Mark Behenna, right, with Wally Thomas. The men hold a newspaper, Kadiak Times, which carried the story of The St. Patrick in Dec. 1981.
Pastor Mark Behenna and his wife, Jessica, had some questions for Wally Thomas, one of two survivors of the 12-member crew that jumped off the scalloper St. Patrick after 60 to 70-knot winds and 20-foot seas created havoc near Marmot Island in early December of 1981. Freak waves smashed windows, killed power, and electricity and caused panic amongst the crew and skipper, who was spooked into ordering an evacuation. Some of the crew didn’t have survival suits.
Ironically the floundering boat never capsized. The St. Patrick was towed to Women’s Bay where it was anchored until it sank
Mark, who was called to serve St. Paul Lutheran Church this year, lost his cousin, Todd Stallins, in the mishap.
Meeting with Wally, his wife, and daughter, and Lon White at the home of Marion and Marty Owen, the Behennas learned more about the incident and character of Stallins.
Wally told the Behennas that Todd was the youngest on the boat; he was 18 or 19.
“He got picked on a little bit. He was a young kid doing his best. He had some real guts,” Behenna.
He cleaned the clock of an older, brawnier fisherman who challenged him to a fight.
“He was afraid of nothing,” Behenna remembers.
Wally recalled Todd’s courage in the final moments before the crew abandoned ship. The life raft had disappeared and there was a shortage of survival suits.
In no uncertain terms, Todd said, “’I’m not done dying yet.’ He had courage. He was handling this pretty well” — with only a life jacket for flotation — explained Wally.
Cool heads struggled to prevail amid the chaos, the sheer terror of expecting the boat to roll over at any moment.
But, there was hope. The boat was still afloat. Wally wanted to keep calling a May Day as long as possible.
But, in the end, the voice of fear prevailed. At the captain’s order, the crew plunged into the icy waters. Some had survival suits; others, such as Todd, just had life jackets. They didn’t stand a chance.
The sea, which was supposed to be a place of escape from a doomed vessel, became a deadly trap.
“It was like being inside a washing machine,” Wally said. “We could hear the wave coming, breaking over us. We’d come back up, get re-oriented and repeat.”
In order to stay together, most of the group connected to each other by a rope. Others drifted away.
Throughout the wee hours of the morning and the coming day, people, one by one, fell into the sleep of death.
At one point, “we realized we had someone tied to the line with us, in their life jacket. He was dead. We gotta untie that guy,” Wally said.
They couldn’t get the rope untied, so they had to undo the life jacket. As Wally released the body, he realized that it was Todd.
During that day, the survivors saw a Coast Guard helicopter several times, recalled Wally. “One time it came so close you could see a crewman standing in the door.”
As the group approached land, one of them — Chuck Parlet — went ahead of the others. When he got close to the shore, he was dashed up against the cliffs repeatedly, said Wally.
That left four of them, including Vanessa Sandin, a Kodiak girl, who had recently been hired as a cook. Prior to jumping off the St. Patrick, Thomas had helped her into her survival suit.
The group released themselves from the line and broke into two pairs. “We didn’t want to tangle in the surf and drown each other,” said Wally, who paired with Vanessa.
Vanessa died before she could get to land.
Wally is the only one who made it to Pillar Cape on Afognak Island. It was not a gentle landing.
“A big wave picked me up, body-surfed me in … drug me on the bottom, turned me upside down a couple of times,” he said.
Even though Wally was extremely weak, he was able to crawl up to a ledge above water at high tide.
He slept off and on that night.
At first light, Wally could see the Coast Guard C-130 flying patterns out there. Later, a fishing boat — the Jacquelyn Joseph — came around the corner not very far offshore.
Wally was on top of a boulder, waving his arms for all he was worth.
“Pretty soon that C-130 was coming right at me, trailing smoke. It flew over me and tipped his wings,” he said.
A Coast Guard helicopter was right behind it.
Wally knew that this was his lucky day.
He was taken to Kodiak on the helicopter and admitted to the hospital, where he was placed in the care of cold water survival expert Dr. Martin Nemiroff.
In the following days, when Wally’s strength came back, he sadly heard about the plight of his companions. Robert Kidd, the other survivor, died in 2007 in Rhode Island, Wally said.
Looking back at the 1981 ordeal, Wally said he’s had some bad times. “PTSD is a real thing. I’ve had to find a way to deal with it. Having family helps,” he said, with his wife and daughter by his side. The Thomases, who lives in Eagle River, also has a son.
Jessica Behenna had a question for Wally. Did they pray when they were in the water?
“Yes,” Wally said. Shortly after the jump “Chuck Parlet led us in the Lord’s Prayer. Yes, we were praying. By that time, we were interrupted by a big wave in the darkness. It’s only by the grace of God that I’m here.
“The only way that I’ve been able to make any sense out of this thing, is that I was supposed to be the witness. If somebody needed to know something about this, it was my job to let them know. I’m happy that I’m still on the earth. I have to balance that with the loss of my friends.”
Source: kodiakdailymirror.com