Hey it's me, Destin welcome back to Smarter Every Day
today, on Smarter Every Day. We're going to continue our deep dive
with the US Coast Guard and we're going to see how they accomplish
their mission of saving people in peril and protecting the nation
from maritime threats. In previous videos
we've learned about command centers and the command structures,
and we've learned about search patterns and the RBM, the Response Boat Medium with its fascinating control system
and remarkable maneuverability. There's still a ton to cover
with this series of videos. And today we're going to spend a memorial Day weekend with a Coast
Guard station in Destin, Florida, and see how the Coasties
go about keeping the boating public safe on one of the busiest boating days of the year, particularly
at a place called Crab Island. If you've ever been to Destin, Florida,
you have heard about Crab Island. It's a barely submerged
Intercoastal Island where the masses love to come and hang out together. So today, let's go visit the Coast
Guard station in Destin, Florida, and get Smarter Every Day. (Guitar riff, sounds of winching, wind and waves) So how do Coast Guard stations
actually work? We know the boats are there and that's
the part that does the people saving. So are they more like a fire station
where they're waiting on things to happen, or is it more like a police station
where they're like going on patrols? If you've ever been to Destin, Florida,
you've heard about Crab Island... Again, it's known as the local party spot. But what I didn't know is right beside
Crab Island is Coast Guard station Destin. I pulled into the station
and met BM-1, Seth Pritt, who introduced me to the man in charge,
Senior Chief Corey Palmer. I'm Destin..
Senior Chief Corey Palmer
Good to meet you. Pleasure. It was pretty early in the morning,
so we just had a few moments to show me around the station
before the team on duty was gathering for the risk assessment
meeting for the day. So this first building kind of walked into
is is our administration building. Mm-hmm And then
over here we have our communications room. Hey I'm Destin
Sean So we have a computer program
that picks up. We're working on four different
towers here, Channel 16
International hailing and distress. And then this is
these two are Coast Guard channels. So this is how we talk to our boats
while they're underway. Destin- So this is the international hailing
and distress....
- Yep These are these are Coast Guard? Sean- These two are Coast Guard. And then this is for more detailed
Marine information. Oh, really... So you can switch to two two alpha. That's a Coast Guard working frequency. We got some flippers here. Yeah,
that's awesome. (laughter) Yeah, they're the real deal. Yeah, they tend to break less often. And this is the
I learned not to call this a map. This is the chart, right? Yep,
that's correct. That's our chart there,
one of the charts we use So this here, which is kind of our our general,
we call it like a bullpen or something, but just general office
space for the folks who come in, They need to get on computer.
They can hop in here, back there. That's our operations. Petty Officer,
BM-1 Seth Pritt here You get it done, right? Yes, that's right. He's probably the busiest guy, busiest guy
at the station I'd say.
-Awesome. And then back behind you,
we've got our armory. And just this is the oh,
this is the armory. quarters, the downstairs garage,
which serves as the headquarters for all the maintenance
they do on their boats. He also walked me out to the boathouse where they pull the boats
in and work on them, and at that time it was being used as a temporary gym
while they remodeled the permanent one. So we have four Coast Guard boats
that are here. The rest of these boats are
our partners in the area that we all kind of work together
to get the job done. Senor Chief Palmer then showed
me the three boats they used, the big one being the 45 foot response boat medium
and the other two boats are the 29 foot response boat small
and the 24 foot boat special purpose craft shallow water
which we'll be out on later. We headed back to the station for a GAR
or general assessment of risk, where the team meets and goes to the various risk factors
they're facing for their mission today. It's a really interesting,
collaborative effort to establish what they should be looking out
for in terms of risk. After this senior chief filled me in a little bit
more on this whole Crab Island phenomenon. All right, Senor Chief,
I have set up a a camera here, and Crab Island is
starting to bake off. How does it how does it go down? Like they're standing up out there, right? Yeah. So most of that people are standing there. It's pretty shallow. They can just kind of stand next
to their boat, hang out, enjoy themselves. But as the day progresses, so many boats will be on there
that you're not able to get to that you'll be right on the
edge where the deep spot is. And that's where the current will be
kind of pushing through there as the tide changes and it can be pushing
as much as three or four knots. What's the most common injury out there? It's hard to say. There's really a wide range of stuff
that can happen, but some of the more severe ones
are drowning. That happens here? Yeah. Yeah. You think it'll happen today? I hope not. I really hope not. That's Terrifying. Where some people come to visit there. They're not necessarily a swimmer. They don't know how to swim. They kind of get that false sense of reassurance like, hey, we're just going to be
in three feet of water. You can just be standing the whole time
as the day goes on. They work their way
closer to that deeper drop off the edge of the sandbar and the current gets them and then they start quickly
start drifting away. And that's when they get in trouble. Oh, man, that's awful. So senior chief wasn't exaggerating. As you can see in this time
lapse over the course of the day, Crab Island kind of builds up
and gets crazier and crazier. A little later in the day,
we load it up in the 24 foot special purpose craft
and headed out on patrol. All right. So what are we about to do? Pretty much for doing recreational boating
safety patrol. So we're going out looking for anyone
that is doing anything that is not safe, looking for BUIs,
anything, you know, that may be not legal. We're making sure everyone's safe. We're going to check safety gear, make sure everyone's good to drive their boats today So lIke if I don't have a mustache, can I still hang out
with you guys or what? Well, I don't have one, so.... I notice the guy doesn't have the mustache
is the one that has to drive. So you guys just sit around,
look cool in the deck. Well he.... he barely has one.
