|
A scallop trawler forced to dock in Lewes left the city owing $980. It also struck a piling, doing $400 in damage as it left the City Dock.
The trawler Nanami, operated by an American captain but whose ownership is unclear, arrived at the city dock one day during the week beginning Sunday, Oct. 19.
The U.S. Coast Guard ordered the craft to dock until safety and environmental concerns had been corrected.
Witnesses say the boat left the dock Saturday, Nov. 1.
Lewes Mayor Jim Ford said Friday, Nov. 14, the city is seeking to collect the debt owed by Nanami’s owners by any legal means possible.
He said it isn’t clear why the Coast Guard directed the vessel’s captain to tie up at the city dock, rather than at some other facility, such as a private dock or the Coast Guard’s Lewes docks.
Ford said he was out of town during part of the time Nanami was at the dock, and Paul Eckrich, Lewes city manager, was off during the period of the vessel’s stay.
Ford said he’s asked Eckrich to follow up with the Coast Guard to find out why the boat was directed to the City Dock and to find out how to go about collecting the unpaid fees.
“The opportunity to lease the dock space to transient boaters was taken away by that ship having to be there. I don’t think that’s an appropriate policy and, for the future, we’d like to correct that,” Ford said.
City regulations do not allow commercial vessels to use the dock until Nov. 1. The city charges $2 per foot per day for use of the dock.
Nanami’s owner should have paid $140 a day in docking fees for the 70-foot vessel, which had been home-ported in Cape May, N.J.
Ford said upon Nanami’s arrival in Lewes, the owner or owner’s representative and the captain told the city’s dock master they didn’t have money and they wouldn’t pay docking fees because a federal agency had ordered them to be there.
Ford said a deal was negotiated with the boat owner and he agreed to pay $400 – less than half of what was owed – using a credit card.
Ford said the credit card charge was declined and the vessel was underway, departing Lewes. The piling damage added insult to injury.
Ford said as soon as feasible the city would replace the piling rather than delay the work as it pursues payment.
Coast Guard perspective
Cmdr. Michael Antonellis, prevention chief, based in Philadelphia with the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Delaware Bay, said the order to detain Nanami in Lewes originated from his office.
He said the Coast Guard’s concerns about safety were significant enough to require Nanami’s owner to address them before the boat could return to sea.
“We have certain safety requirements that a vessel must have, and it was missing some of those,” he said. He said in addition to not meeting safety and engineering requirements, Nanami also did not meet Coast Guard environmental standards.
“There was oil in the bilges and other environmental hazards that we wanted to make sure were rectified before they left,” Antonellis said.
He said Coast Guard Sector North Carolina had contacted the boat about concerns it had when the vessel was offshore in the sector.
Antonellis confirmed that the vessel had made it safely to Charleston, S.C., in Coast Guard Sector South Carolina.
He said according to Coast Guard records, Nora Kim is either the boat owner or the owner’s representative. Antonellis said Kim was aboard the vessel when it arrived in Lewes.
He said U.S. maritime rules require that 75 percent of a fishing vessel’s crew be registered U.S. citizens, and 25 percent be registered aliens.
“The makeup of who they had was more than that. We required that both persons on board be U.S. citizens,” Antonellis said.
He said Coast Guard records do not indicate that a third person boarded the vessel.
He said questions remain about who owns Nanami.
Antonellis said the Coast Guard is working with the National Vessel Documentation Center in Falling Waters, W. Va., to determine ownership.
“Law requires that U.S.-flagged fishing vessels, and this is one, be owned and operated by U.S. citizens,” he said.
He said Greg Cooper of Cape May served as Nanami’s captain when the boat arrived in Lewes.
Antonellis said his understanding was that the boat was going to South Carolina to be reoutfitted for a different type of fishing, but it was unclear whether the boat would remain in the area or head into the Gulf of Mexico.
He said Lewes’ effort to recover unpaid fees is strictly between the city and Nanami’s owner.
“We required that the vessel not depart until they fixed their safety gear. But any dockage fees are between the owner-operator and whoever they’re tied up to,” Antonellis said.
Tina Edwards - Her ship has sailed, but is she safe?
Many in the Lewes area know Tina Edwards. The Cape Gazette Tuesday, Oct. 24, featured her in a Saltwater Portrait in which she told of growing up in Lewes and how, after a series of unfortunate circumstances, poor decisions and bad luck, she became homeless. Edwards, 57, had spent the past three years sleeping in Lewes’ public restrooms, bouncing into and out of shelters for the homeless, and spending time in jail for reasons that are not entirely clear.
Hoping to escape to a better life, Edwards purchased a bus ticket to New Orleans in 2005, only to arrive in the city at the same time as Hurricane Katrina, which had suddenly and devastatingly made thousands of people in the Gulf region of Louisiana homeless.
Taken in by someone whose home barely survived Katrina, Edwards remained in the New Orleans area for a while but she bused back to Lewes only to be homeless again.
“I should have stayed in New Orleans,” she said in an interview this summer as she reflected on the decision to return. Earlier this month many who knew Edwards, and knew of her plight, said they hadn’t seen her in any of her usual spots. Some said she had talked about buying a ticket to Savannah, Ga. – trying again for a fresh start in a new place.
After publication of the Saltwater Portrait about her, a number of people called the Cape Gazette to say they had seen her aboard Nanami several days before the boat left Lewes.
One witness who had never met her but who had read the story about her said he saw her aboard the boat and assumed she was the captain’s lady.
One witness who said she saw Edwards aboard Nanami as it was preparing to leave said she shouted out to her, “Where are you going, Tina?” The witness said Edwards shouted back, “I’m leaving Lewes. No one here will help me.”
Aboard a rusty scallop trawler with people she barely knew, Tina Edwards headed into waters that, for her, are uncharted.
|
