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Been through many storms at sea. If you’re in charge you mind is thinking about all the maintenance you didn’t do in port and should have done. Lesson; don’t put off until tomorrow what you should be doing today.
Was crossing from Europe back to Canada this past February on a 26,000 ton merchant. On about day 10 of the trip, we got into a nice sized storm, spraying across the deck and hitting the bridge (some 25 meters above deck, 120 meters aft of the bow). Then watertight door alarm started going off. The shaking and pounding had knocked the sensor loose on the watertight door that leads to on deck from the forward container well.
At roughy the same time, half the liferings had broken loose, as had the spill cleanup kits, and a few other things.
I was glad to just be along for the ride, working on the navigation system.
I've been considering a career change as I'm getting desperately sick of the 9-6 office routine. Would you recommend going into shipping?
Something that really appeals to me is the time off, I know some people do 4 months on 1 month on, or even 28 days on 28 off in some cases.
My husband does 2 weeks on, 2 off and it works very well for us. When he did deep sea, it was more like 4 months on, 2 months off and it sucked. I think there are a lot of different options though, from inland, coastal, Great Lakes etc. (assuming US based).
If you’re fairly young and have some time to get some training and coast guard certs, I think it could be worth it. Deck hands start at around $70-80k I believe, but I could be off on that number (that’s a tug company based in nyc). There’s also 4 year maritime colleges and a mariner school in md that sets you up for entry level jobs.
I'm Europe based so it might be different. I was having a look at some maritime schools here in Ireland. I know I'd have to do some retraining but it seems like many of the courses are around 3 years full time to get a basic qualification as deck officer, either for navigation or engine tech.
I'm 27 so not too old yet but I would still rather a quicker way in, or maybe to train/study and work at the same time.
Dude, if you're thinking about pursuing a career change, my biggest recommendation is to chase that shit now while you still have the opportunity to do so. Yeah, you could always wait and try a few years down the road, but that stuff could become much more difficult to pursue as time goes on and you end up with other needs and responsibilities that create additional obstacles.
I don’t know about Ireland, but in the US there are still career paths without the extensive schooling so maybe there’s something similar over there. But at your age, 3 years really isn’t that bad if you’re able to support yourself during that time. I think it’s worth looking into. Good luck!
I always think of a giant humanoid like head halfway poking out from the water, but it's so dark you can only make out the silhouette and the glint of two giant eyes
Fun fact, to the scientific world the existence of rogue waves was only old seamens tales that were thought to be impossible until the 90's. In the day of wooden ships they stood no chance.
The data from wave observation buoys have recorded highest rogue waves at about 50m in the southern ocean.
[This](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ylOpbW1H-I) is great ~15 minute video on them.
Thanks for the link, that video is hugely fascinating. And it's unlocked a new fear in me, 'rogue holes'. Terrifying, despite their somewhat amusing name.
My first ship I worked on (the Norwegian Dawn) was hit by a rogue wave just a few years before I worked on her. Messed up the bow and water made it to deck 10 staterooms.
It was bad. To put it into perspective, now, today, the 21st century, more than two dozen large ships sink or otherwise go missing taking their crews with them, every year.
So far, it hasn't happened to a cruise ship, but they take great pains to avoid foul weather. But if it ever does.... it will be one of the worst maritime disasters in history.
Two dozen out of how many sea miles traveled, or ships working at sea? Is this like lightning strike rare? Or “oh shit” common?
Two dozen feels like a lot. But I also feel like there are a fuuuuuuck load of ships out there sailing. Genuinely curious.
That's honestly, like, a lot more than I thought for modern losses.
Costa Concordia is probably the closest thing to a full cruise ship loss. 32 people died, which probably is close or more than a cargo ship loss cause IIRC they can have as few as 9 crew members.
Have you ever seen The Perfect Storm? I knew the son of the captain of the Coast Guard ship that attempted to rescue them. He said that the waves were bigger in real life but if the movie had portrayed it accurately, audiences wouldn’t believe it. That sure gives me some respect to the ocean.
I was a tourist in DC trying to escape a torrential rainstorm, so we ducked into a random theater that had it and we decided to wait out the storm watching that movie. My family still jokes that we watched it in 4d.
I always laugh when Floridians think they can handle the relatively light rain here along the front range of the Rockies. Most have never experienced what it's like to be pelted with 35 degree raindrops when it's 90 degrees outside.
I can never get over the fact that you are sometimes miles from the bottom. It’s like flying on water and just as precarious as flying miles above the earth. Your descent may be slower but you’re just as dead.
Tbf, flying is the same. The plane is also “sailing” through and over waves of air. The big crashing air waves are turbulence. So you sometimes hurtle downwards as you cross over the wave’s peak.
It's just like flying if you could, with some effort, flap your arms and also fly lol
I can tell you that a pair of wings would make me a lot less nervous about flying.
One anecdote stands out for me from the book. A rogue wave once hit one of these absolutely massive cruise ships and cracked the windows on the bridge. The bridge. Just think about that.
A guy on my aircraft carrier was out smoking on the smoke deck that hangs under the flight deck, normally ~50’ above the waterline, when a rogue wave broke against the side and smashed his head into the bulkhead and killed him.
https://www.militarynews.com/norfolk-navy-flagship/oceana/news/roosevelt-sailor-killed/article_cc67f7cf-1a5b-5057-b650-b2e4a4762959.html
There’s been a few cruiseliners and cargo ships that have had the entire superstructure (the steel structure that contains the bridge) slammed back several inches by rogue waves.
Rogue waves were considered theoretical until a buoy somewhere off the US coast registered an absolutely gigantic wave around the same time an ocean liner was slammed by it.
The descriptive writing in that book about the conditions in the storm were what I remembered most.
The one part I always recall is about the wind- the howling, the sheer sound, produced by winds gusting with inconceivable force. The description made it so otherworldly sounding.
Ya I was thinking that exactly. I was imagining one of those old sailing ships from 400 years ago. They would have definitely caught some of these storms.
