I met Durel Wiley, a retired registered nurse who moved to Port Angeles earlier this year.
Since retiring, Durel has not been far from the ocean, to which he feels a special connection.
For 45 years or more, his avocation — and in some instances his vocation — have been upon the seas.
Surfing, kayaking and sail-boating have had a profound influence on Durel’s life and are the genesis for the name of his business, Ohana Kai, Hawaiian for family of the ocean.
Durel has been building surfboards for decades, and his medium of choice is red cedar and Paulownia, which is native to Asia.
He builds a board that was first popularized in the 1960s by Steve Lis of San Diego called a Fish that is about 6 feet 3 inches long, and the traditional long-board that is 10 feet long.
Regardless of the style, the boards are made with strips of wood that are a quarter-inch thick that have been alternately coved and beaded, and fit together much like tongue and groove planking.
The boards are then coated with a layer of epoxy, covered with 4-ounce fiberglass cloth and finished with three coats of varnish.
The kayaks are 20 feet long and 21 inches wide and modeled after an Australian surf ski, where the operator sits on top of the cockpit and controls the rudder with a foot pedal.
The lightweight canoe is molded around a jig that is constructed of marine plywood using the same construction technique that is used to build surfboards, with an additional application of fiberglass cloth to the inside of the kayak.
The kayaks are built in two pieces — the hull and the top — which are then fastened together with quarter-inch doweling.
According to Durel, when the finished product is ready to be put into the water, it weighs only 40 pounds.
An avowed “compulsive experimenter,” Durel said that a couple of adaptations he soon will be making to the kayaks include the addition of pontoons to make one a trimaran and incorporating sailboard technology to have a wind-aided kayak.
Adrift at sea
Durel also knows a bit about sailing and has experienced some of the perils facing bluewater sailors.
On Sept. 27, 1976, Durel and four companions, Nancy Perry, Bruce Collins, Jim Ahola and Camilla Arthur, were aboard Spirit, a 42-foot, gaff-rigged, double-ended ketch bound for San Francisco.
It was about 9 a.m. on the second day of maneuvering in 15-foot seas and 35-knot winds when Durel, who was standing watch at the helm, heard a loud crash on the starboard quarter.
Spirit immediately heeled over until her masts were in the water.
He was thrown into the water and luckily was able to grasp the shrouds as the boat righted herself, and he was unceremoniously deposited onto the afterdeck.
According to Durel, 15 feet of the starboard bulwark had been ripped away, carrying off much of the survival equipment, and the boat was sinking fast.
His boatmates, all of whom had been sleeping, clambered topside to find the stern rapidly disappearing and the bow unnaturally pointing skyward.
Two Avon life rafts were deployed, and everyone climbed aboard as Spirit began to slip beneath the surface.
Two 5-gallon plastic jugs the ladies had brought to wash their hair floated to the surface, and Nancy pulled them into the raft.
Jim’s last desperate act aboard Spirit before jumping onto a life raft was to reach through an access hatch into the afterdeck and retrieve his Nikonos underwater camera.
Spirit sank in fewer than three minutes. The rafts were 4 feet apart in the heavy seas and buffeted by gale-force winds.
It took 15 minutes of hard paddling to bring the rafts close enough to tie them together.
Inasmuch as Durel was manning the helm, he was the only one wearing clothes, and these he shared with his companions, who had been roused from their sleep clothed only in their underwear.
Ultimately Camilla, Jim and Bruce settled on one raft and Nancy and Durel on the other.
Each raft had a 5-gallon plastic jug of water and six pint cans that had come with the rafts. There was also a first-aid kit, a mall knife, a patch kit, a pump, a short paddle, a sea anchor, three hand-held flares and two rocket flares in each raft.
And there was no food.
Bruce was Spirit’s skipper, and Durel had been sharing navigation duties with him.
He knew all too well where they were in relation to the established shipping lanes and was of the opinion that if they were to be picked up, it would be by sheer accident.
They were 16 days out of Hawaii and a bit north and 700 miles west of San Francisco.
Thus began a harrowing ordeal from which only three would survive.
Stay tuned. I’ll continue this amazing story next week.
Water over the side
Thanks and a tip of the bosun’s cap to Mike Van Doren of Port Angeles, who sent me a great question.
Mike asked why water was being discharged over the side of the SeaRiver American Progress as she lay at anchor in Port Angeles Harbor.
After being bunkered Thursday by Tesoro Petroleum, the petroleum products tanker got under way for a shipyard in Singapore for mandatory maintenance and inspections.
Among the preparations is the cleaning of the cargo tanks preparatory to inspections and repairs.
Because personnel need to be inside the confined spaces of the tanks, it is necessary to keep clean, fresh air circulating throughout the tanks.
To accomplish this, large fans are placed over the access hatches of each tank. The power source for each fan is the water pressure that is generated by the ship’s saltwater fire main.
The hoses over the side that were pumping water were exhausting the harbor water that was propelling the fans.
As it happens, Washington Marine Repair, the topside ship-repair company at the foot of Cedar Street, had about a dozen welders and laborers aboard the 575-foot American Progress.
Whenever welders are plying their trade aboard ship, there is also one or more laborers standing fire watch. This is because the welder is under a hood and can only see the immediate work surface.
The laborer’s task is to make certain the area is free of trash and debris and to put out any spot fires that might occur before they have an opportunity to flare into a conflagration.
In doing so, the laborer will have access to a small water bottle, a CO2 cylinder and the ship’s onboard fire-main.
Seiner under construction
Platypus Marine, the Port Angeles waterfront company that repairs and refurbishes pleasure craft, luxury yachts and commercial fishing vessels, has begun building a 58-foot limit seiner in the Rubb building, sandwiched between the east side of the turquoise blue Commander Building and the west side of Westport Shipyard’s facility on Marine Drive.
Hearing the unmistakable sounds of steelwork, I poked my head into the building to take a quick peek and could see the shape of the boat already taking place.
The keel is laid down, the outline of the bulbous bow is in place, and frames are being added.
If all goes well, the boat should splash the water for the first time in the early part of 2013.
On Thursday, personnel from Platypus Marine and Monroe House Movers of Sequim spent much of the day moving the 260,000-pound naval barge YC 1623 out of a satellite building so that she could be picked up by the company’s TraveLift and returned to the water for the 10-hour return trip to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in Bremerton.
According to Charlie Crane, Platypus Marine director of sales and marketing, the barge was at Platypus’ facility for about six weeks and was sandblasted, primed and painted, and had new zincs attached.
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David G. Sellars is a Port Angeles resident and former Navy boatswain’s mate who enjoys boats and strolling the waterfronts.
Items involving boating, port activities and the North Olympic Peninsula waterfronts are always welcome.
Email dgsellars@hotmail.com or phone him at 360-808-3202.
His column, On the Waterfront, appears every Sunday.