De-Con

We've only been offshore about 20 minutes when I get out of bed. The same shit again this morning but worse: the seas have grown larger than 10 feet, the wind blowing 30, even 40 knots at times. I glance out the window on my way to the bridge, and a single diesel tote tank sits unchained on deck. We're running slowly already, but I pull the engines completely out of gear, and Joseph chains down the tank. There won't be a sunrise on the horizon today, but a thousand grays exist there now, the sea a blend of foam and bending light. I run at 900 to 1000 RPMs, roughly half power, and it's not a bad ride. Most people don't run crew boats this way, but I'm paid by the day and like to slow it down.

The platform crane lowers a sling and Alex rigs the tote tank, then we catch a line on the platform leg. It's poly-propelene rope with no give, and after the boat surges twice in good swells, the line parts. Its the first time I've seen a mooring line part on a boat. It sounds like a gun shot. I have to live-boat under the platform edge and receive a hose. For about 40 minutes we stay connected, pumping water. It's easy to hold it in there, but the swells are only growing. A squall approaches and the platform's nearly topped off. We disconnect the hose and put out what remains of the hang-off line, still 200 feet. This time we add a nylon spring to the end of the poly-pro, its Alex's idea.

We spend the next 7 hours without moving the boat, the stern slamming into swells, projecting an oily mist. The sheen is raging fast today, at least two knots from the ESE, which will surely put lots of oil onto the eastern delta--and a fair amount on our boat. Some time around four, the seas are 12 to 15 feet, and the line pops again. Greg calls on 06, and the "company man" has nothing for us, lets us head in. It looks like we've been standing by all day for nothing, watching a fleet of large work boats head for the river to escape the weather.

We surf into SW Pass, spinning the wheel to counteract yawing. The pass is busy as always with ships and dredges, tugs and barges. Rain pelts the windshield and vision is fuzzy, wipers spreading oil. At the Head of Passes, we call the de-con station on 67, switch to 11, and try to arrange a wash-down. Its the IOP Pipeliner, some vender's barge, obviously paid for by BP. I try to get instructions, but its awfully hard to hear. I clutch out and the boat drifts.

The waste water of middle America bears down on us en masse, but the wind prevails and we slide upstream. I can see a guy on the barge speaking into a hand-held radio, but we hear jumbled words, mostly crackling wind. Alex and I decipher meaning from the transmission: it may take a few hours to wait out the present squall. I try to tell him we're in no hurry; he doesn't seem to hear.

We sit for minutes, unsure of what to do. The guy comes back on the radio, but its useless against the wind. Eventually a skiff circles our boat, bouncing in a three-foot chop. A worker on the bow fixes a yellow flag onto a boat hook, then the boat disappears from view under the bow. "Its still yellow," he says clearly on 11, "you look pretty clean, cap." Alex and I just look at each other. Is he wiping that flag onto our hull? It's a cursory inspection, to say the least. We sit there for another minute. The radio again, "You can wait for a wash-down, cap, but it'll be in the morning." Now it's in the morning. Its rough for the river, I'll give them that, but these guys obviously don't want to wash the boat. I tell them to keep it safe, and we head back to Venice.