(Agreeing) I barely have one. I count it. It's better than I can grow It's all a facade. Safety is the priority
every time I get underway for any evolution. You know,
if we see something that looks like that's not right,
you know, we'll stop the boat...potentially run some field sobriety tests
if it comes down to that. So what on earth is that!?
Those are the uh...tikki boats, They're just some floating on some pallets that had a 60 horsepower engine on the back.
And they just scoot around.. You can book 'em out.. So I think it's BYOB. Destin- And you've got a captain that drives you around all day. -And the captain's sober the whole time...? -and they just do their thing...? Yep... Destin - That is bizarre. It's.... BRILLIANT. (Destin Laughing Heavily) Destin -It's really smart, huh? That's great. Very quickly, as we got out to Crab Island,
it became very apparent that there were
a lot of inexperienced people operating boats in close quarters,
which wasn't necessarily the safest thing. Within a few minutes, we had helped somebody
whose rented Jet Ski wasn't working or they didn't know how to operate it. I saw the anchor line of one boat get caught around the anchor
of a big yacht despite the mustaches for the two guys
on the front of the boat. This is not the TV show "Cops". So I want to make a couple of points. I recorded things from that patrol boat
that I don't want to put on the Internet, and it's because people were out there
enjoying time with their families in different states of mental awareness
because of choices they had made. It's not a great look for a lot of people, and I want to respect people's privacy,
so I'm not going to put that out there. But I will tell you this. I learned things I didn't know. For example, I didn't know the Coast Guard
can just board your vessel and they can inspect everything
you have on board to make sure you have the proper
safety equipment, the stuff required by law, like fire
extinguishers, flotation devices. I had no idea that they can board
whether you want them to or not. One thing
I just want to make abundantly clear, if you're going to be in control
of a vessel on the water, it's in everybody's best interest,
ESPECIALLY yours. Just DON'T consume alcohol. Just don't do it. A little later
on, we were doing a boarding out on the outer edges of Crab Island
and then things got serious. There was a report that a woman out
in Crab Island didn't have a pulse. (Radio Voice) Come over here 1018
on the East Side of Crab Island there's as subject on a boat up in the middle of
Crab Island
that apparently didn't have a pulse and's not breathin'. (Yelling on boat) Hey, DROP IT DROP IT DROP IT, (SIREN) (SIREN)
Back at the station. (SIREN)
The paramedics were called. (SIREN)
Some of the local law enforcement officers had jet skis and they could
get out into the center of Crab Island. And when they got to her, suddenly she had revived on her own
and she had refused medical attention. So it was kind of an odd
but a good outcome at the end of the day. Some folks on a boat got our attention and pointed out
another boat that was in distress. It ended up that some ladies had rented
a pontoon boat and it had gotten pushed by the current against the bridge
and they were pinned there. So we went over to help them get free
and get them back underway. And afterwards, Maichachi, who's a mechanic,
made sure that there was no damage to their engine
and that they could operate properly. Back at the station, my buddy
George was filming in the comms room when an important call came at in. (RADIOVOICE) This is Adeline....
