Rough morning on Lake Michigan

yobub

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2016
952
Northern Illinois
Boat Info
1998 400 Sundancer
Engines
Cat 3116's
There was a poker run scheduled from Winthrop Harbor to Milwaukee today.

Before the run, one of the boats hit a wave, became airborne, apparently the wind caught it and flipped it.
https://fox6now-com.cdn.ampproject....e-michigan-after-boat-goes-airborne-capsizes/

This was right outside our harbor mouth so help was on the scene right away. 2 injured.

They towed the boat in this afternoon around 2, From the pictures I saw, other than being full of water the boat seemed to be intact. When they were towing it in almost the entire boat was underwater.
 
Thank god they are "ok." I have pictures of the boat being towed in at the launch ramp. The nose sticking. out of the water. When the got to the dock, some wizard of oz storms rolled in so not to sure what they ended up doing. Looked like towboat us was going to try to pump it out to get if floating again. I'll try to post tomorrow
 
IMG_4230.JPG
"Both were not wearing life jackets". Pretty amazing.
 
Wow! We had a quick storm kick up after Mother Nature teased us all afternoon Saturday. A 17 Whaler CC took a wave over the bow and was swamped and almost instantly a wave hit them from the side capsizing the vessel with 6 aboard. All were rescued but the boat is likely totaled as they could not remove it until morning and it spent the night on the rocks.

In 15 minutes it went from 1 footers to 4 footers then to 6 footers in a few more minutes. I pulled in the harbor in my dinghy in the 4 footers just moments before the vessel capsized about 2 miles up from the entrance.

It is hard to explain to folks not on the Great Lakes just how vicious and quick Lake Michigan can turn on a boater. This is why we cannot anchor off overnight even in the best of conditions, it is playing dangerous odds to do so.

MM
 
Wow! We had a quick storm kick up after Mother Nature teased us all afternoon Saturday. A 17 Whaler CC took a wave over the bow and was swamped and almost instantly a wave hit them from the side capsizing the vessel with 6 aboard. All were rescued but the boat is likely totaled as they could not remove it until morning and it spent the night on the rocks.

In 15 minutes it went from 1 footers to 4 footers then to 6 footers in a few more minutes. I pulled in the harbor in my dinghy in the 4 footers just moments before the vessel capsized about 2 miles up from the entrance.

It is hard to explain to folks not on the Great Lakes just how vicious and quick Lake Michigan can turn on a boater. This is why we cannot anchor off overnight even in the best of conditions, it is playing dangerous odds to do so.

MM
As "quick" as it came, you could see it coming for at least an hour or more. I was watching the sky to the north get pretty nasty all afternoon. I finally pulled up the radar on my phone and saw Milwaukee was nothing but RED and the radar loop had it coming south. But, when it hit, it hit hard. Temp dropped 30 degrees in minutes.
 
As "quick" as it came, you could see it coming for at least an hour or more. I was watching the sky to the north get pretty nasty all afternoon. I finally pulled up the radar on my phone and saw Milwaukee was nothing but RED and the radar loop had it coming south. But, when it hit, it hit hard. Temp dropped 30 degrees in minutes.

A great percentage of the time those never come our way. It is really weird the way weather works on the southern edge of LM. If we ran every time we saw a storm up north or on land south or west of us we would never be out. As it was we never did get a storm. Just the wind kicked up.

Locals call it the New Buffalo bubble. It may very well be the least predictable place on the lake. Storms come up from southern Illinois skip over us then reform on land a few miles inland again. Storms cross the lake but stay just north of us regularly.

We were watching radar constantly in my group and all were just fine, but this particular boat just had a very bad situation hit them.

MM
 
To clarify, the accident was several hours before the storm came in.

The top picture shows the conditions when the accident happened. Bottom pictures are about 45 min before the storm rolled through.
 
Saturday was definitely an interesting day in Grand Haven as well, as there was a “fun run” for the go-fast boats. They left GH to Saugatuk, back to Holland and then return to GH - or at least that’s what was supposed to happen. Boats left the channel around 10:30am with 4’-5’s breaking. Before noon, a number had turned around and came back. For those who continued, many got caught in the afternoon storm and got stuck in Port Sheldon. You could hear them come back in late afternoon when the storm cleared and the lake calmed a bit. Would love to hear their stories!
As well, a number of people were “caught off guard” anchored in Spring Lake. When the wind and storm came thru many tried to outrun it thru the channel and next to the Holiday Inn. A number of unhappy people due to the large wakes made by those going way too fast.
Fun times.
 
