DIRE STRAIT
When the Easy Rider capsized and Dallas Reedy was tipped into the angry ocean without a life jacket, he had nothing to help him survive – except his will to live
As the Easy Rider headed into rough seas, crew member Dallas Reedy had no inkling the trip was doomed.
It sounds like a jet engine. He cannot see it coming, but within seconds he can feel it
It was to become one of New Zealand’s worst-ever maritime disasters, when the heavily laden fishing boat Easy Rider was swamped by huge seas in the Foveaux Strait at the extreme south of the South Island. Nine people were on board that night in March 2012. In moments, deckhand Dallas Reedy found himself alone in the ocean, fighting against the elements and against all reason to abandon hope. IT’S MIDNIGHT and the Radio New Zealand broadcaster begins announcing the day’s headlines. The 11-metre Easy Rider is punching into the tide as it nears the northwestern point of Stewart Island. It bounces over waves and slides over their tips before slamming down into the troughs below.
The skipper is at the wheel. The news bulletin is wrapping up. “That is your headlines to three minutes past midnight.”
Then Reedy hears it. It sounds like a jet engine. It is a roar f rom the starboard side. He cannot see it coming, but within seconds he feels it. The entire deck is swamped. He hears a young boy, one of the skipper’s relat ives, scream – and then nothing. The water is up to his chest. Then the Easy Rider heels back and over. In an instant it is upside down, and pots and ropes are all around him. Reedy goes under. He flails and tries to grab a rope. All he is wearing is a yellow and blue stormline jacket, track pants and boots. As soon as he hits the water his boots and pants are sucked off.
The sea temperature is 13°C. A man wearing a life jacket could survive up to five hours before succumbing to muscle fatigue, cramps and hypothermia. But without a life jacket, in the cold, Reedy thinks he is going to drown.
He fumbles around for anything to help him stay afloat. He manages to get a hold of a rope attached to the boat. The waves pul l him around, slamming him into the side of the hull. It is sl ipper y and barnacl e d like a whale, but he knows he has to stay out of the water for as long as possible.
He wedges himself between the propeller and the rudder as waves continued to crash over him. It feels like death is coming for him.
There is no moon. No stars. Only the boat’s light, which is still attached to a battery. After 15 minutes it goes black. Then comes the cold. He looks around and can see no- one. He bangs on the hull with his fists hoping to get a reply from those who were in the cabins. He yells. There is nothing – only the sound of the ocean.
The Easy Rider’s dinghy is still tied up – only metres away. But if he doesn’t reach it or if he can’t unleash it, he’s likely to drown. So he stays put, occasionally standing and squatting to keep his blood moving.
Two hours pass. He knows he is alone. Then comes another sound. A wooosh. It is like a last, dying breath. It is the air escaping from the boat. The Easy Rider tips vertical and begins to sink. He gets to the back of the boat. Then, when the water is up to his knees, he steps off into the black, the dinghy still tied to the Easy Rider, both slowly sinking and fading beneath him.
Dallas Reedy is alone in the black. He can barely see a metre. He is about to die.
Almost immediately it pops to the surface – a 20-litre red, plastic petrol canister. Nothing else. If it had been a little further away he would not have seen it. He slides his fingers through the grip and holds on tight. It is 2am. The morning … if he can make it to morning then that is his best chance. Did the skipper get a mayday out? Did anyone get out?
He has been cold before. He was in
the army in Waiouru – a tank driver in the bitter winters forced to stay overnight inside the freezing steel. More than once he fell victim to hypothermia. You do that a few times over the years and you learn about your body.
IN THE DARK he has no reference point. He puts the others who were aboard the boat out of his mind. He has to. He can’t think about them. He has to survive.
He thinks back to his sons at home, snuggling into their beds, no idea that their father is out in the ocean fighting for his life.
Hold on, he tells himself. Don’t let go. Hold on. Don’t let go.
He sees things in the water. Millions of them – they sparkle and twinkle in the night. The bioluminescent marine life is the only light he has seen in hours. When he splashes his hand the light disappears. Even out here with all this death, he thinks, there is life.
He is not hungry. Only thirsty. The water slaps against him and tries to force itself into his mouth. He spits and sputters and tries to force it out. His stomach is cramping. He keeps passing stools. It feels like his body is shutting down.
He thinks about his life. His early days putting in fence posts on the east coast of the North Island. His time in the army and how it gave structure to a kid who had known little.
He remembers when he left and the mistakes he made. He remembers the assault on the taxi driver that put him in prison. He remembers playing rugby league on the concrete where inmates would try and smash his teeth out in every tackle. He remembers the inmate who hung himself in the cell next door.
