Any one with a Coastie story, please post. The more amusing, the better!



New Year's Eve, 1976.

It was a lovely, warm, cloudless night on the River. There were hundreds
of boats of all shapes and sizes milling around, trying to find a spot
to anchor. A local radio station, was sponsoring the biggest fireworks
display ever shot in Florida The big hoo-rah was to be a 18 inch, 120
pound star shell designed by a Japanese fellow.

There were hundreds of boats and tens of thousands of people on shore.
The 2 city police boats were out in force, and the Auxiliarists were
having a big chuckle at the Police expense.

In those days, many police were nothing more than uniformed cowboys or
blue suited thugs. Thank goodness things have changed!

In his infinite stupidity, the Chief of Police determined it would cause
an increase in crime if boaters were to tie up to city docks, anchor in
the city limits or tie up to The City owned property anywhere near the
show. So, Chief Bozo set about to make life miserable for all involved
by putting up No Docking and No Anchoring signs on both sides of the
river for 2 miles in both directions.

The way the river curves, if you were to go to "The two mile limit"
there is no way you could see the show over the bridges, buildings,
shipyards and general skyline. So, the boating public took to milling
around the show area.

For a while it wasn't to bad, but as more and more and MORE boats showed
up. "No Anchoring," the police announced on their loudspeakers as they
zoomed around, far too fast, in their new, dark blue, high performance
police boats.

They continued to harass the boaters, who by now had taken up a "loop"
pattern, basically going in a big oval, but remaining underway. Not much
the blue suited cowboys could do about it. Zooming about and trying to
ride heard, one police boat zoomed under a bridge, just as the other
zoomed past the bridge piers from the left. With an impressive K-BAM two
thirds of the fleet became a statistic.

The Coasties went into action salvaging a waterlogged Lieutenant and a
couple of well fed crewmembers, while other Auxiliary took the task of
towing what was left of 2 blue boats to the dock. They didn't sink, but
were no longer seaworthy. (Boston Whalers really don't sink!)

While attempting to tie up the damaged police boats, several
out-of-breath, doughnut fed (and shaped) policemen waddled up to order
us not to tie up here! We asked them where they wanted THEIR boats, and
only then did the uniformed baboons realize the boats trying to tie up
were badly damaged police patrol boats.

It turns out, the waterlogged Lieutenant in charge of the operation,
knew as much about boats as my Labrador knows about an IRS audit. It was
his first trip out on a boat. (It seems being a relative of the police
chief has its advantages. He was recently hired AS an officer.)


Now, with the police out of the way, anchors began to fall like gentle
raindrops and the area calmed down a great deal.


The police department, not to be thwarted by a mear loss of 2 boats,
launched their last. This fellow was roaming about shouting (no
loudspeaker) to people to up-anchor and move OR ELSE. The resulting
mass of boats (pretty much fender to fender) began to seethe back and
forth again, and soon formed up into the familiar oval loop. Apparently,
this was not satisfactory to the donut engorged numb nuts aboard, and,
in the fashion of a sheepdog began a run in the opposite direction of
"the loop" trying to move all the boats back to a 2 mile zone. He was so
intent on making life miserable for the boaters, he forgot to watch out
for the fireworks barge making its way through the crowd of boats. The
barge clipped his stern and made scrap metal out of his Johnson 175.
Strike 3. We laughed so hard I had pains in my side.

The Auxiliary towed this genius to the nearest dock, which was near the
fireboat station. The police dude wanted to commandeer the fire boat,
but, a suprisingly bright fellow with the fire department told him the
fireboat was out of service.

Once again, the anchors fell like autumn leaves, as boating folks
settled in to enjoy the fireworks show. It was a really impressive show,
and that 48" shell. WOW!

Casualty report for the night. 3 police boats damaged in collisions.

Capt. Frank

Any one with a Coastie story, please post. The more amusing, the better!


I have a doozy and it deals with the CG Aux too....

As you know I'm retired USCG (Yeoman 1st Class). In the early/mid 80's I
worked for the 9th District Boating Auxiliary, in the eastern region
detachment, Buffalo, NY.

Well, let me say this about the Auxiliary... They are the most nicely people
around and man, can they PARTY!!! We all went to an Aux Conference in
Cleveland, OH one year... It was no big deal, it's a nice drive from Buffalo,
NY... Me being a young, 23/24 yr old Coastie, I was pretty wild back then in
my single days. I brought along my guitar to the conference for something to
do at night in the hotel room. Well, long story short, I ended up getting
plastered courtesy of the CG Aux and the mixed drinks that they made. They
were all fine and enjoying themselves, but I was absolutely SMASHED!!

From this point on, things are fuzzy and I don't remember, but legend has it, I
left the Auxiliary party at about 10:00pm, went back up to my room. About an
hour later, I was found walking all around the hotel floors, playing my guitar
and singing at the top of my lungs! {serious embarrassment here, folks!} A
bunch of the CG Auxiliary men found me, picked me up, and carried me to back to
my room. They put my guitar away and put me in my bed.

