May Day-May Day
WordS No One Ever
Wants To Hear
By
Warren J. Toussaint
This article originally
appeared in "Shipmates" April-May 1997 published by the Ninth
Coast Guard District.
Tuesday, Nov. 18, 1958, at 5:31 p.m., the limestone carrier,
Carl C. Bradley, was up bound on Lake Michigan,
having delivered her last limestone cargo of the year to Indiana
on November 17,1958. She stayed close to the Illinois and
Wisconsin shores because of reports of severe weather conditions
rapidly developing from the west. As it reached the area of
Sturgeon Bay, Wis., it had to turn to the northeast in order to
cross the upper area of Lake Michigan on its way to the homeport
of Rogers City, Mich., on Lake Huron. Suddenly, the Bradley's
steering wheel went slack, as if the gears had suddenly
disconnected. On the course it was on, the winds and waves were
striking the ship on the aft quarter of the port side causing
the ship to rock severely. First Mate, Elmer Fleming,
knew the ship was in trouble. He jerked the radio telephone
from its cradle and shouted a desperate call "Mayday, Mayday,
-
Mayday. This is the Carl C. Bradley. Mayday
Mayday Mayday."
The
Captain slammed the engine room telegraph to stop engines and
sounded the general alarm. He grabbed the whistle cord and began
to tug seven long blasts and one short - the signal to abandon
ship. Fleming again called out the Mayday. For a moment there
was silence on the channel. All who heard the call were stunned.
A
voice finally responded. It was the radio operator at marine
radio station WAD, Port Washington, Wis. His response, "This is
an emergency, this is an emergency. Clear the channel." He then
asked Fleming to repeat the ship's position. Fleming did so and
added that the ship was beginning to break up and sink. There
were more thuds rumbling through the ship as he spoke. As he
glanced aft from the rear windows of
the bridge he thought
he saw the deck heave up amidships. The sound of the alarm bell
echoed up the stairway from one of the cabins below. Again,
Fleming was on the telephone calling the Mayday. The wheel house
lights blinked out as the spar deck heaved up amidships and
severed the power cable from aft. The radio telephone went dead
in Fleming's hand.
Almost
every Coast Guard unit on the Great Lakes heard the calls,
including Ninth Coast Guard Headquarters in Cleveland. The duty
quartermaster on the USCGC Sundew, moored at its homeport
in Charlevoix, Mich., had gone to the bridge to listen to the
weather report when he heard the distress call. The call was
also heard by all ships underway or at anchor on the lakes. In
fact, many ships had to put anchors fore and aft to prevent
drifting due to high waves and strong winds. Big ships rarely
anchor on the Great Lakes, but many did that late afternoon.
Waves were 25 to 35 feet high and winds were blowing up to 60
miles per hour. Whole gale warnings were in effect. Those ships
that were underway were moving slowly, especially those
downbound on Lake Michigan.
USCGC SUNDEW
Minutes after the Mayday call, the Coast Guard responded through
Ninth District Coast Guard Rescue Coordination Center in
Cleveland. Some Lifeboat Stations in Northern Lake Michigan
began to ready their 36-foot motor lifeboats, even before word
reached them from Cleveland. Before the duty quartermaster on
the Sundew could notify the commanding officer at the
lifeboat station in Charlevoix, he called LCDR Muth, skipper of
the Sundew, at home to tell him of the sinking and to
notify him that Cleveland wanted him to get underway
immediately. Sundew initiated a recall for its crew.
Meanwhile, repeated attempts were made to contact the
Bradley, but to no avail.
Even
before help was on the way the 636-foot Bradley had
broken in two and sunk beneath the waves of Northern Lake
Michigan. Four men, including Elmer Fleming, jumped into the
water as the forward section began to turn over. They surfaced
alongside the sole life raft which had floated free from the
forward section. After a few minutes all four men climbed aboard
the raft.
One
foreign vessel, downbound to Chicago, had spotted a ship on
their radar. The foreign ship had seen the forward section go
black, watched the lighted rear finally passed through the
highway bridge. Citizens of Charlevoix, along with anxious Coast
Guard wives, were standing on the shore and could not believe
the Sundew was actually going out in the storm. She had
to go. "You have to go out, but you do not have to come back",
is an old Coast Guard saying. Many believed they would never see
the Sundew again.
As the
Sundew passed the Charlevoix Lifeboat Station a 36-foot
motor lifeboat followed her out the channel and entered Lake
Michigan. The 36-footer was pitching so violently that LCDR Muth
ordered her back to the station. His reasoning was that he would
be looking for one big ship and did not want have to be looking
for a small one.
The
Sundew's journey to the vicinity of the last known section
begin to dive under, then saw smoke billowing.
Moments later nothing was visible by naked eye or radar.
The
Sundew was moored port side to at the Coast Guard Buoy Depot
in a small channel between Round Lake and Lake Charlevoix. It
was customary to get underway by going through the
open railroad bridge in Lake Charlevoix, turn around, go back
through the railroad bridge into Round Lake, blow the signal to
open the highway bridge, then proceed down the channel out into
Lake Michigan. The Sundew had trouble getting back
through the railroad bridge opening because the strong winds
kept blowing the ship off course until finally the ship had to
proceed at an angle in order to reach the opening at just the
right moment and at the correct speed.
The
location of the Bradley was proving difficult. The
maelstrom now caused almost all of the crew that had responded
to the recall to be seasick. After rounding a point of land and
moving in a West to Northwest direction the real fury of the
waves took effect. Some of the radio equipment
shorted out because water sloshed into the radio room, just aft
of the bridge. Radio Cleveland could be heard calling the
Sundew but she could not reply. Everyone on the bridge heard
Radio Cleveland ask everyone in the area if the Sundew
could be seen.
