Evening star., 1942-10-03

east for two days. The raft re-
sponded delicately to the winds
touch, sometimes cutting along as if
we actually had canvas up, even
leaving a stubby wake at times.
This was most satisfactory when
we were going in the right direction,
but there's no controlling the winds.
We could conceivably be driven in
vast circles, far from the narrow
shipping lanes, until our rubber
and-cloth ship rotted. When this
happened, judged, we would long
since have become three white
skeletons.
Thirsty, tired and hungry, was
wrestling for way out of his grim
conclusion that had begun to nag
me almost as badly as the sun itself,
When a contrary breeze whipped
spray into my eyes. The bow of the
raft tilted upward. Then the stern
lifted until it was higher than the
bow and our floor of fabric shivered.
Tony, trying to rest in the bottom,
yelled as sharp wavetop caught
him in the mouth. Aldrich, white
faced, had death grip on the stern
thWart.
Swept Swiftly On.
The boat whirled in a cloud of
clear green spray, hurling me down
on top of Tony Another wave
struck the port side with a stun
ming boom and white water drenched
us. There was no time to think as
the tiny boat spun into a cavernouS
dark trough. Up we shot again and
then, as if a giant had smoothed
the Wild tumult. we were scudding
swiftly but quietly before a steady
southwest wind
dug my hands into my eyes, wip-
ing out the stinging sea water. I
looked about with some trepidation,
and was surprised to find that there
were no black storm clouds over
head. We were humping along,
seeming to hop from wave to wave,
in fairly choppy sea, but that was
all.
That was our introduction to the
swift wind changes of these lati-
tudes. The powerful gust had treat
ed our little inflated cockleshell as
the wind treats sail when it jibes,
throwing loose booms with cannon
speed. 1t was something to know.
We were very anxious to work
westward from our starting posi-
ton, and now this new wind was
driving us north and east, exactly
the opposite of our desires. If we
were to go on like this, I admitted
secretly, the outlook was not promis-
ing. A good stiff wind in the wrong
direction could push this 40-pound
| boat
Then I had it! Why wouldn't 1t
be feasible to rig some sort of sea
anchor to check our progress when
the wind was wrong?
Immediately began to look
around for some practicable means
of working out my idea.
Gimme that life jacket" I Or
dered Gene.
Prepares Sea Anchor.
The half-inch manila rope life
line still encircled the boat. I re-
moved it. and tied one end to the
Debated life jacket, the other to
the gas inductor manifold on the
pointed bow of the. boat. The line
was about % feet long. I cast out
the Jacket to see how she would
work as sea anchor.
AS the jacket sank in the sea and
the boat pulled to the end of her
tether, the tiny craft jerked, slowed.
and swung about lazily, pointing her
bow into the wind.
Perfect!
We had good line, and the jacket
was just heavy enough to sink 8 or
10 feet in the water in fairly light
wind, 4 to 6 feet in a heavy wind.
In fact, the wind had to be ter
rlf1cally heavy-which it was time
or two-to draw the jacket to the
surface and collapse it. This hap
pened in blows that I estimated to
be 30 knots or over, but we didn't
have lot of wind of that force.
Under average conditions this i'm
provlsed sea anchor cut our rate of
drift to practically zero. estimated
our drift, with the sea anchor rigged,
to be not more than one knot with
l6 knots OF wind. 1t held the bow of
the boat directly into the wind, thus
materially reducing the area of boat
offered to the winds driving force,
While at the same time the Jury
anchor exerted its drag. These two
factors combined most satisfactorily.
Now we felt quite heartened, and
more the masters of our fate. A
thousand disasters could still hap
pen to us, and food and water were
still as unattainable as the stars. but
at least we had conquered one seri-
Gus problem. We all felt more fit to
tackle the others.
Tony, who had been the most
despondent, perked up as soon as he
discovered that I could now control
our little boat. He began to take as
great an interest in our progress as
any of us.
7 Drift in Circles.
This same day the wind shifted
around to the north again, and in a
few hours veered to the east. It
seemed that the winds were most
variable in this area. Our chart
shows that we spent the first few
days describing circles, as had
feared.
We were beginning to notice dry
ness of our tongues and throats.
There was no moisture coming from
our salivary glands, and withered
feeling in our mouths made it hard
to swallow. We had all taken great
quantities of salt water in our first
plunge into the ocean when the plane
sank from under us. We had been
afraid at first that swallowing this
salt water would Immediately cause
us to suffer unbearable thirst. but we
did not find this to be true. Per-
haps, in this particular instance.
this early lack of adverse reaction
to salt water was due to the fact
that our systems were able to as
simulate Immediately the mineral
content of the ocean we had con-
sumed.
Nevertheless, though we were not
yet suffering greatly from thirct