The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1900-04-15
RACE WITH A WATERSPOUT
1t Developed an Affinity for Capt.
Little Schooner.

From the San Francisco Chronicle.
1T swayed and zig-zagged over the
ocean like the staggering gait of a drunken
man, then swept with a roar just under
our stern and carried away the spanker
boom with it
That was the way Capt. Rice described
the encounter his vessel, the schooner
Metha Nelson, had with waterspout on
the morning of Oct 49, about thirty miles
northeast of Point Reyes, while she was
making for this port. The schooner was
bound from Makawell, Hawaiian Islands,
with a cargo of sugar. She had fair
weather during all the voyage until the
capes which mark the entrance to the
harbOr were almost In sight, when the
wind began to freshen and come in titful
gusts.
The schooner was holding well up to the
northeast to get a good slant of wind for
the port after taking bearings from the
Farallone light. The wind, which had
been pretty brisk at the break of day,
kept increasing, and few hours after the
sun broke thr ough the banks Of fog clouds
in the eastward IL was almost blowing a
hurricane from the northwest.
When nearly abreast OF Point Reyes the
vessels course was changed, and she was
bowling in toward the harbor, with the
wind almost astern
Suddenly, and almost directly ahead
of the vessel, there rose a great, tall col
umn of water.
For moment 1t stood almost directly in
the track of the SRI ooner, and only a few
yards in advance of its jibboon. Just az
the vessel seemed about to pierce it. Il
moved slowly from the schooner, then
swung off to starboard. Capt. Rice or
dered the helm hard over, to pass TO port
of the column, and at the same time
jumped down from the poop deck to give
the men a hand in hauling up the sheets.
The work was hardly half done, and the
jibs and mainsahs were Tapping in the
wind, when the great column of water
changed it's course and came swirling back
toward the schooner, as If to strike 1t al
most amid ships
This time 1t came racing over the ocean
with a roar, and with the speed of an
express train. The sailors dropped the
ropes on which they were pulling and
sought the heavy beams of the fOrcastle
head from the spars of the rigging that
they expected the next moment would be
torn from the vessel and come tumblng
down, a mass of wreckage, on the deck
Almost before the men could reach the
shelter the vessel was caught in the
vortex of air which accompanied the
mighty twisting column of water, and she
spun around like a top. lurching her port
sail under the water as she went. The
of the waterspout and it was lifted high
in the air. while the bow sunk down in
the waves and the water rushed in on The
scared sailors over the buwarks forward.
1t was only for an instant. but in that
instant there was a cracking Of tlmbers.
and the little heavily laden vessel groaned
as though the life were being crushed out
of her There was loud report of smash
ing timbers in the midst of it all. Then the
vessels bow rose, and with a quick roll TO
, sterboard that put her almost on her
beam end the vessel spun around, the
waterspout travelling almost parallel to
her inclined decks. The point of the lib
boon all but poked into the twisting col
umn as the schooner twrled around
Slowly The schooner righted, and when
she came 10 an even keel the waterspout
was weI Off 10 starboard Of the vessel and
travelling rapidly away. All danger 10 the
vessel WAS past, and The greatest surpris,
to the crew was the .ittle damage that had
been done.