Watching the Olympics

We camped again at our favorite view point last weekend and watched the Olympic Mountains catch many different lighting aspects. This picture shows Mount Olympus (2428m)and the Hoh Glacier probably most of 100km distant.

Zoomed in. Notice the vessel outbound to the Pacific through the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

The last of the sun's rays presenting a 'golden' appearance.

A fine weekend camping and not as cold as we expected. Listening in to the commercial fishing boats was fun, hake are the prey right now and hopefully there's plenty managing to survive the onslaught. A big thrill for us on Saturday morning was the appearance of a Humpback Whale fairly close to shore (which means about 4km distance from us). Just visible to the eye but the plume when it it surfaced was a giveaway and the binoculars gave a decent view. Too far for the camera though. Stayed in view for a couple of hours following the incoming tide and likely feeding on herring and perhaps krill, after the tide turned it made an encore appearance for another hour or so in the afternoon.

While having coffee on Sunday morning we were again treated to some whale watching. This time a pod of Orcas (aka Killer Whale) proceeded to do much the same kind of thing as the humpback, moving with the tide and apparently feeding on herring. Much easier to identify from distance with the huge dorsal fin knifing across the surface, a few breaches would've been cool but no such luck from either of these sightings.

Tragedy at sea.

Cape Flattery Wa. and Tatoosh Island, from approx 40km.
Panorama showing the entrance to Juan de Fuca Strait.
Tatoosh Island, white building is the lighthouse.

We returned to our camping spot on the 27th Sept to near perfect conditions, sunny and warm with a light breeze. We got settled into our chairs with the VHF radio on and viewed the marine traffic and listened in to plenty of communications amongst the sport fishermen and the commercial fishing boats. Freighter traffic calling in to Victoria, Port Angeles, Tofino and Seattle traffic control gives us the opportunity to both identify the vessels as they pass in front of us and learn a little about their destinations.

Seems the commercial fishboats were having moderate success with the Hake in the Straits. One brief chat mentioned Orcas (killer whales) separating a Humpback whale calf from 2 adults and creating a bloodbath! Yucch, but that's nature. The Orcas' in question must be a transient pod as the resident Orcas diet is salmon and other fish. We also heard the Viking Storm, one of the fishboats, discuss taking their catch south to Westport Wa., fuel is cheaper and there was mention of maybe getting a round of golf in. By dusk these plans had been tragically altered...

A mayday call was made by the Viking Storm, the location given was 1 mile off Tatoosh Island and it was apparent to us which vessel this was as running lights were displayed. The on board situation was a severe injury to a crew member who'd been struck by a cargo hook and was unconcious and bleeding profusely. The nearby USCG station at Neah Bay handled the call and after some delay (likely due to getting medical people ready) put out of the bay and headed towards the Viking Storm which was making all speed back to Neah Bay. Unfortunately fishing boats aren't built for speed but nevertheless they were approximately halfway back when the the coastguard vessel met them. This must've taken 45mins though and in the meantime radio calls indicated just how quickly the injured crewman was fading. Pretty gut wrenching stuff for us. The victim was rushed back to Neah Bay with the Viking Storm following. An expected helicopter from USCG Port Angeles didn't arrive which indicated to us there was no longer any need to transfer the victim to a hospital.

Incredibly sad, we both felt the grief that was sure to come after the loss of a loved one. We've had personal experience and could easily feel the pain to come for the parents, and possibly family, of this young man. We were unable to positively confirm our fears, radio contact had ceased once the Viking Storm had reached Neah Bay and there was no further mention the following day. Nor could I find any news story about this incident after we'd come home. I've withheld names as I don't feel it's appropiate here.