I enjoyed chatting last week with Aaron Harris, who is a Coast Guard boatswain’s mate second class (BM2) assigned to Motor Lifeboat Station Quillayute River at LaPush.
On Wednesday, BM2 Harris was inducted into an elite corps of individuals with the designation Surfman.
These stout-hearted individuals are highly trained boat coxswains who are qualified to operate a rescue boat in treacherous conditions borne of 30-foot seas, 20-foot surf and 50-knot winds.
And to paraphrase a purloined line from the Surfman’s Creed, “it doesn’t seem to worry them a speck.”
Of the nearly 200 boat stations currently in the Coast Guard, only 20 are located in areas with surf conditions that require Surfmen.
Not surprisingly, 17 of the stations are on the West Coast and three are located on the East Coast.
There are currently about 165 Surfmen, which makes the operational specialty the smallest in the Coast Guard.
As a practical matter, the training of a Surfman begins the first day an individual steps aboard a small boat in the Coast Guard Boat Forces.
However, the reality is that few individuals aspire to or are able to achieve the skill level necessary in the multistep training regimen to become a Surfman.
Once a boat coxswain is qualified as a heavy-weather coxswain — no small feat in itself — he or she can apply for entrance into the Prospective Surfman Program.
This arduous training course is long and extremely demanding, and can take anywhere from one to six years to complete.
The final step in what was a three-year qualifying process for BM2 Harris was a drill to recover a mock individual in the waters off the Quileute Reservation.
The simulation was reviewed by the officer-in-charge of Station Quillayute River, Master Chief Petty Officer Scott Lowry, who is also a boatswain’s mate.
BM2 Harris joined the Coast Guard in 2002 after spending a year in Hawaii aboard a commercial fishing vessel.
He said that at the time, he was working on his master 100-ton Coast Guard license but did not have the money to complete the necessary schooling.
It was then that he decided to join the Coast Guard, bank a few bucks during his enlistment and finish his schooling after his commitment using the educational benefits of the GI Bill.
It’s looking like that 100-ton license will have to wait.
BM2 Harris lives in Port Angeles with his wife, Brandi, who works in the Clinical Education Department at Olympic Medical Center as a nurse practitioner and also works at the VIMO volunteer clinic.
They have three children: Berniece, Brazen and Brylee.
And the household now has one of the Coast Guard’s newest Surfmen.
Bound for Brazil
Alpha Crucis, known until recently as Moana Wave, dropped her anchor in Port Angeles Harbor on Thursday afternoon and spent the night.
She is a 210-foot oceanographic research vessel built in 1974 for the U.S. Navy and operated by the University of Hawaii to conduct hydrographic and acoustic research projects in the Pacific Ocean.
In 2000, she was taken over by Ocean Services, a division of Stabbert Maritime of Seattle, and refitted.
She then was put into service as a cable survey and support vessel and provided survey data on three fiber-optic telecommunication systems. Her most recent projects were conducting surveys in the Gulf of Mexico and along the Yucatan coast of Mexico.
The ship has now makes a life’s turn to south of the equator.
Alpha Crucis has been acquired by the Oceanographic Institute of the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil.
She will be added to the school’s fleet of three oceanographic vessels to support the school’s undergraduate and post-graduate students pursuing degrees in oceanography.
While the vessel was getting under way Friday morning, I spoke briefly with Crystal Nailor, who is the chef aboard the ship.
She said the ship is in the early stages of a 40-day journey to the vessel’s new home port in Brazil after a two-month stint in the Stabbert shipyard in Seattle.
Crystal has worked for Stabbert Maritime for 12 years and is one of the four Stabbert employees who are working with the 14 Brazilian crew members, helping them become comfortable with the ship’s operation.
Additionally, there are five scientists aboard who are setting up equipment in the labs and learning the nuances of the ship’s research capabilities.
The 14 Brazilian crew members all speak Portuguese — Brazil’s national language — and Crystal said her kitchen Spanish hasn’t been much help.
However, with a lot of finger pointing and a few words of each other’s language being learned by everyone, all is progressing surprisingly well and is otherwise very entertaining, she said.
Crystal noted that the Brazilian crew members are used to a bit warmer climate than they have been experiencing; most of them slept in their Eddie Bauer parkas when they first arrived stateside.
Crystal has roots that reach deep in Port Angeles.
I don’t recall how many “greats” need to be attached to one of her grandmothers, but she was Madge Haynes Nailor, who served as the treasurer of the city of Port Angeles from 1918 to 1948 and was one of the founding members of the Clallam County Historical Society.
Her great-great-grandfather was Archie Nailor, whose office was in the brick building on Railroad Avenue that is now the Port Angeles Regional Chamber of Commerce’s Visitor Center.
At one time, he also owned and sold what is now the City Pier to the city of Port Angeles.
The big orange
It was hard to miss the arrival of the Trianon in Port Angeles Harbor midday Friday.
Accompanied by the 120-foot, Crowley-owned tractor tug Protector, the Norwegian-flagged vessel has a distinctive orange and white color scheme and the owner’s name — Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics, a private Norwegian/Swedish shipping company — emblazoned on her sides.
Her boxlike shape also is unusual for the harbor.
Trianon is a roll-on/roll-off, or “roro,” car carrier that can carry as many as 5,858 vehicles.
I was told that the backup steering system on the 623-foot vessel malfunctioned, so she came into Port Angeles to make repairs.
She was still anchored in Port Angeles Harbor at dusk Saturday night.
Fueling stop
Tesoro Petroleum on Tuesday provided bunkers in Port Angeles to Iris Victoria, a 2-year-old petroleum-products tanker that is 748 feet long with a 105-foot beam.
Tesoro also refueled Muntgracht, a year-old cargo ship that is flagged in the Netherlands.
On Saturday, Tesoro had its refueling barge alongside Polar Resolution, the blue 894-foot crude-oil tanker that has been moored at the Port of Port Angeles’ Terminal 1 North for the past 10 days for routine maintenance.
________
David G. Sellars is a Port Angeles resident and former Navy boatswain’s mate who enjoys boats and strolling the waterfronts.
Items involving boating, port activities and the North Olympic Peninsula waterfronts are always welcome. Email dgsellars@
hotmail.com or phone him at 360-808-3202.
His column, On the Waterfront, appears every Sunday.
