THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, December 14, 1994 TAG: 9412140464
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LANE DEGREGORY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: HATTERAS VILLAGE LENGTH: Long : 118 lines
Dangling 40 feet above the Atlantic, tied to a helicopter hoist strap, Murray Switzer watched everything he'd worked for wash away off the Florida coast.
An Air Force rescue crew had just plucked Switzer and his wife from their sailboat as Hurricane Gordon hurled 20-foot waves across the hull. The Canadian couple had spent five days without food or sleep, fighting the storm in the Gulf Stream.
They didn't want to abandon their boat. But they decided they couldn't save it and themselves.
So on Nov. 14, in seething seas about 125 miles east of Daytona Beach, Fla., the Switzers finally agreed to be airlifted to safety.
The HMS Destiny, their 44-foot, double-masted vessel - and all of their possessions - were left to sink.
``We'd sold our house. We were going to cruise to the Bahamas and retire. Everything we owned was on board,'' Murray Switzer, 48, said Tuesday from Toronto. ``We didn't want to leave that boat. It was our home, all we had left in the world. But we just couldn't buck that weather any more. We had to let it all go.
``With no insurance - and a strong possibility the sailboat would sink - we thought everything was gone.''
Three weeks later, an Outer Banks fisherman set off at sunrise to search for king mackerel off Cape Hatteras.
About six miles off the beach, captain Robert Harrison spotted a white sailboat bobbing near Diamond Shoals. The boat appeared shipshape. But when Harrison passed by again a few hours later, it was almost on the sand.
Harrison steered his 31-foot commercial craft toward the vessel and shouted to see whether the crew was all right. Receiving no response, Harrison climbed onto the deck. No one was aboard the HMS Destiny.
Within two hours, the sailboat would have shattered against the shoals.
Harrison and Dale Farrow, a commercial fisherman in a 40-foot boat, towed the sailboat to shore at sunset.
The Destiny was found about 360 miles from where the Switzers had abandoned it. It had spent more than 22 days at sea. Its inboard engine was submerged in saltwater.
But it survived Hurricane Gordon almost unscathed.
On Tuesday, the sails were still furled in blue canvas coverings. The lines were still tied to the masts. The cabin door was shut, protecting possessions.
Farrow said the sailboat was the best catch he had ever made.
But one important question remained: Whose ship came in on the afternoon of Dec. 6?
The Switzers still own the sailboat, even though they had it. Harrison and his friend salvaged the vessel, risking their own boats to do so. Both sides have brought lawyers into the maritime battle.
``Mr. Harrison called me from a cellular phone off the Hatteras shoals when he first found the vessel. He had boarded it, determined no one was on board, and called me to see what to do,'' said Stevenson Weeks, an attorney from Beaufort, N.C., who is representing the commercial fishermen.
``It's not `finders keepers' on the ocean, you know,'' said Weeks, who notified the Switzers that their sailboat was safe. ``With salvage law, the vessel still technically belongs to the owner. That `law of finds' everyone talks about for shipwrecks didn't apply to this case.''
Legally, Weeks said, the sailboat's owners will have to compensate Harrison and Farrow for their time and salvage efforts. The fishermen spent Tuesday listing the contents of the craft's cabin. The Destiny, a 1979 Reliance, is tied to pilings at Oden's Dock in Hatteras Village.
The Switzers want to take their boat back to Toronto.
``We assumed it was lost,'' said Murray Switzer. ``The Coast Guard told us the chances of finding it were almost zero. We'd always hoped we'd be able to, though. That was a dream my wife, Hazel, and I shared. It's come true, now that our vessel has been saved.
``But it's been a nightmare trying to get it back.''
With no house and only the clothes on their backs, the Switzers moved in with Hazel Switzer's mother in Toronto last month and are now looking for jobs. They want to recover their handmade guitar, keyboard, five-string banjo, bank receipts, books and other personal possessions that they left adrift. But most of all, they want their Destiny.
``That boat's been our home for five years now. The fishermen who found it have a legitimate salvage claim, I realize,'' Murray Switzer said. ``But we hope we can reach an agreement about what is right.''
Harrison and Farrow did not want to comment about their find, or hopes or plans for the sailboat. They directed all questions to their lawyer. He explained that case law uses six factors to determine salvage claim amounts.
``Basically, the boat's owner has to pay the salvagers a reasonable value for their services,'' Weeks said. ``If it hadn't been for their services, that sailboat's owner would have had a 100 percent loss.''
The salvage payment, Weeks said, is based on:
The degree of danger from which the property was rescued.
The value of the property saved.
The risk incurred in saving the property from impending peril.
The promptitude and skill displayed during the salvage.
The value of the property used by the salvagers.
The labor expended during the salvage.
Tuesday afternoon, Weeks said he had not determined how much his clients would request for their salvage efforts. He estimated the 15-year-old boat and its contents to be worth $75,000.
Switzer said the boat alone is worth about $50,000. He, too, declined to speculate on a reasonable salvage compensation.
If the two parties cannot agree on how much Switzer should pay for having his sailboat saved, the case will go to court. Weeks said if a settlement is not reached by January, he will file a salvage claim against the Switzers in U.S. District Court.
A judge or jury could ultimately put the sailboat up for sale, then allow both sides to share the proceeds. ``My clients probably won't get to keep that boat,'' Weeks said of the commercial fishermen who salvaged it.
As for the Switzers: ``We'd sure like to get that boat back if at all possible,'' Murray Switzer said. ``We'd worked many years to be able to sail away on it. We were so surprised when we heard it was all right. We don't want to have to lose it again.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
DREW C. WILSON/Staff
Dale Farrow helped salvage the HMS Destiny, whose owners abandoned
it in the face of Hurricane Gordon.
by CNB