Yet Another Mooring Block Discovered In Saquatucket Channel

by William F. Galvin

HARWICH –The Coast Guard buoy tender 49403 was scheduled to arrive in Saquatucket Harbor channel Tuesday to pull yet another mooring block out of harm’s way.

Harbormaster Thomas Leach said this week that Brandon Small, who has been hired by Freedom Cruise Line owner Alan McMullen, dove once again and located another mooring block, the fourth found along the channel.

McMullen said he knew the block found two weeks ago an estimated 65 feet outside the channel was not the obstruction the Freedom ferry hit early one June morning. McMullen said he asked Captain Barry Fuller if that was possible and was told there was “no way” was he outside the channel.

So McMullen said he hired Small to come back and dive in the channel again. This time, McMullen said a mooring block was located “two feet off the bottom right in the channel.”

Leach had earlier said he thought the vessel might have struck the bottom on a very low tide on that morning. But McMullen said when he had the damaged propellers and shaft examined when the vessel was repaired, he was told there was granite or cement embedded in the propellers. McMullen said he was told “no gravel did that kind of damage.”

The ferry company owner said he requested that the harbor department to hire a diver to search for blocks, but instead Leach wanted to purchase a magnetometer for the department to use in locating obstructions beneath the sand. However, Leach said he does not have the money in his budget to hire a diver or purchase the magnetometer.

McMullen said he will have expended about $2,000 in hiring a diver to locate the blocks.  He suggested the town reimburse him. He said he has asked Town Administrator James Merriam about the town paying for costs associated with locating the mooring blocks and McMullen has been told there is no money in the harbor budget, and a finance committee reserve fund transfer would be necessary.

“It seems to me the Coast Guard should be the one to find its own damn blocks,” Leach said. “Why should the town pay for it? Why not the Coast Guard? It’s a federal channel, it belongs to the Army Corps of Engineers.”

“The town has taken on the responsibility for the channel, shouldn’t it be the town’s responsibility?” McMullen asked.

Leach said the channel is in the northeast corner of Nantucket Sound, which is prone to freezing in winter and the ice rips blocks apart. The harbormaster said he has examined the latest block and it also looks like an older one, with the chain covered with concretion. He also said there does not appear to be evidence of a strike on the block.

The Coast Guard has said it has accounted for all the blocks placed there since the early 1990s, but Leach pointed out there have been buoys located along that channel since 1969. McMullen said he has been told by one head boat operator that two more blocks have been observed in the channel. Leach said he has not heard any such report.

McMullen said it may be time to use the Helix mooring, which screws into the ocean bottom as a means of anchoring a buoy. At any rate, Leach is hoping the visit on Tuesday by the Coast Guard buoy tender puts an end to the problem of mooring blocks in the channel.

9/4/08