van wyk journeys Oct 17, 18 & 19 – Days at sea, the medical condition, and the helicopter airlift
The announcement October 17th
Late in the evening on the 17th just as we were getting ready for bed when the Captain opened the PA system to make a general announcement. Seems one of the passengers was in serious medical condition enough so that they were preparing to airlift the passenger off the ship and back to land. To do this though required that he altered the location of the ship by bringing it nearer to land as we currently were around 60kms offshore. The nearest point was an island called Barrow Island where he later anchored the ship using the onboard GPS system.
We were then told that the decks 10 and 11 were to be evacuated. As we are on deck 10 close to the stern, that included us. Which meant an early morning.
The early morning
The time we were to be evacuated was 6:00 am so I set the alarm and tried to sleep not much of that happened. The alarm goes off at 5:30 and the crew is banging on our door at 5:45. We get dressed and make our way to the buffet to eat breakfast. Then off to get coffee. And we wait. And we wait for the next announcement. Eventually, the ship makes it’s way closer to the coast, Barrow Island.
The island – Barrow Island
From the port side of the ship, we could see the coast of Barrow Island quite clearly. Coastal traffic makes its way along the coast, in the distance, I see what might be cell towers, we might have contact, nope not today.
The wait
So, we wait for the helicopter to come, and we wait. Seems the helicopter won’t come until the ship was fully ready to receive it. Oh, did I mention that this ship does not have a helipad? Well, it does not so that means a hovering lift from an accessible point on the ship. Hence the reason we were evacuated, the available deck space was directly above our cabins. So, in the event of a mishap with the helicopter, we won’t become a causality.
The helicopter
According to Captain, the helicopter would arrive at 7:45, the passenger would be lifted off the ship and we would be on our way a short time later. Well, that did not happen as the helicopter did not take off until after 8:00 am and arrived at ~8:40 am. The lift went quickly, and we were on our way again shortly afterward.
The reward
Surprise, late on the evening of the 18th a letter was slid under our door. We were surprised to receive a shipboard credit added to our account for the inconvenience caused. Nice, more money to spend.
October 18 & 19
The water is much rougher than previous days making walking about a little more precarious and some stomachs are queasy. This morning (Oct 17) we found seasickness bags hanging from banisters in the central staircases in the event of an event. As our cabins are at the stern of the ship movement is magnified making it seem worse. Ironically, the winds are what is creating the rough water which is large slow rollers spaced 30 of 40 feet apart and about 4 – 8 feet deep. This action which is mostly front to back has increased the number of stairs climbed significantly higher and can also be achieved while sitting down.
Looks like a large number of passengers are going to spend their days in their cabins, not a bad idea given the amount of deck movement happening. I just hope it does not get worse.
So where are we that this rough water is happening? We are in the Indian Ocean just offshore from Kalbarri National park, which is around 9100 nm from Sydney.