The CG Aux could have turned a blind eye and let me get kicked out of the hotel
or arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct. But they looked after me like I
was one of their own kids, which was very nice.

The next morning, my head felt like it weighed 50 pounds. None of the CG Aux
mentioned that last night incident to me, and just let me get over my wicked
hangover. Later on in the afternoon, they sat down with me and told me
everything. They helped me and I really appreciated it. Even though they
thought it was hysterical, they didn't laugh at me.

God Bless you, USCG Auxiliary!!!!

Butch Ammon
YN1, USCG (Ret.)

On 13 Nov 2003 18:37:18 GMT, 123 (Butch Ammon) wrote:


God Bless you, USCG Auxiliary!!!!

Butch Ammon
YN1, USCG (Ret.)

hey...we consider it part of our job to take care of you guys...you
deserve it!


---------------------------
to see who "wf3h" is, go to "qrz.com"
and enter 'wf3h' in the field

Captain,
Great story, thanks.
Paul

"Capt. Frank Hopkins" wrote in message
nk.net...
Any one with a Coastie story, please post. The more amusing, the better!



New Year's Eve, 1976.

It was a lovely, warm, cloudless night on the River. There were hundreds
of boats of all shapes and sizes milling around, trying to find a spot
to anchor. A local radio station, was sponsoring the biggest fireworks
display ever shot in Florida The big hoo-rah was to be a 18 inch, 120
pound star shell designed by a Japanese fellow.

There were hundreds of boats and tens of thousands of people on shore.
The 2 city police boats were out in force, and the Auxiliarists were
having a big chuckle at the Police expense.

In those days, many police were nothing more than uniformed cowboys or
blue suited thugs. Thank goodness things have changed!

In his infinite stupidity, the Chief of Police determined it would cause
an increase in crime if boaters were to tie up to city docks, anchor in
the city limits or tie up to The City owned property anywhere near the
show. So, Chief Bozo set about to make life miserable for all involved
by putting up No Docking and No Anchoring signs on both sides of the
river for 2 miles in both directions.

The way the river curves, if you were to go to "The two mile limit"
there is no way you could see the show over the bridges, buildings,
shipyards and general skyline. So, the boating public took to milling
around the show area.

For a while it wasn't to bad, but as more and more and MORE boats showed
up. "No Anchoring," the police announced on their loudspeakers as they
zoomed around, far too fast, in their new, dark blue, high performance
police boats.

They continued to harass the boaters, who by now had taken up a "loop"
pattern, basically going in a big oval, but remaining underway. Not much
the blue suited cowboys could do about it. Zooming about and trying to
ride heard, one police boat zoomed under a bridge, just as the other
zoomed past the bridge piers from the left. With an impressive K-BAM two
thirds of the fleet became a statistic.

The Coasties went into action salvaging a waterlogged Lieutenant and a
couple of well fed crewmembers, while other Auxiliary took the task of
towing what was left of 2 blue boats to the dock. They didn't sink, but
were no longer seaworthy. (Boston Whalers really don't sink!)

While attempting to tie up the damaged police boats, several
out-of-breath, doughnut fed (and shaped) policemen waddled up to order
us not to tie up here! We asked them where they wanted THEIR boats, and
only then did the uniformed baboons realize the boats trying to tie up
were badly damaged police patrol boats.

It turns out, the waterlogged Lieutenant in charge of the operation,
knew as much about boats as my Labrador knows about an IRS audit. It was
his first trip out on a boat. (It seems being a relative of the police
chief has its advantages. He was recently hired AS an officer.)


Now, with the police out of the way, anchors began to fall like gentle
raindrops and the area calmed down a great deal.


The police department, not to be thwarted by a mear loss of 2 boats,
launched their last. This fellow was roaming about shouting (no
loudspeaker) to people to up-anchor and move OR ELSE. The resulting
mass of boats (pretty much fender to fender) began to seethe back and
forth again, and soon formed up into the familiar oval loop. Apparently,
this was not satisfactory to the donut engorged numb nuts aboard, and,
in the fashion of a sheepdog began a run in the opposite direction of
"the loop" trying to move all the boats back to a 2 mile zone. He was so
intent on making life miserable for the boaters, he forgot to watch out
for the fireworks barge making its way through the crowd of boats. The
barge clipped his stern and made scrap metal out of his Johnson 175.
Strike 3. We laughed so hard I had pains in my side.

The Auxiliary towed this genius to the nearest dock, which was near the
fireboat station. The police dude wanted to commandeer the fire boat,
but, a suprisingly bright fellow with the fire department told him the
fireboat was out of service.

Once again, the anchors fell like autumn leaves, as boating folks
settled in to enjoy the fireworks show. It was a really impressive show,
and that 48" shell. WOW!

Casualty report for the night. 3 police boats damaged in collisions.

Capt. Frank