The earthquake was centered a 1 mile away from us. It was a 6.0 and very shallow... With the boat being up on the lift I felt like a popcorn kernel in a hot pot. I have never been so scared in my life... at first for our safety but then OMG... the boat... what damage is happening. I thought that we were going to slide off the lift sideways and crash onto the cement...
The boat is just resting on the 2 center steel beams that sit on railroad tracks. The boat is then brought out of the water by a tractor with a big winch, so it pulls the boat up and out of the water... When the earthquake hit it felt like we were going to rock off of the supports and fall onto the cement. I thought our trip was over and we would lose it all. It seemed like there was 10 minutes of violent shaking, I was practically climbing into chris' skin, I was holding on so tight. Then it was quiet.... and Chris says, "we are in the water!" .... WHAT?!!! I had no idea we had broken free on the lift and ran back into the water. Well, with out props and no anchor on board there was no way for us to direct our drift in the river or stop us. We had taken the anchor off because we were replacing the chain... We scrambled out to the deck and I have to tell you, by the time I had grabbed one dock line, Chris has methodically turned on the deck lights gotten 4 dock lines and was throwing them to the amazing people that had come to help us within a matter of seconds. I literally looked down to untie a line and then looked up and there were 8 people on the docks helping to pull us back and tie up. We then went thru the boat to make sure we weren't taking on any water. We weren't sure if there was any damage to the bottom of the boat from the lift. We were okay... I think we got very lucky. There was a power boat out of the water next to us on the other side of the dock and he also slid into the water on the lift... he lives on his boat so he was there as well and he was taking on water quickly. He didn't have the propeller shaft in so there was just a big hole in the bottom of the boat. The hole was plugged and then because power was out.. everyone scrambled to help get generators and pumps to pump the water out. People went and got their trucks to face the docks with their headlights on to give us all light to work in... and after a few hours he was floating again... it was close he almost sunk on the boat ramp... the sailing community is so wonderful... There are quite a few people that live in the marina and several of them came up to me the next morning. ALL were asking about the kids and if they were okay. I had no idea that so many people noticed. It was really endearing having them all ask if they were with us that night and to say they were so worried about them.
There was quite a bit of damage to the yard not just the building, but also other boats that were up out of the water on the hard.
2" cracks ran through the banks of the marina...
This is the front of the cement platform that our boat sat on
We are all good... the boat was hauled out yesterday and the new props put on... and it seems we literally came away from this with a couple of scratches. We were very lucky that the boat slid back into the water. When the lift hits the water it slows down and then keeps going until the boat was floating and set free. It seems it was a perfect straight launching back and the only scraps were from the scaffolding I had left up from painting the boat. I never thought I should put this away incase an earthquake hits.... HMMM maybe we should add new mandatory drill for the boat... earthquake drill.
That sounds crazy! We were in the mountains camping and did not feel a thing. Glad everyone is doing well.
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