After
reaching the last location of the Bradley and not finding
any trace of the ship, a search grid was initiated, which meant
the Sundew took the full fury of the wind and wave
ultimately on the port, then the starboard side. The only relief
came for a few brief minutes as the ship turned to run with the
wind before again turning in the grid.
The
searchlight on the flying bridge was turned on and swung from
side to side. Occasionally, what happened to be a body was seen,
but before any attempt to recover the body was made, it was out
of the beam of light. The Sundew also made contact with a
foreign vessel, the only ship that had seen the demise of the
Bradley. It was difficult to communicate with the foreign
ship because of language problems. She did offer to search the
immediate area but informed Capt Muth that she had to get to
Chicago in order to return and clear the St. Lawrence Seaway
before it was closed to navigation for the winter.
During
the entire rescue effort the Sundew was sealed. No one
was allowed outside. Even the bridge was sealed. Because of the
mooring status not everything on board was tied down and there
was no time to do so before sailing. Gas bottles broke loose and
were lost over the side. Every can of paint in the forward
locker burst. Paint was sloshing two feet deep in the locker,
which was discovered when the locker was finally opened several
days after the event. Because of the difficulty in moving about,
many of the crew tied themselves to the mess tables to prevent
injury. No one went below to the crew's quarters. Between
manning the searchlight and checking on the crew, the corpsman
had to report their status to the captain. To state that there
were some anxious moments is stating it mildly. Several rolls in
excess of 50 degrees
were made along with water spraying down the stack,
causing sputtering in the main electric board in the engine
room.
At 4
a.m. on the 19th, the corpsman was told to lay below and try to
get some rest because the Captain determined that the corpsman's
services would probably be
needed after daylight. The HM2 lay below to sick bay, where he
loosely tied himself to a bunk. The winds had begun to abate,
the seas were not as rough. Suddenly about 8:15 a.m., the
corpsman was awakened by a crew member and told that a raft had
been sighted with at least two men on board. He ran out to the
buoy deck and saw a raft about 500 feet off the port side.
Blankets and Stretchers were brought out. All hands responded to
the welcome sight of possible survivors. The Captain maneuvered
the Sundew alongside the raft, which was then tied to the
ship. A cargo net was let over the side. A Bos’n mate went down
the net to assist the two survivors. He literally threw each of
the men up on the buoy deck where they were wrapped in blankets,
placed on stretchers, and taken to the chief’s quarters where
there was sufficient room for them to be attended to properly.
The two survivors were in good shape, despite their ordeal. At
9:15 a.m., the Sundew was able to send a message stating,
“Picked up two survivors on raft 5.25 miles from Gull Island.”
The two survivors had been on the raft for almost 15 hours and
fell into the water several times when the raft capsized. The
other two men that had been on the raft attempted to swim ashore
during the night but both were lost.
Coast
Guard aircraft notified Sundew of bodies in the water,
and sighting an overturned lifeboat on the shore of one of the
small islands in the area. After making sure there were no more
survivors, the Sundew sent a small boat out to recover
the lifeboat, which was empty. All the bodies were
taken from the lake and checked for any sign of life and
identified. All personal effects were placed in envelopes and
marked accordingly.
By the
afternoon of the 19th it was decided to return to Charlevoix
with the two survivors where they could receive extensive
medical attention. The bodies on the buoy deck were covered with
a tarp. At 4:23 p.m. the battered Sundew, her flags
shredded, weary crewmen leaning on the rails, returned to
Charlevoix, escorted by boats from the Lifeboat Station and
planes over head. The silence of the city around the mooring
area was eerie. The only sound was that of the ship moving
through the channel and waters at a slow pace. Everyone in the
area knew of the loss of life. The local contract doctor came on
board to officially declare the men dead and to check on the
status of the two survivors. After removing the bodies, the two
men who survived were taken to the local hospital for further
treatment and reunion with their wives who had been flown to
Charlevoix from Rogers City. The long night and day was over --
for now. The Sundew returned to search the area at dawn
on the 20th and 21st and spent all the daylight hours there, but
found no trace of the Bradley and no more survivors or bodies.
Out of a crew of 35 on the Bradley, just two survived, 18
bodies were recovered, and 15 bodies were never found.
Terror
manifests itself in many ways. All the crew of the Sundew
recall being very hot, then very cold. However, when the seas
calmed and help was needed for the survivors and assistance in
bringing bodies on board, everyone responded immediately. Some
of the younger members of the crew had never seen a dead boy,
yet they too responded when the call for help was issued.
The
life raft was delivered to the Coast Guard Buoy Depot in
Charlevoix, along with the life boat. The life raft has since
disappeared. In 1994 the lifeboat was found at Put-In-Bay in
Ohio and is now at the marine museum on Beaver Island. The First
Mate, Elmer Fleming, passed away several years ago after
retiring from the Bradley Steamship Company. The other survivor,
Frank Mays, never sailed again on the lakes and is
now retired and living in Florida. Mr. Mays returned to the area
in 1995 and participated in a search of the wreck, which had
been found. He descended in a mini-sub and viewed his old ship,
even noting that the red paint was still on the rails that he
had put there only a few days before the disaster.
Capt.
Muth is retired from the Coast Guard and resides in Florida. The
corpsman retired in 1981.
The
Bradley was lost because she was at the wrong place at the
wrong time. With wind and waves coming at her from the rear and
riding high in the water, despite full water ballast, she simply
broke in two and was lost.
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