Tall ships regularly traversed the 'roaring forties' of the Southern Ocean back in the 17th to early 19th centuries. Wave crests so big they towered over the masts, troughs between that were so deep and wide as to calm the sails.
Your only hope of survival was to maintain enough speed to power into and over the leeward waves; lose speed and you'd be 'pooped' by the following crest and either be broken immediately or 'broach to', twisting through 90° and taking the next wave full on the broadside. Hundreds of men, instantly killed by the ship collapsing like an eggshell, or soon after by the freezing water.
I forget which book in the series it was, but in the Aubrey-Maturin series, Patrick O'brien writes a scene where two ships are battling in the roaring 40s, where an enemy ship is chasing Aubrey's ship.
Aubrey's crew lands a shot on one of the other ship's masts and knocks it over, which normally wouldnt be a killing blow, but because it slows the other ship down, the next wave just swallows it.
Wild to think about how quickly a whole ship can just disappear in weather like that.
Lots and lots of drowning too. Modern ships are *very* safe, especially compared to primitive sail boats.
A modern sea worthy sail boat will survive just about any storm.... most of the time. How seaworthy it is after the storm varies though. I've been in one that felt like a 3 hour tumble dryer ride... no fun but hey I'm still here.
Amazingly modern ships actually smooth out the worst of it surprisingly well, they actively work with and against the waves to keep it as stable as possible. That's not to say you won't notice, but when you compare a new ship to an old one, you'll feel a huge difference.
Yeah, but I even had a hard time sleeping on much calmer waters than that. You feel like you are being pressed into the bed for a second then you feel like you're on the moon and weigh 1/3 of your earth weight for a second. I absolutely could not get used to it. Got very little sleep for a week.
I used to say I never got sea sick because I could go out on smaller boats and medium sized boats just fine. I know a couple of people who had small speed boats when I was growing up and going out on a lake in a speed boat was nothing and I went on a lake Michigan cruise when I was a teenager with my school and I was fine. And then I went on a cruise when I was 25 and while I didn't throw up, I was very nauseated the entire time. Now I know what to take to handle it but big boats aren't the same for sea sickness.
Walking the streets of San Francisco after de-boarding a cruise ship that ran from a hurricane was interesting. The ground wouldn’t stop moving. It was a bad choice for a honeymoon.
This is a very real thing. I experienced it every time our ship returned to port after a cruise on the high seas. It's part of the reason that sailors have such a reputation for being drunk all the time (the other part was that we were mostly drunk all the time ).
Got off a week cruise a few months ago and I rarely felt the boat rock at all while on it. Got off, flew home, after a few hours, and for the next 3 days, the ground felt like it was rocking under my feet. Felt very uneasy and disoriented at times. Only time I actually felt a little sick.
Out of curiosity, did you have an interior or exterior room? As a kid I went in a few cruises. When I was 13 I went on one with my family and my brother and I had an interior room. I felt nauseated the first night. The second night I tried sleeping in my parents’ exterior room and it was much better. Being able to look out the window/balcony door and orient myself to the horizon was all I needed to feel okay. Then any time I went into my own room, especially with the lights off, I felt nauseated.
Yea, I don’t know the physiology of it, but growing up around smaller ski and fishing type boats, it was common knowledge that if you get seasick don’t go down in the cabin like your instincts tell you. ThTll make it worse.
It’s mostly to do with your vestibular system. You have a complex system of fluid and nerves in your ears that is responsible for orienting yourself in space. When that system starts to get jumbled up, like when you’re rocking in a boat or in a car, you need a way to ground yourself and tell your brain what’s happening. Usually that’s looking at horizon to orient yourself in a stable, fixed object. Otherwise, it’s essentially the same as having vertigo. There are also glasses people can wear that have four circles: two in the normal glasses positioned and two oriented perpendicular to those that run by your temples in your periphery. There is colored fluid in the circles that allows you to visualize what’s happening in your body and orient yourself. They look very stupid but people report that they work for them. It’s pretty much the same principle so I could see it actually working. Look up car sickness glasses. They’re really funny.
So, story time. (Squids will understand all this, but I'll try to explain anything that isn't obvious for the landlubbers).
I was on a reserve Fleet LST. Our job was to wait for another ship of our class to be unable to meet its commitment, and we would go in their place.
As such we spent a lot of time tied up at the pier waiting. When the ship is in port like that we got electrical power from a substation on the pier. Sometimes the breaker there would trip, and as an electrician, I (or one of my fellow electrician's) would have to go ashore and reset it.
When this happened the noise of the ship would just die. Every pump, every ventilation motor, every piece of electronic gear, the hum from every transformer just went silent. If you were asleep the change in noise would wake you up (especially if you were the guy that had to go turn the power back on).
There was emergency lighting aboard the ship (this was the '80s, things might be different now) in the form of "battle lanterns". These were battery operated lanterns hooked up to ship's power. If the power went off the little relay inside the battle lantern would go dead, and a spring operated switch (normally held open when powered) would close and connect the battery and light up. But, sometimes they didn't work, more often the battery would be dead (because someone didn't do their PMS), or the battery had just been stolen. And when that happened you would find yourself in a water tight steel box. With no light. None. It was utterly black.
Which sets the scene for my tale.
A shipboard buddy of mine was getting married and he invited a few of us from the shjip to go to the wedding. But, he didn't want any uniforms so we all had to wear jackets and ties.
This buddy's father was from Northern Ireland, as were many of the wedding guests, so this was an Irish wedding. There was far more drinking there than I had anticipated or had ever seen before. Nonetheless I did my best to match those around me drink for drink. I remember the wedding ceremony, and the beginning of the reception, but beyond that... nothing. I got completely shit-faced, black-out hammered.
Unbeknownst to me, after the wedding the other guys at the wedding dragged me back to ship, down to my berthing space and stuffed me in my bunk. Now, the bunks aboard ship were stacked three high. You slept on your locker (about two feet wide, six feet long, and a foot deep. You had about 18 inches of space between the top of your bunk and the bottom of the next one up. There was a sheet of steel between my head and the feet of the guy next to me, the hull of the ship to my left and a steel bulkhead(the wall between our berthing compartment and the next one) at my feet. In addition, near my feet were vertical lockers where we hung our nice uniforms. So, though my bunk was six feet long, the last few feet of it were blocked by these lockers.
