Ocean Rescue TV began as a joint venture between Praxis Universal Productions and Channel Watch Marine. Here are some sample episodes from the venture!
Stranded PWC's
Inexperienced PWC riders call for assistance after they are unable to get their machines off the beach in adverse conditions.Late in the evening, Channel Watch Marine received a call to rescue two stranded Personal Watercraft from the beach just North of Channel Islands Harbor. Captains Paul and Randy prepared rescue boat Retriever for the job. There was a Small Craft Advisory for the area, so Retriever was equipped with a quick-deploy anchor in case of emergency. In the severe conditions of the day, three youths were using two PWC’s near the beach. They got in trouble close to the shore, inside of the breaking waves, and were unable to get back out. Their grandmother agreed to call Channel Watch Marine for the rescue. Arriving on scene, Captain Randy readied himself to paddle into shore, while Captain Paul kept Retriever bow into the breaking waves. Because the waves were breaking quite far offshore, Captain Randy had to swim in over 1000 feet of towline. Once hooked up to the PWCs, Retriever’s engines pulled the watercraft off of the beach, with Captain Randy riding the trailing machine. Once inside Channel Islands harbor, the PWCs were towed to the launch ramp, where the trailers were waiting.
Videographer Notes: Stranded PWC’s
Mike: Okay, so it’s super late in the day, and the call comes in that some jetskis are on the beach near Channel Islands Harbor. “Why don’t they just drive them off the beach?” everyone asks. Well, it turns out that the inexperienced riders got too close to shore, inside the breaking waves, which with the gale force conditions (small craft advisory) were pretty square. So we get the bejeezus bounced out of us on the way over, and then Randy has to swim in to attach the tow lines to the machines. He somehow manages to hold on the entire way, and it was pretty fun watching Paul haul in a quarter mile of towline all in one go. So we get back to the launch ramp, and the sheepish kids are there, and it turns out that their grandmother called in the salvage! That’s one cool grandmother.
Stuck on Sandbar
Navigational errors and a malfunctioning GPS put these sailors on the beach at Pt. Mugu Naval Base.A couple on a Schock 30 sailboat left Long Beach at 1300 hours on a voyage to Ventura Harbor. At about 0200 hours the next morning they thought they had reached their destination and made a turn toward the coastline into what they believed was the Ventura Harbor entrance. The mariners had not plotted their journey on paper charts prior to leaving Long Beach, and their onboard GPS was not functioning, making it impossible to determine their exact location. When the turn toward the entrance landed them on a sandy beach near Point Mugu Naval Base instead of safely inside Ventura Harbor, they realized they had made a gross error in navigation and issued a Mayday on Channel 16. The Coast Guard responded, along with the Fire Department, rescuing the mariners from their stranded boat, but since the Coast Guard only takes responsibility for human victims, the boat was left on the beach to fend for itself. Channel Watch Marine was contacted the following day to attempt to salvage the boat and Captains Jason and Jon were assigned the task. Losing the coin toss meant it was Captain Jon's mission to jump into the shark infested waters and swim the tow line in to the beached vessel. After the line was attached and the boat was surveyed for structural damage Captain Jason positioned Retriever for maximum pulling effort and initiated the removal. The boat was safely towed to Channel Islands Harbor and delivered to a boatyard for haulout and inspection.
Videographer Notes: Stuck on Sandbar
Mike: This is probably the best possible salvage scenario: early morning start, easy salvage, and back by lunch. The lighting was great for the entire episode, and we managed to capture the VHF from the night before, when the boat went up on the beach. We also got to try our new helmet camera, and the footage is pretty neat. Luckily there weren’t any sharks in the area…
Dangerous Swell
An evening sail in large seas goes wrong for the crew aboard this Catalina 36A father and son took their Catalina sailboat for a daysail out of Ventura Harbor. The conditions were perfect most of the day, with a 10 - 15 knot breeze, so the sailors enjoyed a good day of sailing. Toward afternoon when the boat turned around to head back to Ventura the mariners noted that the sea state had begun to build, with swells increasing in size, but with a steady breeze it was no problem and the boat was able to make way under sail most of the way back to the harbor. When the boat was about a mile off the harbor entrance the wind died. Without wind the mariners needed to start their engine in order to get back to their slip, but when they tried to start it the engine would not turn over and it was discovered that the batteries were dead. With no wind, no engine, no batteries, and a big swell running, the boat would have been in trouble in such close proximity to the harbor entrance. They were also without a VHF radio since there was no batter power, so the situation could easily have turned deadly, but fortunately, the mariners had a cell phone on board and were able to get a call out to Vessel Assist for help. The 30 foot RIB, Retriever, with Captains Jason and Paul onboard, was dispatched out of Ventura and arrived on scene with the disabled boat and rendered assistance before the circumstances deteriorated any further. The boat was put under tow and safely brought into the harbor and put into its slip.
Videographer Notes: Dangerous Swell
Mike: This was actually one of the first ever “real” rescues we shot. We had some problems with the tape, so the episode was put on hold for quite a long time. It was one of those “time is of the essence” rescues. I had to drag a giant camera case down the dock to get onboard. The entire rescue was really quick, but the swells were enormous. Earlier in the day we shot from shore the surf breaking against the jetty that day. The surfer in the video is Ventura local Shaun Hayes.
