Funny, watching a new episode of Deadliest Catch that caused me to smile. They were facing really big seas, a few seasoned crewmembers were out for the count, laying in their bunks eating saltine crackers. As a man who has been to sea a few hundred times… It doesn’t matter how good your sea legs are… when the waves get big enough, you’ll be eating a saltine cracker, have to keep those electrolytes up!
It happened to me twice, once as a civilian, we put to sea a few hours after a tropical storm made landfall. Its sustained winds were 69mph… not much different than a CAT 1 hurricane at 72mph sustained winds.
The second time I was in the Navy… the battle group pulled out of Sardinia in the Mediterranean and steamed into a storm with 50ft seas… I admit, I had partied a little too much the night before… I ate a lot of saltine crackers that day.
I had a friend in those days, different division but still in Combat Systems. He and I used to play a lot of chess. Say we were tied up pier side but getting underway… All he had to hear was the ship wide announcements… “Pull in all Lines” “Underway, Shift Colors” (shift colors… US flag on the jackstaff comes down… US flag on the main mast went up, shifting our colors to different location on the ship).
My friend was useless for the next 24 hours… he’d be in his bunk looking green around the gills when he wasn’t throwing up… even though we were still within 30ft of the pier! Of course, everyone teased him… After 24 hours he was fine… it was a mental thing with him.
We'd still be in the Chesapeake bay, 3-4 ft seas... On a ship 564ft long you don't noticed the seas until they are 10-12 ft.
