Fla. Cousins was not certified to pilot the tanker through the Sound. La. The harbor pilot who helped guide the Exxon Valdez out of port and handed command of the vessel to Hazelwood at Rocky Point south of Valdez Narrows said he smelled alcohol on Hazelwood's breath. The first Coast Guard officer who boarded the damaged vessel also detected the odor of alcohol on Hazelwood. However, both said Hazelwood did not seem to be impaired. The average person with a reading of .20 or more would have slurred speech and a stumbling gait, Propst said.
Experienced drinkers learn how to mask symptoms.
Alcoholics usually metabolize alcohol at a faster rate than non alcoholics, Propst said, thus the .24 estimate is a minimum rather than a maximum. Adm. Paul Yost, commandant of the Coast Guard, lashed out at the operation of the tanker before it ran aground, arguing it should have been child's play for the captain and the crew to navigate in what he described as a wide open swath of open sea. We've got 10 miles of open water there, and for that vessel to have come over and hit a reef is almost unbelievable. This was not a treacherous area. Obviously, something went very badly wrong.