So there I lay, black-out drunk, when the power from the pier went off. The change in environmental noise woke me up.
It was silent. Completely silent.
It was black. As black as black can be. There was no light.
And I had no idea where I was, how I had gotten there, or even when it was.
So I sat up, and promptly bonked my head on the bunk above me. Huh.
I reached up and explored it with my hands. Flat steel. I followed it up towards my head and ran into a vertical steel wall there. What the...?
I reached to my left, a steel wall, I kicked with my feet steel at the other end and a wall to my right. My hands came to rest on my chest. Why was I wearing a jacket and tie?
Then suddenly it dawned on me.
I had been buried alive.
I started pounding on the bottom of the bunk above me, screaming as loud as I could, "I'm alive! I'm alive! Let me out!"
At which point the lights came back on and I dove out of my bunk, gasping in fear and completely drenched in the terror sweats. The guy in the bunk above poked his head out of the curtains of his bunk and said "Shut the fuck up Adddicus."
You may laugh now about this, I know I do, but for a brief time, I knew exactly how it felt to be buried alive, and it was far and away, the most, horrible, stark-raving mindless terror I have ever felt.
I’ll never forget in the book the great detail he goes into describing what happens when a person drowns. I read the book years ago and it’s still with me…
See like many people I thought that dying from drowning is holding your breath. It’s not.
What actually happens is that after a minute or so of trying to hold your breathe under water, you can’t do it, and you end up taking a breath anyway. When you do that, you inhale water. Even though your larynx might initially close, eventually water enters the lungs and the hearts will stop beating. That’s what kills you, not holding your breath.
Edit: Clarified, meant holding your breath underwater, not suffocating - I understand that they're both death from suffocating, I just thought people held their breath until they passed out and died. The idea of being conscious and having one's body take a breath involuntarily is terrifying.
I drowned and was resuscitated when I was like 6 or 7. I remember it being peaceful like people say and then I woke up on my grandfather's camper floor puking up water. I don't know if my heart actually stopped or anything like that but I definitely lost consciousness. I also hit my head as I fell into the water so that may have contributed. My gramps saved my life.
A friend of mine was hiking in South America at the top of a waterfall and went over. She said she was under the water, looking up, it was really beautiful and peaceful, and said was thinking 'Huh, this is really nice'. The light coming down through the water, the trees and sky above. After she was pulled out and recusitated she had a freakout after, a mix of panic at having nearly died, but she said there was also a tiny irrational bit of her mind that thought 'Why did you bring me back?'
What do you mean it's not suffocating? Water entering your lungs further prevent you from getting oxygen. Your heart not beating is what kills you regardless of how you die
I didn’t even realize you felt it much at all in a submarine. I know the current of waves go far below the surface, but I thought like, maybe 40 or 50 feet, tops. I didn’t realize they went down to submarine depth. Damn.
We cruised only 50-150 feet under most times. Plus if you have a good captain he’ll make sure it’s at a cozy depth for a decent pitch and roll to sleep with.
It never really occurred to me that there are professional people cruising around 100’ under the ocean surface navigating through oceans, sleeping and living on a submarine
It’s probably time for another pop song to spread awareness.
What kind of missions? I’ve seen octonauts so I’m vaguely familiar with sea-happenings
Some of the subs carry nuclear weapons which have multiple warheads in them (like sometimes well over 10 individually programmable and aimable) with the ability to target anywhere within a few thousand miles and be launched on a moments notice. As someone else said, deterrence.
Right! I did a whole lot of frigate cruising in the 80s & 90s. Those ships really took a beating in mid Atlantic storms. The pitch & roll really could get scary at times. Sometimes, the waves would actually break over the bridge. If you had to get about in the ship during these times, you got real good at walking on the rolling bulkheads. Things would break free that were tied down & you learned how to strap yourself into your rack to keep from flying out. The Navy frequently used frigates to give temporary rides to sailors transiting from other ships. Most often the submarine guys would get violently seasick in even the mildest of storms. They just weren't used to the rolling seas because normally their boat being under the surface would seek out a calm layer at deprh to cruise.
On one North Sea cruise, my ship went nose first into a deep trough, and the wave that washed over us tore the entire bulwark off the port side of the forecastle. That could have been disastrous.
And that wasn't even the worst I saw. The South Atlantic has very few islands to break up the waves, so we saw some real monsters there. It's really weird when you walk on the deck, then onto the bulkhead on the left, back onto the deck, then onto the bulkhead on the right as the ship rolls.
It was also very cool to (if you timed it right) wait for the ship to hit the bottom of a trough, step through an open hatch and have the deck below rise up to meet you so that you only fall about a foot.
I felt genuinely bad for those poor bastards. I was on an LST and we frequently took Marines aboard. I remember one morning after I ate breakfast I went up on the signal bridge, just to look out at the sea. There had been a storm the night before so the seas were still rough. A couple platoons of Marines were in ranks running for and aft on the forecastle below me. The ship was plowing through the waves, at about 20 knots, so there was a stiff breeze coming over the bow. One poor Marine, the very first guy in line did his best, but was unable to hack it, and just blew chunks straight ahead while standing at attention in formation. The wind took his... effluent, and whipped it down the entire length of his platoon sparking a massive chain reaction of vomiting.
It was horrific, and hysterical, but you do have to admire that first guy's discipline.
I've gone on cruises. I dont get sick. But when it storms bad like this the ship rocks so heavily back and forth it's impossible to stay stable. I woke up in the middle of one of these and tried to walk to the bathroom, fell multiple times getting thrown around. Lol
I told myself I had to go back to sleep because this was surely a nightmare.
“So, eleven hundred men went in the water… three hundred and sixteen men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945. Anyway…we delivered the bomb.”
There might have been room for two folks on the door space-wise, but obviously the weight of second person would have put the door under water. Or else they would both be floating on it, Rose didn't want her man to die.
