Recalling a Deadly Odyssey

They wanted to be near the water when they told their story.

And so, three of the survivors of Sunday’s outrigger canoeing accident sat on a weathered picnic table Thursday morning across the channel from the beach where they launched. They recounted what happened when their canoe flipped them into the frigid water and they were washed out to sea.

Ben Taitai, 50, the steersmen and leader of the group, Mike Davis, 29, and Faustino Rico, reluctantly relived the worst day of their lives.

Another survivor, Justin Heard, 28, who had only been paddling with the Channel Islands’ Outrigger Canoe Club for eight days, was not there.

They lost one of the club members--John Deblin, 50--to hypothermia that day, and a second friend and paddler--Scott Sullenger, 35--disappeared when he tried to swim to shore for help. He is still missing and presumed dead.

“Tino” Rico started it off.

“First of all, if the weather was bad, we wouldn’t have gone out,” Rico said. “We’re no fools. The weather wasn’t bad. We’ve been out in far worse weather.”

All three jumped in to tell the story, words cascading out like water.

They said they were on their way back after a morning of rowing. They were less than 100 yards from the breakwater at Channel Islands Harbor when the 40-foot outrigger canoe began to take on water.

“We were home,” said Rico, tears welling up.

“We could see the breakwater,” Davis said. “We could see the rocks in the dredge wall we were so close. We were there.”

But they weren’t there.

As they returned from their weekly paddle out to an oil platform, about 3 1/2 miles offshore, a high wave swamped the boat.

Their canoe takes on water all the time, so they thought nothing of it. They started bailing, but the water was coming in too fast.

They decided to “take a drink,” or hop into the water to better empty the water out. Even that was not unusual. But even doing that they couldn’t get all the water out.

“We tried,” Taitai said. “We sat on top of it. We tried paddling above water, under the water, we couldn’t get it back.”

At last, frustrated and growing colder by the minute, they unlashed the ama, or the single pontoon from the partly submerged canoe. By then, their hands were so cold they could not untie the knots with their hands.

“We had to use our mouths,” Davis said.

In a tiny clump, they clung to the ama for flotation, and each other for warmth.

Tino prayed. Ben said he sang gospel songs.

Still they drifted.

Within an hour they had drifted 700 yards. The shore still looked close, but the standing rule among club members is stay together, no matter what.

“Nobody leaves,” Taitai said. “We walk together. We paddle together. If it were an individual thing, we’d have separate boats.”

But as they got colder, and farther from land, Justin Heard said he would swim for shore.

Taitai said he was furious. Heard was breaking ranks. Deblin, who they call “Big John,” was fading. Sullenger had a partial wetsuit, so he wriggled out of it and gave it to Big John to keep him warm.

As the others struggled to get Deblin--still alive at this point--into the wetsuit, Sullenger swam off too.

It was five minutes after Heard left.

Remaining Four Clung to Each Other

“That hurt me so much,” Taitai said. “Scott knew I was angry. If I’d have gotten ahold of him I would have bitten his kneecaps off.”

Helpless and shivering, the remaining four clung to each other. Some part of them was broken, they say, when they lost the other two.

The canoeists withstood more cold than they thought was possible.

But still they clung to the ama, and each other, as they drifted farther out to sea. Deblin died. His friends don’t talk about when, or how.

More hours passed.

Davis said he was just so tired, so bone-tired.

He looked over at Big John and he was ready to let go.

“I just wanted us all to go to sleep,” he said, tears running down his face. “I just wanted it to end.”

These are men of few words, men who love the sea. They are religious, and grateful to be alive. They began their Sunday morning rowing an hour earlier so they could get to church on time.

As they drifted at sea they were praying, Rico said. He sobbed at the recollection, and his friends comforted him.

“Let it out,” Taitai urged. “This will heal you.”

Boats passed by that morning. But they were too far away to help. No one saw them.

Until the John Start spotted the canoeists bobbing on the horizon.

“I knew God answered our prayers,” Rico said. “My only thought was, ‘I hope he really sees us. I hope he doesn’t go right by.’ ”

The paddlers--all hulking and strong--were so big that the much-smaller fishermen on the John Start had trouble pulling them out of the ocean.