I've got a capsized vessel with (Break) ..........(Radio Noise)........ (Radio) eight people in the water. I'm fixin' to pick 'em up You wanna know my position? (Radio Break) (Authoritative Voice) Vessel hailing
Coast Guard station Destin Roger, what is your location? (Radio Static) 30 degrees, 20, 95, 86 degrees and 30 113. (Radio Static) Captain, his Coast Guard Station Destin. Roger, can you confirm you (BM1 Pritt through Radio)
have all the personnel our of the water? Over CAST OFF! So as that was happening,
we could hear the radio calls going back and forth and quickly
got ready to head that way. (Radio Chatter) Accounted for. All personnel. They're still in the water. You are working at this moment
to get them on your vessel, 9 2 5 (Concentrating)
(Other Coasty Repeats) 9-2-5 ok...Two miles south of the pass (ENGINES ROARING, SIREN)
You're gonna want to hang on Destin! (ENGINES ROARING, SIREN)
Yes Sir! (ENGINES ROARING, SIREN)
We took off out to sea. And I quickly began to appreciate why they usually use the larger response boat medium when they head out
of the harbor, out into the ocean. It was a heck of a ride. And even with the built in shock
absorption, Man!! It was.... ...It was a LOT! (Destin Laughing, but clearly concerned)
(Lots of pounding, spray, and noise) We heard over the radio
that everyone was safely retrieved from the water
by the captain of the Adeline. So I cannot imagine how stressful
this ride would have been out to the sinking vessel, knowing
that people might have been in danger. It would have been a very different mood. Destin - How far out are we going? Justin (screaming over pounding) - Two more miles! Destin in disbelief - TWO more miles? Yeah! Destin - Holy Heck.... (SIRENS BLARING)
Holy... cra....aaapp It was a very long two miles. And thankfully when we got there, the captain of the Adeline was headed
back in with all eight boaters on board. So this boat just flipped. I had sunglasses somewhere. This boat just capsized. Eight people were on it. A good Samaritan picked them up. And so what are you guys doing now? We're just picking up debris. We're going to stay in the location
for a little while just to make sure we don't hear anything. Maybe someone trapped
in the hull or something. We can hear them, but we're pretty sure we
we heard from the source that there were eight people in,
eight people out. Everyone's accounted for. So we're just picking up debris
at this point. Destin - Some dude wants these shoes, man. Those are... where's the other one? (Engine noises) it's over there, Destin- How fun would it be to take a guy his shoes back? Just to bring it back like shoes? Hey, thanks for paying your taxes. Hey you forgot your shoes...they were on your boat,
that you also forgot. For goodness sakes, go. You want me to get his others? How crazy would it be to get his other shoe?
It's right there! Shoe! Shoe Number two! Oh it's good! You got it. There's the other one right there, Joseph. (Waves pounding on boat)
Destin - All right, so a boat sank. They're trying
to get the numbers off of it. There were eight souls aboard. They made it in. That's good. Nobody's hurt. Right now they're thinking about the environmental issues
such as oil on the water, stuff like that. So right now they're trying to get
the registration number off of the boat. A salvage company
was contacted to come refloat the boat and we made our way back to station
Destin and tied up. But the funny thing about getting the shoes in the hat is
we actually got to give the captain those things back and I'll show you that
in just a minute. This episode of Smarter
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thanks to Brilliant for supporting Smarter Every Day and a huge thanks to you
for considering supporting the sponsor. My daughter in law,
she's five months pregnant. Thank God that cooler was there and I got her rough on the boat. Destin - Oh there's your shoes man Those are Josh's shoes
Marsha's hat she's gonna love it, man. That's cool. Aw this is too funny. Destin- So is that your boat? Yeah it's mine...man.
Destin- What happened? We're just out there on anchor fishin.... And the waves... the lines
are just going and going. I was like, you know what man? Screw this it's starting to come over to back, you
know, with a waves breaking over the back. And I'm like, you know what? So all the sudden the boat just automatically...
you could feel it just start dropping And I said hey... is that pump?
And he said yeah! It's pumping! All I know man it just starts like this and I'm
just like this and it jus literally.... Destin - It just went.... Was it scary? Yeah. There wasn't much time to think about it... I rolled with the boat and then I just hung onto it
Destin - and and you guys were able to get out, - get the life jackets and all that?
No! I couldn't. Okay. That's
just that's a stupid thing about it. You couldn't get the life jacket out,
quick enoughs. As fast as the boat went down. No I'm former 82nd Airborne, so I've
jumped out of a perfectly good air planes. I'm not afraid anything. But when that went over, first thing was
my daughter in law with my grandson.... you know, carrying my grandson and my son that was.... And I got all mentally exhausted
cause I'm looking around, trying to find her We're trying to stay......
Destin- And y'all were treading water?
Yeah. I'm grateful that this man and his whole
family, including his grandson, who's now been born,
made it through this experience. And I'm grateful
that a Good Samaritan on the Adeline was out there and able to get to him
so fast. It's a good day for the Coast Guard
when all they have to do is manage the clean up on a bad situation
and no one is missing or lost. But I'm grateful for these men and women
who were there waiting and ready for the call. A huge thank you to YOU for checking out
the Deep Dive series here on Smarter Every Day with the Coast Guard.
Got more videos comin' Please consider subscribing
if you want to check that out. Also, a huge thank you to everybody
that supports on Patreon. I have a surprise
coming up soon for patrons, so if you want to check that out
Patreon dot com slash smarter every day That's it! I'm Destin I'm grateful for you. You're getting Smarter Every Day. Have a good one. Bye.