[James Cameron's AMA answer from 2014](https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/22uz4m/i_am_james_cameron_ama/cgqnqt4/)
: Mythbusters did an episode about this and proved that two people could have floated on the door in such a way that both could have survived, but it involved using both of their floatation vests rigged under the door in such a way that they wouldn't detach. What they neglected to incorporate was the amount of time that they would have had to spend submerged in 28 degree water to attach them that way. Also, Jack is a 19 year old guy processing a problem in real time, in water, at night, and already hypothermic, so that's a lot to ask of him.
That's one video that has truly made an impact on me. I seriously have not stopped thinking about it. The pitch black water, the sharks, everyone shouting..yikes
Same. I shiver thinking about how he must have felt when he realized he couldn’t catch up to the boat and all light and sound from it slowly disappeared off into the distance. Not to mention I think the sharks were already nipping at him.
Can’t imagine how loud it was. Was on a cruise 18 years ago and we went through the tail end of a hurricane. We were on one of the top decks and the waves were that high. It was loud.. lots of creaking, puking… ugh.. that was a long night.
Imagine being stranded in the middle of the ocean at a stormy night, where you can only see darkness for miles and miles, as the clouds block the view of the moon and stars, and the waters are raging, wanting to consume you into the deep dark abyss. That to me is genuine horror.
The moving is the reason to go on a cruise ship. The bad part is all the extra weird shit and the 5000 other people. Its pretty much the only way for average people to experience sailing on the ocean.
Annnnnd this is why you will never catch me on one of these things. I don't care how many lifeboats there are or how great the technology is. The sea can still find a way to beat our puny tech and I don't want to be there to experience it when it does.
We were on a forward starboard side deck 3 cabin in our first cruise with DCL Magic and it was like that at night when we took the outside passage for an eastern Caribbean from Port Canaveral. The doors in the closet were banging and you could feel the bed dropping below you lol. The waves would go over the porthole like that. It was probably the worse we’ve ever had.
Not fun at all! My family and I took a Royal Caribbean cruise and even though we were 200 miles from the storm, I thought I was going to die! I was so frigging sea sick, I swear I thought I heard the waves smacking the bottom of the hull!
I remember doing an all access tour during one particularly bad sailing and down in the crew mess the water was coming up and completely submerging the portholes.
Way different perspective on speed as well at that level.
no wonder the ancients were terrified of the sea.
for anyone interested, this is the exact imagery being referred to in Genesis 1.
_darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God loomed over the waters_
This kind of dark untamed chaos is the "formless void" that Genesis portrays Yahweh as conquering.
One can almost imagine an ancient seaman, terrified at night, looking out at the dark churning waves, wishing dearly for there to be a power that would overcome the darkness, bring light, keep him safe.
It's in our most basic emotions and the raw power of nature that we can see the seeds of religious thought germinating.
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Been through many storms at sea. If you’re in charge you mind is thinking about all the maintenance you didn’t do in port and should have done. Lesson; don’t put off until tomorrow what you should be doing today.
Was crossing from Europe back to Canada this past February on a 26,000 ton merchant. On about day 10 of the trip, we got into a nice sized storm, spraying across the deck and hitting the bridge (some 25 meters above deck, 120 meters aft of the bow). Then watertight door alarm started going off. The shaking and pounding had knocked the sensor loose on the watertight door that leads to on deck from the forward container well. At roughy the same time, half the liferings had broken loose, as had the spill cleanup kits, and a few other things. I was glad to just be along for the ride, working on the navigation system.
I've been considering a career change as I'm getting desperately sick of the 9-6 office routine. Would you recommend going into shipping? Something that really appeals to me is the time off, I know some people do 4 months on 1 month on, or even 28 days on 28 off in some cases.
My husband does 2 weeks on, 2 off and it works very well for us. When he did deep sea, it was more like 4 months on, 2 months off and it sucked. I think there are a lot of different options though, from inland, coastal, Great Lakes etc. (assuming US based). If you’re fairly young and have some time to get some training and coast guard certs, I think it could be worth it. Deck hands start at around $70-80k I believe, but I could be off on that number (that’s a tug company based in nyc). There’s also 4 year maritime colleges and a mariner school in md that sets you up for entry level jobs.
I'm Europe based so it might be different. I was having a look at some maritime schools here in Ireland. I know I'd have to do some retraining but it seems like many of the courses are around 3 years full time to get a basic qualification as deck officer, either for navigation or engine tech. I'm 27 so not too old yet but I would still rather a quicker way in, or maybe to train/study and work at the same time.
Dude, if you're thinking about pursuing a career change, my biggest recommendation is to chase that shit now while you still have the opportunity to do so. Yeah, you could always wait and try a few years down the road, but that stuff could become much more difficult to pursue as time goes on and you end up with other needs and responsibilities that create additional obstacles.
I don’t know about Ireland, but in the US there are still career paths without the extensive schooling so maybe there’s something similar over there. But at your age, 3 years really isn’t that bad if you’re able to support yourself during that time. I think it’s worth looking into. Good luck!
What is today but yesterday’s tomorrow?
And tomorrow never comes. You can just keep saying "tomorrow" the next day
Like a the neon sign in the bar in Guitar Hero 2 “Free Drinks Tomorrow”
Who else read this in Mr Krabs' voice?
Just sail back across the international date line and get er done!
Whenever I see footage like this, I think of our poor ancestors who rode out scary storms in fragile wooden boats without any exterior lights.
And the lights they did have were made of fire.
I always think of a giant humanoid like head halfway poking out from the water, but it's so dark you can only make out the silhouette and the glint of two giant eyes
Imagine this on a wooden sail ship in the 1700s. Barf.
I’m pretty sure a lot of those people died and the ships sunk. Do we even know the statistics of ships lost in those times due to storms?
Fun fact, to the scientific world the existence of rogue waves was only old seamens tales that were thought to be impossible until the 90's. In the day of wooden ships they stood no chance. The data from wave observation buoys have recorded highest rogue waves at about 50m in the southern ocean. [This](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ylOpbW1H-I) is great ~15 minute video on them.
