Er .....
Posted on 09/10/2022 1:57:16 PM PDT by texas booster
Five people died Saturday in New Zealand after the small charter boat they were aboard capsized, authorities say, in what may have been a collision with a whale. Another six people aboard the boat were rescued.
Police said the 8.5-meter (28-foot) boat overturned near the South Island town of Kaikoura. Police said they were continuing to investigate the cause of the accident.
Kaikoura Police Sergeant Matt Boyce described it as a devastating and unprecedented event.
“Our thoughts are with everyone involved, including the victims and their families, their local communities, and emergency services personnel,” Boyce said.
He said police divers had recovered the bodies of all those who had died. He said all six survivors were assessed to be in stable condition at a local health center, with one transferred to a hospital in the city of Christchurch as a precaution.
Kaikoura Mayor Craig Mackle told The Associated Press that the water was dead calm at the time of the accident and the assumption was that a whale had surfaced from beneath the boat.
He said there were some sperm whales in the area and also some humpback whales traveling through.
He said locals had helped with the rescue efforts throughout the day but the mood in the town was “somber” because the water was so cold, and they feared for the outcome of anybody who had fallen overboard.
Mackle said he’d thought in the past about the possibility of a boat and whale colliding, given the number of whales that frequent the region.
“It always plays on your mind that it could happen,” he said, adding that he hadn’t heard about any previous such accidents.
(Excerpt) Read more at voanews.com ...
That’s just what the officials wanted them to believe, but really it was p!ssed off whales, determined to pay back Herman Melville for the bad press they got.
Talk about bad luck. Dingo ate my baby. Moose bit my sister. Whale sank my boat taking my firearms down with it. I’m just unlucky.
Gonna need a bigger boat.
Mandatory scuba masks at least?
“Stove by a whale!”
Well, maybe if NZ can find a way to administer a carbon tax while you rent scuba gear and tanks from the prime minister's nephew.
And don’t forget James Bartley, who was swallowed by a whale (although that probably didn’t really happen).
If this were the ‘70s, a disaster movie would already be in production. Whales are p!ssed off. They’re determined to rid the seas of humanity in WHALE! Coming soon to a theater near you.
—
Whalenado!
There was Inferno, Earthquake, Avalanche, Piranha, Killer Bees...yeah, I guess there’s precedent for a three-syllable title. Of course, a lot of them went for just one: Jaws, Frogs, Claws (grizzly on rampage)...
“I thought that, too-I’ve never heard of a fishing charter booking 11 people for a boat that small-most specify no more than 6-7b people-and why was a charter boat-of any size out there running around where there had been several whales sighted in the 1st place? Sounds like a dumb thing to do...”
Bird-watching groups go “watching”, not fishing. Lots of 28’ boats certified t0 carry even more than 11 passengers.
Beau tells me that, too! He wants to go on cruises, and I’m kind of coming around to the River Cruise idea. I could PROBABLY swim to shore if I had to...
He also tells me that if I slip and fall correctly I can ‘drown’ in the toilet at home!
Yeah. Neither of you are of ANY help to me, LOL! ;)
Er .....
Was Oprah out swimming again?
I don’t doubt that is true, and yes-I’ve seen small boats like the one in your posted photo taking whale watchers right up to whales-on TV-however, it still looks like a really risky thing to do-and in this case it obviously was. I live close to woods and walk there-but I wouldn’t walk up to a bear or mountain lion in the woods and watch them-same idea-wild animal in its own environment-better left alone and admired from a distance...
Oddly, earlier last evening my daughter and I watched the Star Trek TOS episode “Space Seed”, which then lead to the movie “Wrath of Kahn”, and you just naturally get to Khan quoting Melville...
Later I actually re-read that same Wikipedia account of the Essex’ destruction and the horrors the surviving crewmen went through (cannibalism) trying to make it to civilization. But, thanks, maybe someone unfamiliar with the story will click that link - it’s pretty incredible.
Then I saw this story!
Living near the Lower Ohio River, I’d MUCH rather fall into a deep lake than that river. The whirlpools and current of a medium or large river can overcome even powerful swimmers. Plus you can get bonked by debris. Biggest one I ever swam across was the Current River in MO, at moderate flow, in some fairly fast water, but no whirlpools. I was young and stupid, but not so stupid as to not learn never to try that again. I ended up about 40 yards downstream from the point I thought I could make on the opposite bank, and I was a fairly good swimmer.
As for the toilet, geez, even I’m not that mean! ;-)
I took my sons whale watching on the St Lawrence near Tadoussac in Quebec. Fin and other large whales come up to a deep area in the St Lawrence to feed. They let you know that even wearing a life vest that you will only last 3-5 minutes in the water. It was a fairly large boat, and the captain announced that by the time we turn this boat around you will be in a state of hypothermia. And this was in July.
“...bonked by debris...”
See? That’s what I’m sayin’! That’s going to be on my Tombstone if Beau has his way and hog-ties me and gets me on a boat.
I’m just trying to save my family a lot of heartache when I die under suspicious circumstances. ;)
Peter Hockley is one of five people killed after a boating accident at Kaikōura on Saturday.
“We don’t even know who else is dead and who else survived. We just know that Dad was one of the ones in the cabin,” his daughter told Stuff at her parents Halswell home in Christchurch.
She paid tribute to her “amazing” father, saying he was an incredible photographer.
Hockley and 10 other people were on a Nature Photography Society of New Zealand field trip and were participating in a three-hour boating trip using Fish Kaikōura Charters on Saturday.
That guy looks like a lot of other folks my age ... Information is starting to come out on this capsizing.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.