Club to take advantage of the docking and larger body of water on which to sail.
That winter my Dad pulled the trailer with the boat into the garage and went about removing the centerboard well and fixing it so it didn’t leak. I helped him. Taking out the metal centerboard was quite a project because it weighed at least 200 lbs. We rigged a line through the rafters in the garage and hoisted it out of the well. He remanufactured the centerboard well and bolted it in place caulking the mating area to the bottom of the boat, tightening it down well with all the bolts.
I became his boat maintainer. After we fixed the centerboard well, I got the job of painting and varnishing the boat for the next season on the water. When the weather cleared, we pulled the boat out into the driveway, and I spent many hours sanding and painting our reconditioned Lightning with the very unique trailer.
Little did I know that the Lightning and its new home on Lake Erie would open up a whole new chapter in my fledgling sailing career providing many future adventures. After sailing with my dad a few times, I wanted to take my best friend John out sailing in the Lightning. We happened to pick a day when there were high winds out in the lake, and it was too rough to go out. Prudently, we decided to sail in the harbor where the Portage River flowed into Lake Erie. This was more protected and seemed like a safe idea.
My dad had a 5hp Mercury Outboard motor on the back of the Lightning which we used to get out of the Yacht Club and up the channel into the lake. This method of getting out into the lake worked fine. The motor started reliably. The motor was on a bracket attached to the stern and had a portable gas tank which was in the stern of the boat and attached to the motor by a detachable fuel line. In order to tilt the outboard up out of the water when you started sailing, you had to disconnect the fuel line and tilt the motor, or the tilting of the motor would either pinch the fuel line or break it. This was usually not a problem.
The Portage River is really just an extension of the lake. When the wind blows from the North, water fills the river to a higher level depending on the strength of the wind. When the wind blows from the South, the river empties into the lake. We were used to observing the river, even as far down as Oak Harbor, with low water
and mud flats showing, or with high water depending on the direction, strength and duration of the wind. The movement of this water creates a current as we were to find out on our sail that day.
Ohio State Route 163 crosses the river in Port Clinton right about where the Yacht Club sits on the river. There is a draw bridge with a bridge operator that raises and lowers the bridge to allow boat traffic from farther up the river to access the lake.
The three of us in the Lightning motored out into the Portage River in the harbor and raised the sails. We started tacking back and forth across the river, working our way away from the Lake towards the bridge. As we got closer to the bridge there were large cottonwood trees on the north side of the river and some two-story buildings on the south side. The wind began to give out in the river nearer the bridge due to the trees and buildings.
At this point we discovered that the river current was pretty strong, carrying us closer and closer to the bridge. With no wind to power the boat and counteract the force of the current we were now approaching the draw bridge. We drifted closer and closer to the drawbridge. Within about 50 yards of the bridge my dad saw our predicament and said “No problem, we’ll start the outboard motor.” As he turned around to lower the motor and start it, he looked at the fuel line and discovered he had forgotten to remove it prior to tilting it up and it was broken in two! He only said one word as we were about to drift into the bridge, “****.”
Initially we were not terribly concerned. Our mast would contact the bridge and we could get the boat off and paddle back upriver. We underestimated the force of the current.
The bridge operator had not opened the bridge for us because we had not stopped and signaled that we wanted to proceed up the river.
The mast contacted the bridge span and the force of the current started to lever against the mast forcing the boat to begin to capsize. We were suddenly surprised and chagrined that we were going into the water and the boat was going over. This all happened as if we were in a slow-motion movie, as the three of us scrambled to the higher side of the boat as the force of the current pushed against the mast and the boat tipped over and slipped under the bridge.
As the sailboat slowly capsized, I suddenly remembered that I had brought a transistor radio with us and jumped back into the cockpit and grabbed it before it went under and handed it up to John. We were able to save the radio by holding it up out of the water. All three of us were perched on the high side of the boat like sailors on a sinking ship.
The current completed our forced capsize and the bridge operator started to open the bridge. He was too late as we drifted upriver with the current, all three of us clinging to the capsized sailboat, which was now full of water up to the gunnels. Fortunately, a wooden sailboat doesn’t sink when full of water as we drifted further down the river.
There were some motorboats nearby who witnessed our spectacular slow-motion collision and capsize under the bridge and we threw them a line. They towed us over to a dock where we began the tedious process of bailing out our water-filled sailboat. With three of us working quickly with several buckets, it took us about fifteen minutes to bail the boat out. Once we were upright, emptied out and ready to navigate as a viable watercraft, again one of the motorboats volunteered to tow us back to our yacht club slip. Our outboard motor would not start because we had no fuel supply from the broken.
This time we signaled the bridge to open and waited as it lifted. The operator recognized us for sure this time! The next passage through the drawbridge was uneventful. The Good Samaritan power boater towed us all the way back to our slip at the yacht club.
Our arrival back in the Yacht Club completed our adventure for the day! My transistor radio was saved, and John had an exciting introduction to sailing. There was no damage to the boat, and after my dad repaired the severed fuel line, we were ready to sail anew.
This was only one of the adventures in the Lightning as I gained experience and learned to sail the Lightning next as its skipper.
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