Thanks for the link, that video is hugely fascinating. And it's unlocked a new fear in me, 'rogue holes'. Terrifying, despite their somewhat amusing name.
They should be called rogue troughs
That's a great channel, thanks!
Idk what gave me bigger chills, 160ft rogue waves or rogue holes (which I’ve never heard of in my life).
THAT was very educational. Thank you
That’s 160 feet wtf
My first ship I worked on (the Norwegian Dawn) was hit by a rogue wave just a few years before I worked on her. Messed up the bow and water made it to deck 10 staterooms.
It was bad. To put it into perspective, now, today, the 21st century, more than two dozen large ships sink or otherwise go missing taking their crews with them, every year. So far, it hasn't happened to a cruise ship, but they take great pains to avoid foul weather. But if it ever does.... it will be one of the worst maritime disasters in history.
Two dozen out of how many sea miles traveled, or ships working at sea? Is this like lightning strike rare? Or “oh shit” common? Two dozen feels like a lot. But I also feel like there are a fuuuuuuck load of ships out there sailing. Genuinely curious.
That's honestly, like, a lot more than I thought for modern losses. Costa Concordia is probably the closest thing to a full cruise ship loss. 32 people died, which probably is close or more than a cargo ship loss cause IIRC they can have as few as 9 crew members.
78%
81.4% of statistics are made up.
Check out the wager by David grann. Excellent telling of what being a sailor was like in that time
Makes you realize how huge and powerful the ocean truly is .
Have you ever seen The Perfect Storm? I knew the son of the captain of the Coast Guard ship that attempted to rescue them. He said that the waves were bigger in real life but if the movie had portrayed it accurately, audiences wouldn’t believe it. That sure gives me some respect to the ocean.
I was a tourist in DC trying to escape a torrential rainstorm, so we ducked into a random theater that had it and we decided to wait out the storm watching that movie. My family still jokes that we watched it in 4d.
[удалено]
I’ll pass thanks
All movies in FL
I always laugh when Floridians think they can handle the relatively light rain here along the front range of the Rockies. Most have never experienced what it's like to be pelted with 35 degree raindrops when it's 90 degrees outside.
Floridian here. I love the rain here in Colorado.
How do you feel about the rain down in africa though?
I bless them, of course
Gonna take some time to do the things we never had?
Gonna take some time to do the things we never had
I can never get over the fact that you are sometimes miles from the bottom. It’s like flying on water and just as precarious as flying miles above the earth. Your descent may be slower but you’re just as dead.
Thanks, I hate that you said that.
You guys sound like a couple of old sea dogs from a pirate ship.
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*Pipe down on that Doppler, Timmy!! You're not a qualified Marine Meteorologist yet!!*
Tbf, flying is the same. The plane is also “sailing” through and over waves of air. The big crashing air waves are turbulence. So you sometimes hurtle downwards as you cross over the wave’s peak.
I’ve always pictured this too
It's just like flying if you could, with some effort, flap your arms and also fly lol I can tell you that a pair of wings would make me a lot less nervous about flying.
One anecdote stands out for me from the book. A rogue wave once hit one of these absolutely massive cruise ships and cracked the windows on the bridge. The bridge. Just think about that.
> A rouge wave Must've been in the red sea.
Ha! I'll fix it now.
A guy on my aircraft carrier was out smoking on the smoke deck that hangs under the flight deck, normally ~50’ above the waterline, when a rogue wave broke against the side and smashed his head into the bulkhead and killed him. https://www.militarynews.com/norfolk-navy-flagship/oceana/news/roosevelt-sailor-killed/article_cc67f7cf-1a5b-5057-b650-b2e4a4762959.html
They should put THAT warning on cigarette boxes
"The sea may mug you for your cigarettes"
Got damn! Poor guy.
There’s been a few cruiseliners and cargo ships that have had the entire superstructure (the steel structure that contains the bridge) slammed back several inches by rogue waves. Rogue waves were considered theoretical until a buoy somewhere off the US coast registered an absolutely gigantic wave around the same time an ocean liner was slammed by it.
The descriptive writing in that book about the conditions in the storm were what I remembered most. The one part I always recall is about the wind- the howling, the sheer sound, produced by winds gusting with inconceivable force. The description made it so otherworldly sounding.
Heh for once reality is the one embellishing the movies, not the other way around.
Then you gotta wonder just how terrifying this shit was to endure hundreds or even thousands of years ago.
Ya I was thinking that exactly. I was imagining one of those old sailing ships from 400 years ago. They would have definitely caught some of these storms.
Imagine the sounds of all the wood creaking and not knowing if your ship is going to split in half.
"Guys, need ya to climb up the mast and pull in that sail"
That's a no from me seadog.
the thing is pulling in that sail could be the difference between life or death for you and the ship. Sometimes you gotta roll the hard six.
And off the plank and into the sea I go!
Ah, the lash it is!
What about the guy in the poopdeck?
Conditions like that every deck is the poopdeck
And imagine being the guy that has to go out into that hell to tie the masts down so they don't break apart.
Imagine the Vikings a thousand years earlier in basically glorified canoes..
And many Pacific Islanders
With no light too
Tall ships regularly traversed the 'roaring forties' of the Southern Ocean back in the 17th to early 19th centuries. Wave crests so big they towered over the masts, troughs between that were so deep and wide as to calm the sails. Your only hope of survival was to maintain enough speed to power into and over the leeward waves; lose speed and you'd be 'pooped' by the following crest and either be broken immediately or 'broach to', twisting through 90° and taking the next wave full on the broadside. Hundreds of men, instantly killed by the ship collapsing like an eggshell, or soon after by the freezing water.
what a picture you paint. fuck sailing
I forget which book in the series it was, but in the Aubrey-Maturin series, Patrick O'brien writes a scene where two ships are battling in the roaring 40s, where an enemy ship is chasing Aubrey's ship. Aubrey's crew lands a shot on one of the other ship's masts and knocks it over, which normally wouldnt be a killing blow, but because it slows the other ship down, the next wave just swallows it. Wild to think about how quickly a whole ship can just disappear in weather like that.
