I recently watched the movie “The Perfect Storm” and was reminded of my most dangerous time when I worked on the tug boat. I had just returned from a 6 day trip to Molokai. The weather and ocean conditions were so bad that instead of the day and a half that it usually took it ended up taking three days! On the way out the electricity went out so it was very hot and humid and also the plumbing went out so there were no showers or any running water and we had to use a bucket. It was so rough that I didn’t eat for 4 days but I was never hungry! When we arrived in Molokai it was so rough that we couldn’t tie up in the harbor and had to go back to Honolulu! That trip alone was terrible but there was something worse waiting! As soon as we got back to Honolulu, about 10:00 pm, we got a call about a drifting freighter that we needed to tow back to Honolulu. The ship was under a foreign flag and there were no crew aboard! Apparently they all went in to China Town and anchored the ship but they only planned to be gone a short while so they didn’t think about the changing tide since they planned to come back soon. The swells were about 15 feet or higher and there were no lights on when we spotted her. She looked like a ghost ship! She was not exactly a freighter but the size was about 150 feet or so long. The plan was to tie up to her and then tow her back to Honolulu. We were able to tie up to her and as soon as I got on board all the lines broke! I immediately secured myself to the ship on the deck area so I would not get washed away and I sat on the deck and watched the tugboat try to tie up again and again with no luck. The swells were building and it was raining very hard. The ocean actually made a type of roaring sound!
Just before sunrise the first mate was able to get on board and the ropes broke again so it was just the two of us watching the huge swells and bobbing along on the ship. My first mate said that he didn’t think he would die like this! I never realized until that point on how dangerous it was. The tugboat was able to finally tie up and put the ship under tow later in the morning. The crew were found in Chinatown in a bar and were escorted back to the ship! There were no apologies from anybody! Only embarrassed looks. We finally got into Honolulu in the early afternoon. I was so tired that I stayed on the boat and slept there. I didn’t even bother washing my clothes as they were so filthy that I threw them away! That was how I used one of my nine lives.