Disaster Strikes!

Our visit to Saint Pierre was the best of times and perhaps the worst, although Brio believes (as do I) that we have avoided numerous self-inflicted wounds through Divine intervention. In the case of Saint Pierre, there was a different presence that made itself known to us too late for us to avoid a heart-stopping moment or two. But let's not get too far ahead of ourselves!

In our last submission, we showed you the beautiful desserts and French pastries available in the downtown area of Saint Pierre. We were warned that French cuisine was not very "haute." But our palates were not disappointed. Here we are having arrived on the municipal dock in Saint Pierre, going through Customs.

Our "quarantine flag", which signals to Customs that we need to be visited.

Then we are visited by Customs. They review the ship's papers and our passports and ask us many questions. Some questions are straight-forward, others are a bit tricky.

We are still boat-bound until Immigration comes to see more documents and ask more questions. But we can fly the Tri-Colour!

We are welcomed by the Harbour Authority, Enrique, who is also the master of emergency response by the lifesaving crew (as we will see soon.)

At the head of the dock, we find Danielle (sadly, no photo) in the Saint Pierre Harbour Authority and Yacht Club. Many hats are worn by few individuals!

The harbor activity is fascinating and beautiful. Here's the ferry that runs between Saint Pierre, Miquelon (the symbol of the side of the ferry is of a "P" above a "Q"), sailboats and kayakers.

And here is the rescue boat that Enrique commands.

Charlie and Steve went out Monday morning to buy more croissant. Charlie stopped at a booth manned by the lifesaving group and bought a necktie and a tee-shirt. This was foreshadowing, for his purchase had future "returns."

We cast off with diesel and water tanks topped off. Or so we thought. Just as we left the harbor and entered a narrow passage between two breakwaters, both engines failed. They just ground to a stop and quit. Perhaps a minute before we had received a "Water-In-Fuel" warning twice. Historically, these are advisory and require attention at the end of the day by checking the fuel filters. This time, the alarm went off again and it warned of a catastrophic condition. It required that we return to the dock immediately! Too late! The engines stopped.

We started drifting towards one of the breakwaters. Fortunately, an outboard runabout came by and towed us to a spot where we could anchor. We dropped the hook. We radioed Danielle on Channel 72 and told her of our predicament. We requested immediate assistance. We later learned from Danielle that two boats responded immediately, her inflatable team and Enrique's team. While the inflatable arrived first, their group "bowed" to Enrique's larger craft.

Here's Enrique's boat, tying up to us.

And the whole crew:

Enrique, still in his white shirt, came out on deck and we exchanged pleasantries and jokes. Of course, the crew recognized Charlie since they had only just sold him the tie and shirt. In fact, Charlie was wearing their shirt. It was, "Greetings, mate!" Fast friends indeed.

They towed us into the municipal dock. Meanwhile, we contacted the fuel distributor to tell him of how the engines had failed and that we had high levels of water in the fuel. He had sold us fuel the previous day. He was there at the municipal dock soon after we had returned, along with his mechanic.

With no questions asked, he instructed his mechanic to determine the problem and fix it. Both the port and starboard fuel filters were full of clear liquid, which could have been diesel since diesel fuel in Saint Pierre is allowed to be sold without dye. In Canada and the States, it has to be dyed to show that it has been taxed appropriately. So, there was still the question whether the filters were full of water or clear diesel.

The mechanic quickly determined that the filters were full of water. The secondary filters were also full of water. This is why the situation generated such catastrophic messages and subsequent engine failures. Water in the fuel in a diesel engine is bad news.

The mechanic and his boss arranged to pump out the fuel tanks of water and bad fuel. It turns out that there had been about 40 to 50 gallons of fresh water in the fuel tanks. How in the world could so much water be introduced? It might be condensation if it were a gallon or so, but this was another matter. Our conjecture now is that foul play occurred, perhaps when we were out at dinner Sunday night. Someone, we guess, must have unscrewed the filler pipe for the diesel and pumped in the water. The engines had run "like a top" the day before for 10 hours. The introduction of so much water must have been an intentional act of delinquency.

The mechanic started work around 3:00 pm and finally finished at 7:30 pm. During that time, the water was removed from the tanks, the filters were emptied and cleaned and new filters, which we had been carrying on board just in case, were installed. After purging the fuel system, the engines were able to start again on clean fuel.

We went to bed around 10 pm, exhausted. Brio's batteries were drawn down extensively, starting the engines as the purging was conducted.

The next morning, the mechanic returned and checked everything. All seemed tight and repaired. New diesel fuel was added to the tanks. The engines started and ran like a charm. White smoke came up from the exhaust, an indication of water in the fuel, but it quickly dissipated.

Before setting off to Fortune, Newfoundland, we did several trial runs at a variety of speeds to make sure the engines ran well. All seemed okay.

Brio was back again!!

Cheers,

Brio