It took them 25 minutes to pull Davis and Rico onto the boat. The men said they were so weak and cold they could do almost nothing.

They were so cold they were almost hallucinating. Their bodies had shut down almost completely.

Davis said he thought he was helping to pull Taitai out of the water, but then he realized he was still lying on the floor of the boat. He couldn’t will himself to move.

Rico said his eyes were so glazed from the saltwater that it was like being in a smoke-filled room.

“I don’t remember much,” Davis said. “I couldn’t really understand them. But I could hear them calling, ‘Mayday!’ ”

Added Taitai: “We were looking at the faces of human beings. It was life.”

The fishermen--Vuong Tran and Phuoc Pham--moved Rico inside and wrapped him in blankets. He was the worst off. Davis hugged the steam smokestack for heat.

Survivors Feel the Joy of Life

“I’m surprised you didn’t get branded,” Taitai joked.

They said the fishermen made a big commotion and revved their engine to full throttle to get them back to land. Rico still didn’t think he would make it.

“I told them, ‘I’m gonna die,’ ” he said. “And they said, ‘No,’ and wrapped me in more blankets.”

On land again, and alive, the three men say they cannot bear to be out of each other’s sight. Even when they are together they are constantly turning their heads to make sure the others are there.

More than anything, as they sit by the shore, drinking in the sunshine, they say they are thankful to be alive. They cannot stop exclaiming about the sound of birds, the diving pelicans, the joy of life.

“I look at the world totally differently now,” Rico said. “God has spared us. Every step, every breath, it’s different.”

In the days since the accident, Coast Guard officials, friends and observers have analyzed the paddlers’ actions. They have questioned why the men went out in strong winds, why they went out without life preservers and why they separated.

The men can only answer some of those questions.

But these are not arrogant recreational boaters, unwise to the ways of the sea.

An outrigger canoe is a racing craft, they explain. The sleek wooden vessel sits only 14 inches above the water. There is no room for life jackets. Hawaiians paddle the 40-mile Molokai Channel all the time without life jackets and without incident. They too have paddled together for years without mishap.

Besides, they say, in their situation life jackets would not have helped.

It’s true that their craft was old. They prided themselves on having no commercial sponsor, on being an invitation-only club of elite rowers. The best, the strongest.

Most clubs charge members $25 to $65 a month for membership. Not the Channel Islands Outrigger Canoe Club.

“In our case we’re just poor paddlers,” Taitai said. “But we’re strong paddlers.”

They were so poor they did not even have a trailer to pull their boat to races. So they stopped racing. But still they paddled their 30-year-old craft.

“The boat we have right now is like going to war with a BB gun,” Taitai said. “Most boats are like missiles.”

But they insist that despite its age, their outrigger was safe and seaworthy. It was fiberglass, which floats even when it has holes, Taitai said.

And these men know the sea and its power. They know it and are respectful of it.

Sullenger--who had not been found by late Thursday--wrote about that power in a poem, “Pulling Water,” that he gave to Taitai for his birthday last summer.

Through the mouth, into the sea

Mother Ocean sees her child

Today calm and welcoming

Tomorrow angry and wild

For the respect she deserves

And we work so hard to give

Is taken from us once again

Ah! humbled, she helps us live

As they sat in the sun, mourning the loss of their two old friends, they spoke with gratefulness for the community and how it has turned out to help.

“The people of the community have showed so much compassion,” Taitai said. “We’d like to thank everybody for keeping us in their prayers, thank the churches that have come out and helped us. Most of all we would like to thank God for giving us our lives back. And we want to thank the skipper and crew members of the John Start.”

Despite the accident, the survivors say they will--and must--paddle again.

They will return to the water Saturday during a Hawaiian memorial ceremony for Deblin and Sullenger off Silver Strand Beach.

“We have to go out there,” Taitai said to his fellow survivors. “We have to be strong for when we go out on Saturday.”

FYI

The Channel Islands’ Outrigger Canoe Club will hold an informal memorial service at 8 a.m. Saturday at Silver Strand Beach to celebrate the lives of John Deblin and Scott Sullenger. An Outrigger Canoe Trust Fund has been established for the families of the two men through Santa Barbara Bank and Trust’s Channel Islands branch.