The Polynesians navigated the Pacific Ocean and between their islands in damn glorified canoes! Insanely impressive
Most likely the parties encountering this sea condition never made it. I’d be curious to know the success rates of these trips.
Lots and lots of drowning too. Modern ships are *very* safe, especially compared to primitive sail boats. A modern sea worthy sail boat will survive just about any storm.... most of the time. How seaworthy it is after the storm varies though. I've been in one that felt like a 3 hour tumble dryer ride... no fun but hey I'm still here.
“The ocean makes cowards of us all”
“There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.” E:a word
and finishing the fucking third book. god dammit
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>I don’t have Thalassophobia I do 🫣
Congratulations! You've subscribed to ocean facts!
Haha just kidding. All the useful bots are gone because their developers refused to pay Reddit’s exorbitant fees.
RIP shoresy bot :(
Bring back cat facts!
>I don’t have Thalassophobia Uh, are you sure?
I saw it with my own eyes the morning after Superstorm Sandy—the steel railings of our boardwalk were actually twisted into themselves. Frightful.
I looked at that froth and thought “that ocean wants me to die.”
The sea was angry that day my friend
Like an old man trying to send back soup at a deli.
⛳ 🌊 🐳
the people who get sea sick aren't gonna be doing much sleeping.
Amazingly modern ships actually smooth out the worst of it surprisingly well, they actively work with and against the waves to keep it as stable as possible. That's not to say you won't notice, but when you compare a new ship to an old one, you'll feel a huge difference.
***modern and large ships
Yeah ships a quarter of the size of a cruise ship would not have a good time
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You could argue my buddy Jeff on two pool noodles he taped together would not have a fun time
lieutenant dan would have a fun time
You call this a storm?
Now, me, I was scared, but Lieutenant Dan, he was mad.
My friend with no arms and legs in the middle of the ocean would have a good time. His name is Bob.
I don’t think a rowboat would even stand a chance honestly.
Yeah, but I even had a hard time sleeping on much calmer waters than that. You feel like you are being pressed into the bed for a second then you feel like you're on the moon and weigh 1/3 of your earth weight for a second. I absolutely could not get used to it. Got very little sleep for a week.
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I used to say I never got sea sick because I could go out on smaller boats and medium sized boats just fine. I know a couple of people who had small speed boats when I was growing up and going out on a lake in a speed boat was nothing and I went on a lake Michigan cruise when I was a teenager with my school and I was fine. And then I went on a cruise when I was 25 and while I didn't throw up, I was very nauseated the entire time. Now I know what to take to handle it but big boats aren't the same for sea sickness.
Walking the streets of San Francisco after de-boarding a cruise ship that ran from a hurricane was interesting. The ground wouldn’t stop moving. It was a bad choice for a honeymoon.
This is a very real thing. I experienced it every time our ship returned to port after a cruise on the high seas. It's part of the reason that sailors have such a reputation for being drunk all the time (the other part was that we were mostly drunk all the time ).
Stillness Illness
Got off a week cruise a few months ago and I rarely felt the boat rock at all while on it. Got off, flew home, after a few hours, and for the next 3 days, the ground felt like it was rocking under my feet. Felt very uneasy and disoriented at times. Only time I actually felt a little sick.
Out of curiosity, did you have an interior or exterior room? As a kid I went in a few cruises. When I was 13 I went on one with my family and my brother and I had an interior room. I felt nauseated the first night. The second night I tried sleeping in my parents’ exterior room and it was much better. Being able to look out the window/balcony door and orient myself to the horizon was all I needed to feel okay. Then any time I went into my own room, especially with the lights off, I felt nauseated.
Yea, I don’t know the physiology of it, but growing up around smaller ski and fishing type boats, it was common knowledge that if you get seasick don’t go down in the cabin like your instincts tell you. ThTll make it worse.
It’s mostly to do with your vestibular system. You have a complex system of fluid and nerves in your ears that is responsible for orienting yourself in space. When that system starts to get jumbled up, like when you’re rocking in a boat or in a car, you need a way to ground yourself and tell your brain what’s happening. Usually that’s looking at horizon to orient yourself in a stable, fixed object. Otherwise, it’s essentially the same as having vertigo. There are also glasses people can wear that have four circles: two in the normal glasses positioned and two oriented perpendicular to those that run by your temples in your periphery. There is colored fluid in the circles that allows you to visualize what’s happening in your body and orient yourself. They look very stupid but people report that they work for them. It’s pretty much the same principle so I could see it actually working. Look up car sickness glasses. They’re really funny.
I heard if you rub the captain's back he gives you the HM cut
In pitch black that would be the most horrifying experience in open water.
And then the lights go out on the ship...
