Bad Experience with Sea Tow; Sag Harbor

Hey Ken,
Hopefully Sea Tow, Sag Harbor and Sea Tow corporate follow this forum. As a local independent captain who goes on many local boats, and a carrier of a Sea Tow Professional Mariners membership since 2002 I read your post with great interest.
We all know it's a competative world out there, but SHAME.
Ed

down here the rivalry between the guys in red and the guys in yellow has excalated to fists fights at least once...

It's unfortunate that when you have a situation like this, the best people (as in this case) can do is argue about "me me me" and it becomes a 'who's going to pay me my money' issue, rather than a greatest good for the greatest number. Protect the environment, see that the crew and company are safe, and do whatever is needed to recover the boat safely.

Wonder if he'll proudly post this story in the magazine he sends me each year where he boasts about all the good they do.

I can't help but think about what kind of great advertising and good will one can achieve in business by helping out in instances like this. It surely would have looked even better in the local newspaper (and website) had they helped out. What really distresses me is what would happen should a life be at risk and the towboat and personnel being in a position to help. Is it company policy to stand aside for all non members? I wonder what the protocol is.

Roger

Roger,
You're not from around here. If you could see what's is Sag Harbor right now to watch Sea Tow refusing to help you'd really understand what they did to themselves as far as advertising. Too bad they didn't understand. Joe Frohnhoefer from Sea Tow would have done much better to say 'woops, we screwed up and will do better in the future'. BTW, what may have gotten burried in Ken's telling and what makes this even worse is:
"I had learned that the owner of the Hinckley is a member of Sea Tow so I tried to reason with them that they would get paid for their services"

Joe F. is a very smart man and a very good business person. I for one would love to learn from him. I understand that the salvage and tow laws are very complex, but I learned early on that you render the assistance needed first; then you think about business and pay, etc. Granted that's not very savvy thinking, but that's the way it has to be on the water. Lives (marine & human) depend on that. You have boom. Why not drop it or give it to the other company to drop and do a deal there and then for the cost. That seems simple. The marinas in Sag would certainly appreciate the protection, and this thread would be about a whole different subject.
I hope Sea Tow will enter this thread so we can understand their reasoning or even to just say "whoops" (we all screw up once in a while). Then we might have a better idea of what to expect.

I'm sure there are complex salvage and tow laws and I look forward to a SeaTow reply but there was a reason why the Good Samaritan law and Duty to Rescue exist. I'm certainly not a lawyer and the gentlemen from Sea Tow probably know this stuff inside and out but it certainly makes common sense to me at least, that if you CAN help, HELP.

Roger

i hope there is more to the story than the childish behavior of refusing to deploy pollution control booms because somebody else got the job... if so, there is no excuse for this kind of behavior.

i wonder what the salvage value of a sunk Hinckley 55 is, but at that point, it's just a hulk of fiberglass, not much more. little salvage rights to be claimed...

Brought up right away from these waters (shallow, relatively low salt content) she's still got a lot of value. Hose her out, dry her off, toss the electronics, pickle the mechanicals and she'll be good to go. Oh yeah...fix the hole .

and rewire the boat, redo the air conditioning, all the soft goods... the window to save the engines after saltwater immersion is very narrow...

Sounds like they moved fast, and (like I said) low salt content. I've seen motors come back fine after more that a week under water here. You just have to move fast once it's up. Plus it's a Hinkley, but if the salvers don't think it's worth it I'll take it off their hands for $100
Still waiting to see input from Sea Tow.

If electrical power was cut before she went down (unlikely - they probably kept it live to run pumps) then even the electronics are potentially salvageable out of Long Island Sound. A thorough flush with running fresh water and a week or so in a warm and dry place before testing with juice to them. You'd be surprised at how robust modern electronics are. LCD displays, on the other hand... they might have issues.

OK- I will ask the question everybody wants to know!!


Where are the Pic's?

Not the Hinkley, but from around the corner the week before. This fellow thought that, after finding that the outgoing tide left him high on the rocks and his buds (3 that you see plus one pushing on the port quarter) couldn't muscle it off, it'd be a good idea to lower his 3 outboards until the skegs touched the rocks and power off.

Nobody hurt this time.
No shortage of whoops up here this time of year. It's like a race to get it in before the season ends.