Iliasik Pass
[from the stabenow.com vaults, first posted February 6, 2004]
Hello again from sunny (so far) southwest Alaska. We started the day with snow on the deck and fog. In the middle of the Unga Strait we came across a fishing vessel pulling cod pots, guys out on deck working the gear. “That there?” I said to Captain Lloyd, “that’s why I went to college”.
Later, there was an overdue alert on a fishing vessel en route from St. Paul to Dutch Harbor. Things got quiet and serious on the bridge there for an hour or so, until they found out that she decided the hell with Dutch and headed straight for Seattle without telling anyone.
After lunch the sun came out in a big way, and we skinnied through Iliasik Pass, with land that looked way too close on either side, especially when I looked at the fathometer. After which, a real crisis: Captain and crew discovered that the Greek pizza place in Dutch Harbor is closed. For a minute there I thought we were going to turn around and head back to Kodiak.
The Ops officer keeps forecasting horrible, terrible awful weather and rock and roll city. We got like five minutes tonight, and now we’re back to practically flat calm again. (I know, I know, I’m tempting the fates, the crew is going to kill me.) Meteorologists. They were invented to make astrologists look good.
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