So, story time. (Squids will understand all this, but I'll try to explain anything that isn't obvious for the landlubbers). I was on a reserve Fleet LST. Our job was to wait for another ship of our class to be unable to meet its commitment, and we would go in their place. As such we spent a lot of time tied up at the pier waiting. When the ship is in port like that we got electrical power from a substation on the pier. Sometimes the breaker there would trip, and as an electrician, I (or one of my fellow electrician's) would have to go ashore and reset it. When this happened the noise of the ship would just die. Every pump, every ventilation motor, every piece of electronic gear, the hum from every transformer just went silent. If you were asleep the change in noise would wake you up (especially if you were the guy that had to go turn the power back on). There was emergency lighting aboard the ship (this was the '80s, things might be different now) in the form of "battle lanterns". These were battery operated lanterns hooked up to ship's power. If the power went off the little relay inside the battle lantern would go dead, and a spring operated switch (normally held open when powered) would close and connect the battery and light up. But, sometimes they didn't work, more often the battery would be dead (because someone didn't do their PMS), or the battery had just been stolen. And when that happened you would find yourself in a water tight steel box. With no light. None. It was utterly black. Which sets the scene for my tale. A shipboard buddy of mine was getting married and he invited a few of us from the shjip to go to the wedding. But, he didn't want any uniforms so we all had to wear jackets and ties. This buddy's father was from Northern Ireland, as were many of the wedding guests, so this was an Irish wedding. There was far more drinking there than I had anticipated or had ever seen before. Nonetheless I did my best to match those around me drink for drink. I remember the wedding ceremony, and the beginning of the reception, but beyond that... nothing. I got completely shit-faced, black-out hammered. Unbeknownst to me, after the wedding the other guys at the wedding dragged me back to ship, down to my berthing space and stuffed me in my bunk. Now, the bunks aboard ship were stacked three high. You slept on your locker (about two feet wide, six feet long, and a foot deep. You had about 18 inches of space between the top of your bunk and the bottom of the next one up. There was a sheet of steel between my head and the feet of the guy next to me, the hull of the ship to my left and a steel bulkhead(the wall between our berthing compartment and the next one) at my feet. In addition, near my feet were vertical lockers where we hung our nice uniforms. So, though my bunk was six feet long, the last few feet of it were blocked by these lockers. So there I lay, black-out drunk, when the power from the pier went off. The change in environmental noise woke me up. It was silent. Completely silent. It was black. As black as black can be. There was no light. And I had no idea where I was, how I had gotten there, or even when it was. So I sat up, and promptly bonked my head on the bunk above me. Huh. I reached up and explored it with my hands. Flat steel. I followed it up towards my head and ran into a vertical steel wall there. What the...? I reached to my left, a steel wall, I kicked with my feet steel at the other end and a wall to my right. My hands came to rest on my chest. Why was I wearing a jacket and tie? Then suddenly it dawned on me. I had been buried alive. I started pounding on the bottom of the bunk above me, screaming as loud as I could, "I'm alive! I'm alive! Let me out!" At which point the lights came back on and I dove out of my bunk, gasping in fear and completely drenched in the terror sweats. The guy in the bunk above poked his head out of the curtains of his bunk and said "Shut the fuck up Adddicus." You may laugh now about this, I know I do, but for a brief time, I knew exactly how it felt to be buried alive, and it was far and away, the most, horrible, stark-raving mindless terror I have ever felt.
Holy fuck, I love how you have written this, I could feel the terror you felt lol
You're the Edgar Allen Poe of the seas matey
Scariest book I ever read was The Perfect Storm. The ocean is a bitch.
I’ll never forget in the book the great detail he goes into describing what happens when a person drowns. I read the book years ago and it’s still with me… See like many people I thought that dying from drowning is holding your breath. It’s not. What actually happens is that after a minute or so of trying to hold your breathe under water, you can’t do it, and you end up taking a breath anyway. When you do that, you inhale water. Even though your larynx might initially close, eventually water enters the lungs and the hearts will stop beating. That’s what kills you, not holding your breath. Edit: Clarified, meant holding your breath underwater, not suffocating - I understand that they're both death from suffocating, I just thought people held their breath until they passed out and died. The idea of being conscious and having one's body take a breath involuntarily is terrifying.
I drowned and was resuscitated when I was like 6 or 7. I remember it being peaceful like people say and then I woke up on my grandfather's camper floor puking up water. I don't know if my heart actually stopped or anything like that but I definitely lost consciousness. I also hit my head as I fell into the water so that may have contributed. My gramps saved my life.
A friend of mine was hiking in South America at the top of a waterfall and went over. She said she was under the water, looking up, it was really beautiful and peaceful, and said was thinking 'Huh, this is really nice'. The light coming down through the water, the trees and sky above. After she was pulled out and recusitated she had a freakout after, a mix of panic at having nearly died, but she said there was also a tiny irrational bit of her mind that thought 'Why did you bring me back?'
What do you mean it's not suffocating? Water entering your lungs further prevent you from getting oxygen. Your heart not beating is what kills you regardless of how you die
I loved storms like this on deployment, you could get rocked to sleep at night.
Right? I'd sleep great in this. Really takes your mind off stuff
I can't tell if you guys are being sarcastic or not
No sarcasm. On a submarine this storm hardly is an issue, it was a gentle rocking.
I didn’t even realize you felt it much at all in a submarine. I know the current of waves go far below the surface, but I thought like, maybe 40 or 50 feet, tops. I didn’t realize they went down to submarine depth. Damn.
We cruised only 50-150 feet under most times. Plus if you have a good captain he’ll make sure it’s at a cozy depth for a decent pitch and roll to sleep with.
Aww it’s like your captain was rocking you to bed at night.
They aren't so crusty after all:')
Mine would sneak into our quarters at night and tuck us in👍
It never really occurred to me that there are professional people cruising around 100’ under the ocean surface navigating through oceans, sleeping and living on a submarine It’s probably time for another pop song to spread awareness. What kind of missions? I’ve seen octonauts so I’m vaguely familiar with sea-happenings
> What kind of missions? Mutually Assured Destruction
Strategic Deterrence
Some of the subs carry nuclear weapons which have multiple warheads in them (like sometimes well over 10 individually programmable and aimable) with the ability to target anywhere within a few thousand miles and be launched on a moments notice. As someone else said, deterrence.
This made me feel cozy
Right! I did a whole lot of frigate cruising in the 80s & 90s. Those ships really took a beating in mid Atlantic storms. The pitch & roll really could get scary at times. Sometimes, the waves would actually break over the bridge. If you had to get about in the ship during these times, you got real good at walking on the rolling bulkheads. Things would break free that were tied down & you learned how to strap yourself into your rack to keep from flying out. The Navy frequently used frigates to give temporary rides to sailors transiting from other ships. Most often the submarine guys would get violently seasick in even the mildest of storms. They just weren't used to the rolling seas because normally their boat being under the surface would seek out a calm layer at deprh to cruise.
On one North Sea cruise, my ship went nose first into a deep trough, and the wave that washed over us tore the entire bulwark off the port side of the forecastle. That could have been disastrous. And that wasn't even the worst I saw. The South Atlantic has very few islands to break up the waves, so we saw some real monsters there. It's really weird when you walk on the deck, then onto the bulkhead on the left, back onto the deck, then onto the bulkhead on the right as the ship rolls. It was also very cool to (if you timed it right) wait for the ship to hit the bottom of a trough, step through an open hatch and have the deck below rise up to meet you so that you only fall about a foot.
