my head was in the water. Eyes wide open with fear, I saw the white thrashing of the propeller flash past me in an instant with incredible speed. The propeller missed my torso by about 1-2 feet – had it hit me no doubt it would have ripped me to pieces.
The whole thing was over in a second and the boat was away again. Perhaps it hit another wave that changed its course – or perhaps the act of hitting me had changed its course for although it continued its wild circling, it was now starting to move slowly out to sea away from me. I bobbed in the water helplessly as my boat started to get smaller and smaller and moved well away from me.
I don’t know how long I floated in the water for – it seemed to be forever but was in reality probably only half an hour or so. There was no one else out on the sea and I had resigned myself to a long float before any eventual rescue.
As I turned to look forlornly at the distant shore my eyes drifted towards the harbour and suddenly my spirits jumped in a single second from utter dejection to utter elation. For there charging out of the harbour was the large bow and white bow wash of one of the Maritime Rescue Institute training vessels, one of several fast rescue vessels that were used for training out of Stonehaven harbour.
Either Derek had made it to shore or else someone ashore had seen what had happened and called for help. As it was, the boat sped over nearer the shore and I realised that they were getting Derek out of the water. Before long the boat was charging over to me and slowing down beside me to let me clamber aboard. We then went over and picked up the water skis, which were floating not that far away from me.
The skipper of the boat Hamish McDonald then had me go through what had happened and asked some searching questions about the set up on my boat. He wanted to know how much petrol was left in it – if it was low then he would simply wait until it ran out of fuel and stopped of its own accord.
“It’s got a full tank,” I said. “We’ve only been out on the water for about an hour – the engine will run all day.”
He then asked about my engine - did it have a long shaft or a short shaft – did it have a shear pin. I replied that it had a long shaft but that I didn’t know if it was fitted with a shear pin or not. He decided to try and lay a rope across the track my boat would take. Hopefully we would foul the propeller and the engine would stall – or else the shear pin would disable the engine.
Having agreed the plan of action he throttled up his boat and we raced out to sea in the direction my boat had headed off. Very soon we were closing on it as he rigged up a sturdy rope to a large pink danbuoy.
We motored across the path my boat would take as it circled. Hamish threw out the danbuoy and attached rope and as he motored forward the rope floated up to the surface in a long line stretched across the path of my boat.
My boat came charging round and motored right up to and onto the rope. Suddenly the rope went taught – we had hooked my boat all right, but the rope had caught above the prop and not fouled it or sheared it off. We now had my boat straining to go in one direction like a hooked fish. My boat thrashed and the sea churned at its stern as the prop tried to force it on its way. It wasn’t going anywhere against the weight and power of Hamish’s far larger boat – but we couldn’t do anything with it.
Eventually Hamish cast off the rope and my boat immediately leapt forward and went about its way again. We pulled in the rope and buoy wondering what to do next.
A large dredger platform had been moored just outside the entrance to the harbour over the course of the preceding week. I now became aware of a small grey Rigid Inflatable Boat (RIB) heading off from it and making a bee line for our position at great speed. They must have seen what had happened and were coming over to have a go at bringing my boat under control.
There were three crew in the RIB, all in work boiler suits, peaked caps and steel capped work boots. They handled their boat well and with ease as it sped past us and headed straight for my boat. As they approached, the cox started to track my boat as it circled. Gradually, after sizing up the situation, he started to edge his RIB closer and closer to my careering inflatable.
The gap was perhaps 20 feet at first, and then the RIB edged closer to 15 feet, then 10 feet, then 5 feet.
Before long the RIB was side by side by my boat tracking it perfectly as it circled. I was hugely impressed by the skill and seamanship shown by the cox as my boat wasn’t taking a true course and was bumping and changing course every now and then. The cox had to react immediately to all these sudden changes in direction but did so as if he had been doing it all his life.
The cox closed in one more time on my boat and one of the crew calmly jumped into it, moved to the stern and pressed the Stop button killing the engine. It was over.
Hamish took us alongside and I made my thanks to the crew of the RIB. They graciously made light of it and zipped off back to work on the dredger. I jumped back onto my own boat and pulled in the water ski rope. I started the engine up and I followed Hamish’s boat as we headed back to the harbour at a sedate, safe speed. I had had enough thrills for one day.
Meanwhile, back at the harbour Claire and Derek’s girlfriend had enjoyed a leisurely couple of drinks down on the sand by the slip. It had crossed their minds that Derek and I were taking a long time to come back but that’s not unusual when you go to sea. They were just enjoying the pleasant sunny conditions.
As they sat, glass in hand on the sand they watched bemused as the Maritime Rescue Institute fast rescue boat had powered up, cast off and sped out of the harbour. They watched innocently as an ambulance arrived down at the harbour followed by a police car. What could all the commotion be about? It never crossed their minds that we could be in trouble – their view of the sea was screened by the harbour walls and building themselves.
It was only when Derek stepped off the Maritime Rescue Institute boat back in the harbour, and I arrived back shortly afterwards alone in my own boat, that the penny dropped. I was interviewed by the ambulance man to make sure I wasn’t suffering any adverse effects from my immersion, such as hypothermia. I was then interviewed by a police officer who took my details for the record. They told me that someone in the small coastal village of Cowie, adjacent to Stonehaven, had spotted our plight and alerted the rescue services.
I also learned later that my predicament had stopped play up on Stonehaven Golf Course, which sits high on the cliffs looking down over Stonehaven Bay. The golfers had a grandstand view of the events as they unfolded from up there.
Needless to say, I made a suitable donation to the RNLI in the weeks following as a thank you token. I had been very impressed by the cool professionalism displayed by Hamish and by the crew from the dredger.
Thankfully no one got hurt but it had been a close thing and I learned a number of invaluable lessons in those short hours on the water. Like everything else in life you learn your hardest lessons from experience. But I would try never again to leave anyone alone in a boat and I would always have a means of attracting attention to myself in the water. For years afterwards I dived carrying a small watertight plastic container that held personal distress flares and a launcher.
In more recent times, partly as a result of this experience I went on become a Royal Yachting Association Yachtmaster Offshore and Advanced Powerboat Instructor. In addition I served for four years as lifeboat crew on the Maritime Rescue Institute private lifeboat service in Stonehaven - the same lifeboat that had pulled me out of the water. When it was closed down following damage during the great storm of December 2012, RNLI stepped in and opened a lifeboat station in its place. I served as the volunteer RNLI Lifeboat Operations Manager for a number of years thereafter.
