BOATIE’S AMAZING TALE OF SURVIVAL IN A LIFE RAFT AT SEA
Cairns boatie on the pain of losing mate in tragedy
THE Far Northern survivor of a sailing tragedy in the Philippines has told how he begged his dying mate to live ‘because he owed me a beer’.
Speaking for the first time about the ordeal, Cairns boatie Laurie Miller said he spent five days in a life raft being smashed by a typhoon only for his mate Anthony ‘ Johnny’ Mahoney to die in hospital hours after their rescue by a Filipino fishing boat.
Mr Miller and Mr Mahoney were delivering a yacht to the Philippines with the boat’s new owner, Lionel Ansselin, in December last year when disaster struck.
It was Mr Miller, of Trinity Beach, who made the decision to abandon the sinking ship in the face of the typhoon and it still keeps him awake at night as he mourns the mate who never made it home.
“When you’re out in the deep blue you find out a lot about a man,” he said.
“Out there, the bulls--stops. And there was no bulls-- about Johnny.
“In the hospital, I stood by his bed and told him to get his arse in gear because he owed me a beer. But he never regained consciousness.
“I’ve always been a great sleeper and I could usually sleep standing up. But I’ve had more than a few sleepless nights since.
“I believe I did the right thing (in abandoning ship), but I wonder whether I could have done better, or more.”
Katerina was a beautiful yacht. Once owned by American broadcasting legend Wal- ter Cronkite, it was bought last year by Mr Ansselin, a Frenchborn Aussie who once served in the Australian Navy.
He bought the Katerina in Newcastle and hired a crew to deliver it to his home in the Philippines.
By Cairns the original crew had deserted the trip and Mr Ansselin made inquiries about the availability of other sailors.
A friend at a local yacht club mentioned it to Mr Miller, a 69-year-old former British Merchant Navy sailor with salt water in his veins.
He had been sailing boats for more than 50 years and he mentioned the trip to his mate Mr Mahoney, 73, another avid sailor who had been around yachts for decades.
Mr Miller, who had sailed more than 20 yachts around the world, said the two friends jumped at the chance.
The trio set sail from Cairns on November 24.
“She was a beautiful boat, she had done several Atlantic and Pacific Ocean crossings.”
They struck a minor hiccup in the Philippines, running out of fuel near the port city of Davao, but arrived under sail to refuel and buy supplies for the final leg of the journey.
Mr Miller said Mr Ansselin checked with the local Coast Guard about weather forecasts, but was told there was nothing worth worrying about.
Katerina sailed out of Daveo on December 11.
“The weather was okay,” Mr Miller said. “It was getting fairly hairy, but she was such a good boat, she was handling it so well.”
Early on December 13, Mr Miller discovered the Katerina was taking on water.
By midday Mr Miller called to abandon ship.
“I think about it now, ‘should we have stayed?’
“But I think it was the right decision and nobody argued.”
The trio set off an EPIRB rescue beacon before launching the life raft but within hours they had been repeatedly flipped by cyclonic seas, losing most of their supplies in the chaos.
“At some point we lost our sea anchor so we just kept getting rolled over.”
For five days they sat in waist-deep water, praying for rescue.
“Those days just all dragged in to one never-ending nightmare.
“You tried to sleep when you could, but we were soaking wet, Johnny was always cold, we were getting salt water sores. We didn’t eat, we had nothing to drink.”
However Mr Miller never gave up hope of being rescued.
“It was my belief, wrongly as it turned out, that people were out looking for us and any minute now we would hear a helicopter or boat engine coming towards us.”
The rescue response, or lack of, still angers Mr Miller.
On the fifth day the weather cleared though Mr Mahoney was fading.
“He was getting delirious. We were all struggling, but Johnny more than us. We tethered him to the raft to keep him safe.”
Then, a sound, different to the relentless crashing of waves against the raft – a boat
YOU TRIED TO SLEEP WHEN YOU COULD, BUT WE WERE SOAKING WET, JOHNNY WAS ALWAYS COLD, WE WERE GETTING SALT WATER SORES. WE DIDN’T EAT, WE HAD NOTHING TO DRINK. LAURIE MILLER
motor coming towards them.
Two Filipino men in a fishing boat, not even a metre wide, had spotted them.
Through broken English and hand gestures, they rescued the trio and headed back to land, a five-hour journey in the small boat.
“I tried getting Johnny to drink some water but he had his teeth clenched and was saying he didn’t want it.”
Over the next few hours, Mr Mahoney’s health declined.
By the time they reached the town of Tandag, Mr Mahoney had lost consciousness and the trio was then rushed to hospital.
The town hospital was basic and while Mr Miller and Mr Ansselin were rehydrated, it became clear there was nothing they could do for Mr Mahoney, who had suffered severe dehydration and multiorgan failure.
“I went down to his room and stood beside his bed and told him to get his arse in gear because he owed me a beer.”
He returned later to say goodbye. “I kissed him on the chin and said that was from everybody.”
Incredibly, Mr Miller plans to return to the sea next week to help deliver a boat to Fiji.
“I’m second-guessing myself a bit, but there is a full-time skipper on board and I just want to get back out there.” editorial@cairnspost.com.au facebook.com/TheCairnsPost www.cairnspost.com.au twitter.com/TheCairnsPost