He remembers wanting to turn his life around and do the best for his kids and his wife. He remembers moving to Southland. All of it, he thinks, has led to this moment.
THE SUN FINALLY hauls itself over the horizon. Dallas figures it’s about 6am. It looks like the world being born, he thinks. It hits his skin. Finally, he feels warmth. He has lasted the night. Now, he tells himself, someone will find me.
His tongue is swollen. He cannot swallow. The salt water he has been spitting out is seeping into his body.
Reedy knows the sea. He has spent most of his life in it. He learned to dive near here – getting in the ocean with great white sharks that returned to these waters every year. Now that there is daylight he can see that his knuckles are bleeding. For a moment he panics. He flails and tries to pull his legs into his chest. He wills himself to be calm, to breathe.
The waves slap on his jacket. Slap, slap, slap. It is constant. Slap, slap, slap. JUST ****** STOP! He shouts into the open air.
The ocean does not listen. He tries
to concentrate. He looks about him. All this time, land has only been about 3km away. He cannot see anything else, only land. He has to swim. He moves to take off his jacket. He slides his arms out and lays it flat on the ocean’s surface. He hopes it will be a signal to helicopters or planes that will come looking for him.
Just before he lets go of it he thinks back to a television show he watched once about survival. It was hosted by former specialforces soldier Bear Grylls, who told his audience to use everything around them to survive. Just before he lets go of the jacket he pulls out the drawstring from its hood.
The jacket floats for a second. Then it sinks into the sea.
Dallas ties the string around his wrist and around the petrol canister’s grip. Hold on. Don’t let go.
HE WAKES BENEATH the sea. His vision is blurry through the water. The string saves him. He bursts to the surface and into tears. I am dying now, he thinks.
He has to move. He starts swimming, pushing out the canister with each stroke. It tires him. He stops and ties the string to the elastic of his underwear. He starts for land again. Forty minutes pass. He looks up and sees he is no closer. He looks back to the sun. It is dipping. He has about four hours. He knows he can’t fight the current. He knows he can’t make it another night.
He begins to sing. Anything at first – songs from the ’ 60s and ’70s – the Eagles, Dire Straits. He recites haka – war challenges he learned as a boy at boarding school. He tells himself jokes. He makes himself laugh. He talks to the petrol canister. He has named it Wilson, after a Tom Hanks movie he once watched. He feels like he might be losing his mind.
He thinks Wilson is too heavy. There is liquid still inside. Maybe if he can pour some out it will float better. He unscrews the lid and begins to tip it out but does not realise how much is still inside. The gasoline pours all over his face and into his eyes. He is blind. He grips the lid in his fist. If he loses it, he will die.
Carefully, he screws it back on and begins to say goodbye to everyone he has ever known. Strangers, friends and family – he wishes them all a long life. He begins to say hello to everyone he knows who has already passed over. He says he will see them soon. He is calm.
He begins to say hello to everyone he knows who has already passed over
He tries to untie the string from his wrist so that he can wrap it around his neck to keep his head above the water. If he sinks he knows the sea lice will eat his eyes first. But his hands are too cold. He cannot undo the knot. Then he sees a plane flying high above him. He tries to wave, he tries to scream. It passes by.
WHEN THE SUN had first come up that morning he felt so much hope. It gave him warmth. Now, he can feel it turning on him as it skulks back over the horizon. I can’t fight anymore, Reedy thinks. He says goodbye and closes his eyes. He has done enough. He has done enough. Then he hear s it .
A man on a boat speaks words he will never forget: “SURVIVOR IN THE WATER”
Neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. He looks up and locks eyes with a spectacled young man on the back of a boat who speaks words he will never forget : “SURVIVOR IN THE WATER.”
REEDY WAS PICKED up by the Bluff Coastguard after helicopter crew near Stewart Island spotted a diesel slick in the water. It was 6.11pm. He has been in the water for 18 hours.
Two months on he has been to hospital and heard people call his story a miracle. He has appeared on television and been in magazines. His story is now his family’s story. He wants his sons to know what he went through and what he did to come back to them. He wants them to know the blood that runs through his veins is theirs too – Ngati Porou: warrior blood.
He does not believe himself to be an exceptional person, but he now understands that if you push yourself, exceptional things can be done. His initials are DT R – Dallas Tumoana Reedy. Tumoana: “He who stands steadfast in the sea”.
The search in Foveaux Strait continued through the night and the days that followed, but there were no other survivors. Of the nine aboard, only Reedy survived. Four bodies were recovered; the remainder were never found.