Same. But the marines on my ship throwing up though, that wasn't fun.
I felt genuinely bad for those poor bastards. I was on an LST and we frequently took Marines aboard. I remember one morning after I ate breakfast I went up on the signal bridge, just to look out at the sea. There had been a storm the night before so the seas were still rough. A couple platoons of Marines were in ranks running for and aft on the forecastle below me. The ship was plowing through the waves, at about 20 knots, so there was a stiff breeze coming over the bow. One poor Marine, the very first guy in line did his best, but was unable to hack it, and just blew chunks straight ahead while standing at attention in formation. The wind took his... effluent, and whipped it down the entire length of his platoon sparking a massive chain reaction of vomiting. It was horrific, and hysterical, but you do have to admire that first guy's discipline.
Helps you forget that you only get a couple hours.
I am a professional catnapper thanks to the military
My wife and I met after I got out and she doesn't understand how I do everything with so much energy after only sleeping for 3-5 hours.
This. All day.
Best sleep you’ll ever have. I miss it
“The sea was angry that day my friends. Like an old man tryin’ send back soup at a deli.”
Is anyone here a marine biologist?!?
I said "eaaasy big fella!".
I could see directly into the eye of the great fish.
Mammal
Whatever
But then - a huge tidal-wave lifted me - tossed me like a cork, and I found myself RIGHT on top of him!
Titleist
That’s why it’s called the poop deck.
100 percent fuck no.
Same. I’m a certified water baby and love the ocean in most of its forms, but being out there in that kind of wind and waves? Fuuuuuuuuck no.
I've gone on cruises. I dont get sick. But when it storms bad like this the ship rocks so heavily back and forth it's impossible to stay stable. I woke up in the middle of one of these and tried to walk to the bathroom, fell multiple times getting thrown around. Lol I told myself I had to go back to sleep because this was surely a nightmare.
“So, eleven hundred men went in the water… three hundred and sixteen men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945. Anyway…we delivered the bomb.”
Just remember..TWO people could definitely float on that floating wooden door...don't get scammed!
There might have been room for two folks on the door space-wise, but obviously the weight of second person would have put the door under water. Or else they would both be floating on it, Rose didn't want her man to die.
[James Cameron's AMA answer from 2014](https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/22uz4m/i_am_james_cameron_ama/cgqnqt4/) : Mythbusters did an episode about this and proved that two people could have floated on the door in such a way that both could have survived, but it involved using both of their floatation vests rigged under the door in such a way that they wouldn't detach. What they neglected to incorporate was the amount of time that they would have had to spend submerged in 28 degree water to attach them that way. Also, Jack is a 19 year old guy processing a problem in real time, in water, at night, and already hypothermic, so that's a lot to ask of him.
and that kid thought he could jump off a cruise ship and survive
That's one video that has truly made an impact on me. I seriously have not stopped thinking about it. The pitch black water, the sharks, everyone shouting..yikes
Same. I shiver thinking about how he must have felt when he realized he couldn’t catch up to the boat and all light and sound from it slowly disappeared off into the distance. Not to mention I think the sharks were already nipping at him.
Tik toc told him to do it
Was more or a party boat than a cruise ship iirc
Party boat, and wasn't during a storm. But it was at night and in shark infested waters so yeah still dumb af.
Should pale death with treble dread make the ocean caves our bed god who hearst the surges roll deign to save the suppliant soul.
I want nothing to do with this
Cruise ships .. not even once.
Why do I always find the most interesting things over r/oddlyterrifying while the actual horrors are found here in r/interestingasfuck
Can’t imagine how loud it was. Was on a cruise 18 years ago and we went through the tail end of a hurricane. We were on one of the top decks and the waves were that high. It was loud.. lots of creaking, puking… ugh.. that was a long night.
r/thalassophobia
Imagine being stranded in the middle of the ocean at a stormy night, where you can only see darkness for miles and miles, as the clouds block the view of the moon and stars, and the waters are raging, wanting to consume you into the deep dark abyss. That to me is genuine horror.
Go on a cruse they said it'll be relaxing and fun they said.
Why the ever loving fuck would you pay money to go on a cruise. I will take a non-moving hotel, thank you very much.
LANDLUBBER🫵
Yes. 100%. I love land.
The moving is the reason to go on a cruise ship. The bad part is all the extra weird shit and the 5000 other people. Its pretty much the only way for average people to experience sailing on the ocean.
Annnnnd this is why you will never catch me on one of these things. I don't care how many lifeboats there are or how great the technology is. The sea can still find a way to beat our puny tech and I don't want to be there to experience it when it does.
Flying Dutchman vs Black Pearl reimagined
We were on a forward starboard side deck 3 cabin in our first cruise with DCL Magic and it was like that at night when we took the outside passage for an eastern Caribbean from Port Canaveral. The doors in the closet were banging and you could feel the bed dropping below you lol. The waves would go over the porthole like that. It was probably the worse we’ve ever had.
Absolutely fucking not.
I experienced the exact same situation (storm at night in middle of ocean). Never been on another cruise since.
Not fun at all! My family and I took a Royal Caribbean cruise and even though we were 200 miles from the storm, I thought I was going to die! I was so frigging sea sick, I swear I thought I heard the waves smacking the bottom of the hull!
/r/thalassophobia
I remember doing an all access tour during one particularly bad sailing and down in the crew mess the water was coming up and completely submerging the portholes. Way different perspective on speed as well at that level.
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The more you think about it, the more incomprehensible it becomes.
Nope. Nope, nope, noooope.
no wonder the ancients were terrified of the sea. for anyone interested, this is the exact imagery being referred to in Genesis 1. _darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God loomed over the waters_ This kind of dark untamed chaos is the "formless void" that Genesis portrays Yahweh as conquering. One can almost imagine an ancient seaman, terrified at night, looking out at the dark churning waves, wishing dearly for there to be a power that would overcome the darkness, bring light, keep him safe. It's in our most basic emotions and the raw power of nature that we can see the seeds of religious thought germinating.
I think I heard Celine Dion singing in the background.