T&T: anchor mishaps

[Richard Tomkinson]

Some of you might know of this, it shows even the big boys have a 'murphy' 
day. This story is from August 2004.
...in the words of a passenger....
You won't believe this story! I just got back yesterday from a wonderful 7 
day Alaska cruise on the Statendam. We left one bow anchor in the Sitka 
harbor last Wednesday, and the other bow anchor now sits in the Ketchikan 
harbor where we left it on Friday! Our captain kept us well informed on the 
whole situation and in fact, held a special meeting the next day to answer 
questions and tell us all about it. It was strictly mechanical difficulties 
and he did a tremendous job and made critical decisions that allowed us to 
continue the cruise, basically on schedule. Luckily, Sitka was the only port 
where we had to tender, so that helped. I'll try to be as brief as possible, 
but here's what happened! Just as the anchor was almost all the way in 
before leaving Sitka, the electric motor burned out. After 3 and a half 
hours of trying to lift it using the other motor on the other side of the 
bow, the decision was made to attach some buoys to it and leave it in the 
harbor and be on our way. He made up the time and we were only an hour and a 
half late into Juneau and all the shore excursions waited for us. THEN, in 
Ketchikan, the captain decided to test the remaining bow anchor and just as 
it was almost in, the chain broke and it dropped to the bottom. I guess they 
spent the day filling out paper work, calling everyone from Lloyds of London 
to the Coast Guard figuring out whether we could sail. They brought in one 
scrap anchor - too small. Then, found a rusty anchor washed up on shore in 
Ketchikan, brought it to the ship on a barge, and it met the regulations so 
we were able to set sail. (Ketchikan wants this anchor back). We were a 
little late, but still made the Inside Passage in time (much concern when 
traveling from the north cause of tides, etc.). If our captain had set sail 
from Ketchikan without a bow anchor we would have had to go far outside and 
be pushed into Vancouver by tug boat and would have been many hours late and 
people would have missed their planes. We commend the captain for his hard 
work and good decisions. We still had a wonderful time!
Richard