CHILD OF THE STORM

Tragedy at sea The Chinese celebrate each year with a different animal. One year can be the year of the snake while the next one might be the year of the goat or some other well known animal. Not being Chinese I’m not too sure how all this works but I do know that on the west coast of Canada, I962 was the year of the pink salmon. Millions of them returned to the central coast of British Columbia to invade the rivers of their birth to spawn. They descended upon the coast like locusts. Every bay and channel was teeming with these small salmon during late July and August. Maybe because of their great numbers, they were smaller than usual. Their average weight was about one and a half pounds when under normal conditions they would average three pounds. Pinks are the bottom of the salmon pecking order when it comes to public opinion. Although they are very tasty, somewhat like trout only better, there is always a stigma that follows them from birth. Of course they cannot be compared with the mighty Chinook that can attain weights of over one hundred pounds. Then there is the famed Sockeye, which roam the North Pacific Ocean as far as Asian shores for four years before returning home to lay their eggs for the next generation on the same river bed where they were hatched. Anyone who is a sport fishing purist will no doubt have starry eyed memories of the last Coho salmon they hooked on a fly rod as it leaped and jumped on the end of their line. Even the Kita, or Chum as it is more often known, outranks the lowly pink. Due to this somewhat unfair judgement, several derogatory labels have been hung on these helpless creatures. The most common is humpback, because the males at spawning time do acquire a very pronounced hump and vicious looking jaws. This name has been shortened over the years to just plain humpie and would explain why they are known as humpies from hell when they appear in huge numbers as they did in 1962. I was employed as mate on the fish packing vessel T.W. Sea Queen during that summer long ago. She was a wooden vessel 90 feet in length that was one of many of her type built in 1944 for the U. S. military. We were dispatched to haul several loads of pinks from Kwakume Inlet to the Tulloch Western cannery at Vancouver. This turned out to be non-stop work for several weeks as the transport vessels were not able to keep up with the huge production of the fishing fleet. Even though the fishing boats were put on a quota of five thousand fish a day, the amount of fish delivered was staggering. The cannery at Namu, which was located adjacent to the fishing grounds, was working to full capacity 24 hours a day, seven days a week. At Klemtu, located just north of Namu, there was an old cannery that hadn’t operated for several years. This plant was kicked back into life in an attempt to keep up with the amount of fish being produced. These two canneries were in addition to the numerous ones located mostly at Prince Rupert and Vancouver. By late evening we were fully loaded with 350,000 pounds of those humpies from hell. These fish had to be weighed as they were unloaded from the fishing boats then layered with ice in the hold of the Sea Queen. Even though we had taken extra deckhands, we were a weary crew that headed south for the 24 hour run to Vancouver. We had one stop to make at Deep Bay on the run south to pick up a few boxes of high grade fish for delivery to our plant at Vancouver. This gave us a run of about 20 hours to get rested as we crossed Queen Charlotte Sound then down Johnstone Straits. Our skipper, Bill Zelley reduced our times on watch to help us recover from the rigors of loading so much fish in such a short period of time. We arrived at Deep Bay to pick up our cargo, and then departed for Vancouver as the sun was setting in the western sky and our little ship was engulfed by the warm evening breezes of the southern Gulf of Georgia. I was off watch when awakened by our cook and asked to report to the wheelhouse on the double. I couldn’t imagine what was happening but knew that there must be some trouble awaiting me. Upon arrival topside I was surprised to see most of the crew already there ahead of me and a worried look on Captain Bill’s face as he met me in his cabin just aft of the wheelhouse. Loretta B. was a vessel that had been chartered by our company during this busy time and was taking on water after leaving Porlier Pass on their way into Vancouver through choppy waters kicked up by northwest winds. Radio contact had been lost with the Loretta B. and we all feared that they may have sunk suddenly before they were able to get off a final radio message. Rescue center was dispatching vessels to the last reported position and aircraft were leaving from Comox Airforce Base to light the area with flares. After a brief discussion Bill decided to make all speed to the area to assist in the search for the distressed vessel. Our Engineer was asked to crank up our 400 horsepower Enterprise engine beyond its normal speed which he did with great haste. Normally we would maintain a steady 10 knots at 400 revolutions per minute; this would make our arrival at the search area in about three hours. With that faithful old engine cranked up to 430 RPM we sped through that balmy summer night at close to 12 knots. The weather was clear with a light to moderate northwest wind and ebb tide which added to our speed. Bill ordered blankets and hot soup to be prepared just in case survivors were brought aboard. As we proceeded to the search scene, flares were sighted as they were being dropped from the circling aircraft. When we arrived on sight just before daybreak, there was much discussion on the radio among the various search vessels. Some debris was sighted but there was no sign of the Loretta B. or her crew of three. In addition to the three crew members, it was learned from the manager at Porlier Pass that two passengers had asked for a ride into Vancouver. This meant that five people were missing, not good news. Shortly after daybreak a fisherman who was working off the mouth of the Fraser River asked on his radio if anyone knew of a boat that had sunk overnight. It seems that he had been sleeping while all the excitement was swirling around him and had not heard the bad news. He was immediately informed of the situation of the Loretta B. by the search master. His reply was that he had just picked up a young lady who had been floating in the water all night clinging to a wooden fish box. All of us who were in the wheelhouse just looked at each other in disbelief. Bill ordered a deckhand to climb the forward mast as we sped for the area where the lady was recovered from the choppy water. We searched from the recovery area in ever widening circles in the hope of finding more survivors. Some more debris was located but not much else. The search was continued by aircraft and selected vessels but we were stood down by the search master so that we could proceed into Vancouver to unload our cargo. This news of the rescue resulted in elation and grief all at the same time, as there were no further survivors despite the continued search effort. The lone survivor was that young lady who had been hitching a ride into Vancouver to await the birth of her child near a big city hospital. She was well along with her pregnancy when this event took place and as far as we know all went well after her rescue. I have often wondered over these many years who this lady was and where her child is now. The baby would now be over 45 years old and it sure would be interesting to hear the life story of this child who was spared the fate of the other four that were lost when the Loretta B. sank beneath the waves that balmy summer night of 1962.