Brittle Cold
Bob Jameson reached down and scratched his dog, Max, behind the ear. The Lab had settled comfortably at his feet as Jameson sat on a fiberglass storage box on the deck of the rolling boat. It was a brittle cold morning in January 2004.
“How many fox do you think you'll catch？” he asked Newt Sterling, the owner of the small flat-bottomed vessel called a garvey. They were motoring out of the Oyster Creek docks on the New Jersey shore, to Brigantine Island on the edge of the Atlantic.
“Eight or ten,” Sterling replied. He was a professional trapper who also worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. His job was to protect piping plovers from egg-eating predators on the low-lying coastal islands. He and his buddies Jameson and John Scagline were going to check the snares Sterling had set the day before.
Jameson stood, ducking beneath a metal rack that held a green canoe above the deck. A cold front was moving in from Canada, pushing raw, wet gusts across the bay that opened to the rolling, gray Atlantic. The salt spray rasped his face, but he and his friends were looking forward to a day in the salt marshes, a place they loved.
Eight miles south, Al Kurtz took his eyes off the dark water for a moment and gazed at the laser points of stars in the predawn sky. He was taking a group of hunters out in his 22-foot runabout to hunt geese and ducks. The weather conditions —— temperature at a near-freezing 35 degrees, wind blustering in from the west at 18 mph —— made for a good hunting day. The birds would be moving.
Jameson patted Max. Like the others, Jameson was dressed in heavy layered clothing and a camo jacket. He was concerned for the aging animal, lame in the hips from arthritis. They'd been constant companions the last eight years and it felt good, even in the biting cold weather, to be out on the water now with the dog beside him.
Jameson, 52, was a professional wildlife damage-control agent. At six feet, 220 pounds, with shoulders built by weight-training, he towered over his five-foot-three-inch buddy Sterling. But Sterling, one of the last Jersey “Pineys,” men who make their living from the Pine Barrens and adjacent salt marshes, was as tough as oiled rope and leather. His lined, brown, bearded face showed a lifetime spent in the wind and sun.
John Scagline, 54, a taxidermist and trapper who often worked with Jameson, was a lean and fit five-foot-ten, but also a severe diabetic who wore an insulin pump.
By the time Sterling steered the boat into Great Bay, the eastern sky was bright red, the traditional sailor's sign for storms. The tide was full-moon high. At 7：45 a.m. they were 300 yards west of Egg Island, and Sterling was quartering into swells to reduce pitching and rolling. Then it happened.
Among the normal waves was a rogue. The 16-foot garvey slid into the wave's deep frontal trough. Then, motor revving, it rose upward, exposing its right side and flat bottom to the wind. At that moment a powerful gust hit the boat and rolled it onto its left side as smoothly as a roller coaster going into a banked turn. And then the wind knocked the garvey all the way over, dumping everyone into the frigid water of Little Bay.
Trapped beneath the garvey, Sterling and Jameson fought their way to the surface. Max and Scagline had been thrown clear. All were gasping from the stunning shock of the 45-degree water.
The stern sank until the outboard motor snagged the bay bottom some seven feet below, anchoring the boat in place. A section of the overturned bow, about 5 feet by 4 feet, projected out of the water. Sputtering, coughing, the men swam frantically to the overturned hull and clung to the sides.
There was not a boat in sight.
“What are the chances we'll be seen？” Jameson asked.
“Not good,” Sterling said. Anguish replaced initial shock. “I'm sorry. I killed you guys today.” The thought that he was responsible for his friends' deaths overwhelmed him.
“It's nobody's fault,” Jameson replied. They were all outdoorsmen. They knew what the risks were, and they knew their odds. “It was an accident.”
Bob Jameson reached down and scratched his dog, Max, behind the ear. The Lab had settled comfortably at his feet as Jameson sat on a fiberglass storage box on the deck of the rolling boat. It was a brittle cold morning in January 2004.
“How many fox do you think you'll catch？” he asked Newt Sterling, the owner of the small flat-bottomed vessel called a garvey. They were motoring out of the Oyster Creek docks on the New Jersey shore, to Brigantine Island on the edge of the Atlantic.
“Eight or ten,” Sterling replied. He was a professional trapper who also worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. His job was to protect piping plovers from egg-eating predators on the low-lying coastal islands. He and his buddies Jameson and John Scagline were going to check the snares Sterling had set the day before.
Jameson stood, ducking beneath a metal rack that held a green canoe above the deck. A cold front was moving in from Canada, pushing raw, wet gusts across the bay that opened to the rolling, gray Atlantic. The salt spray rasped his face, but he and his friends were looking forward to a day in the salt marshes, a place they loved.
Eight miles south, Al Kurtz took his eyes off the dark water for a moment and gazed at the laser points of stars in the predawn sky. He was taking a group of hunters out in his 22-foot runabout to hunt geese and ducks. The weather conditions —— temperature at a near-freezing 35 degrees, wind blustering in from the west at 18 mph —— made for a good hunting day. The birds would be moving.
Jameson patted Max. Like the others, Jameson was dressed in heavy layered clothing and a camo jacket. He was concerned for the aging animal, lame in the hips from arthritis. They'd been constant companions the last eight years and it felt good, even in the biting cold weather, to be out on the water now with the dog beside him.
Jameson, 52, was a professional wildlife damage-control agent. At six feet, 220 pounds, with shoulders built by weight-training, he towered over his five-foot-three-inch buddy Sterling. But Sterling, one of the last Jersey “Pineys,” men who make their living from the Pine Barrens and adjacent salt marshes, was as tough as oiled rope and leather. His lined, brown, bearded face showed a lifetime spent in the wind and sun.
John Scagline, 54, a taxidermist and trapper who often worked with Jameson, was a lean and fit five-foot-ten, but also a severe diabetic who wore an insulin pump.
By the time Sterling steered the boat into Great Bay, the eastern sky was bright red, the traditional sailor's sign for storms. The tide was full-moon high. At 7：45 a.m. they were 300 yards west of Egg Island, and Sterling was quartering into swells to reduce pitching and rolling. Then it happened.
Among the normal waves was a rogue. The 16-foot garvey slid into the wave's deep frontal trough. Then, motor revving, it rose upward, exposing its right side and flat bottom to the wind. At that moment a powerful gust hit the boat and rolled it onto its left side as smoothly as a roller coaster going into a banked turn. And then the wind knocked the garvey all the way over, dumping everyone into the frigid water of Little Bay.
Trapped beneath the garvey, Sterling and Jameson fought their way to the surface. Max and Scagline had been thrown clear. All were gasping from the stunning shock of the 45-degree water.
The stern sank until the outboard motor snagged the bay bottom some seven feet below, anchoring the boat in place. A section of the overturned bow, about 5 feet by 4 feet, projected out of the water. Sputtering, coughing, the men swam frantically to the overturned hull and clung to the sides.
There was not a boat in sight.
“What are the chances we'll be seen？” Jameson asked.
“Not good,” Sterling said. Anguish replaced initial shock. “I'm sorry. I killed you guys today.” The thought that he was responsible for his friends' deaths overwhelmed him.
“It's nobody's fault,” Jameson replied. They were all outdoorsmen. They knew what the risks were, and they knew their odds. “It was an accident.”