Storms don’t really start up out of nowhere all of a sudden. If you watch the radar you can see the systems development and usually there is enough data for a captain to make a prudent decision.

My experience has been either boaters we’re unaware of coming storm and ignored the signs or the captain took a risk and hoped to avoid and under estimated the changing conditions.

I’ve boated on the lake and across the Gulf Stream. Weather should never surprise a captain unknowingly.
 
Storms don’t really start up out of nowhere all of a sudden. If you watch the radar you can see the systems development and usually there is enough data for a captain to make a prudent decision.

My experience has been either boaters we’re unaware of coming storm and ignored the signs or the captain took a risk and hoped to avoid and under estimated the changing conditions.

I’ve boated on the lake and across the Gulf Stream. Weather should never surprise a captain unknowingly.

Yeah....I'd agree with this mostly. But you weren't there watching the radar and making those decisions so it's pretty easy to armchair quarterback it from the comfort of the keyboard.

I was in Grand Haven during the storm pictured above. I was out for a dinghy ride and barely got the dink back on my davits as the storm rolled over us. I stood in the rain for the next 30 minutes helping dock neighbors get their boats tied up.

I checked the radar before we left, during our trip out and again as we were getting ready to tie-up and swim with friends (which we didn't, we went back). I can tell you that this particular storm was not, in any way, headed for us until it decided it wanted to blow up to the south. And when it went south, it went fast.

If any of us think we can predict the weather with absolutely certainty more than 12.9 minutes in advance we should be working for NOAA or NWS. The world needs weather forecasters with this kind of all knowing greatness :)
 
IMG_4230.JPG
IMG_4446.JPG
Another Walter E. Elliott photo of last week's storm off coast of Grand Haven.
 
Saturday was definitely an interesting day in Grand Haven as well, as there was a “fun run” for the go-fast boats. They left GH to Saugatuk, back to Holland and then return to GH - or at least that’s what was supposed to happen. Boats left the channel around 10:30am with 4’-5’s breaking. Before noon, a number had turned around and came back. For those who continued, many got caught in the afternoon storm and got stuck in Port Sheldon. You could hear them come back in late afternoon when the storm cleared and the lake calmed a bit. Would love to hear their stories!
As well, a number of people were “caught off guard” anchored in Spring Lake. When the wind and storm came thru many tried to outrun it thru the channel and next to the Holiday Inn. A number of unhappy people due to the large wakes made by those going way too fast.
Fun times.
We were part of the fun run down to holland in our 39 Cigarette. It was some serious water, 5-7 by the time we got down south. Most of us were running 30-40 mph and some people were struggling to stay on plane. The raft off in port Sheldon was another story. Luckily for us we were tied up to my buddy in his 400ss. We put the cover on mine and hung out on his until the storm passed. As the sky turned black about 2 dozen boats decided to head north back to GH, straight into the storm. Not a smart move in my opinion. All in all was a good day with a lot of broken hardware due to water conditions.
 
Wow! We had a quick storm kick up after Mother Nature teased us all afternoon Saturday. A 17 Whaler CC took a wave over the bow and was swamped and almost instantly a wave hit them from the side capsizing the vessel with 6 aboard. All were rescued but the boat is likely totaled as they could not remove it until morning and it spent the night on the rocks.

In 15 minutes it went from 1 footers to 4 footers then to 6 footers in a few more minutes. I pulled in the harbor in my dinghy in the 4 footers just moments before the vessel capsized about 2 miles up from the entrance.

It is hard to explain to folks not on the Great Lakes just how vicious and quick Lake Michigan can turn on a boater. This is why we cannot anchor off overnight even in the best of conditions, it is playing dangerous odds to do so.

MM
Same for Lake Erie. I see guys all the time who are leaving our local ramp in small fishing boats totally unaware of an impending squall that will kick up major wave action. Perch isn't worth that much.
 

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