Can you imagine sitting on this ocean in front of your lighthouse in a fourteen foot Zodiac rubber boat just minding your own business, and then the sea erupts around you with hundreds of torpedo shapes zooming in and out of the water?
One of the events my son will always remember as a young boy on the lighthouse, and I will never forget is being in the middle of a what people call a dolphin stampede. Continue reading Stampede!
Groceries at Sisters Island c. 1927
– Elizabeth Kate (Stannard) Smithman (Wife of Henry Herbert Smithman who was Senior Keeper at Sisters Island 1927 – 1929)
Light keepers have to take a four-month supply of food when they go on as there’s no way of getting anything otherwise. No stores to run to and no neighbours to borrow from, ha ha. The government boat called the lighthouse tender [probably the CCGS Estevan which was built in 1912] calls around every 4 or 5 months. Light keepers order groceries from wholesalers in Victoria and it is delivered to the government wharf and loaded on the tender and they bring it when they are coming up that way.
******************************** Continue reading Sisters Island Lighthouse c. 1927-1928 – Short Stories
The following extracts taken from early Victoria, British Columbia (BC) newspapers are credited to Leona Taylor for her excellent work in indexing the papers. Full information can be found here: ”Index of Historical Victoria Newspapers“, 2007-09.
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Dominion Government Steamer Quadra is loading supplies for the lighthouses of West Coast Vancouver Island, and is expected to leave about the end of the week. [Colonist, 1912-09-05]
Walbran may command Estevan… came here in 1888 with SS Islander, native of Yorkshire, England, b 1848. Educated at Ripon Grammar and served on British training frigate Conway, served in merchant marine for 11 years, and secured his master’s certificate at age 22. First ship commanded by Walbran was sailing vessel British Consul, bound from Continue reading Lighthouse History – 41 (1912-09-05 to 1914-12-30)
Automated in 1926, this video shows what some governments wish to do with automated lighthouses. They cannot just leave it alone as a lighthouse and a monument. No, they dream of turning it into a concession stand selling soft drinks and candy bars to the tourists! This was June 28, 2006. Luckily it was turned down by the public, but what comes next?
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Harry Heine R.S.M.A., C.S.M.A., N.W.W.S. (July 24, 1928 Edmonton, Alberta, Canada – September 25, 2004 Victoria, BC, Canada) was an artist who specialized in maritime scenes. – Wikipedia
Many years ago, having found the Heine family website at Spindrift Studios, I admired the lighthouse paintings of Harry Heine and upon request I was given permission by his son Mark Heine to reprint the following three works of Harry Heine for your enjoyment, and as a lure to get you to visit the family website. Beautiful artwork. Click the photos below to go to the website.
Continue reading Spindrift Studios – the Artwork of the Heine Family
In an earlier story I wrote about how the lighthouse keepers have been doing sea water samples since the early 1930s – some of the oldest observations on the BC coast!
Now, with satellites we can get different temperatures of the sea – Sea Surface Temperatures for one – similar to what the lightkeepers do, but globally.
Sea surface temperatures have a large influence on climate and weather. For example, every 3 to 7 years a wide swath of the Pacific Ocean along the equator warms by 2 to 3 degrees Celsius. This warming is a hallmark of the climate pattern El Niño, which changes rainfall patterns around the globe, causing heavy rainfall in the southern United States and severe drought in Australia, Indonesia, and southern Asia. On a smaller scale, ocean temperatures influence the development of tropical cyclones (hurricanes and typhoons), which draw energy from warm ocean waters to form and intensify. – NASA Earth Observatory Continue reading The Awfully Long Thermometer!
Following along with yesterday’s story about travel on a CCGS ice breaker, and with the permission of the author, Pamela Coulston, I am reprinting her article here about life on Canadian Coast Guard ice breakers servicing the north and the lighthouses. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
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Surprisingly, everyone made it to dinner, they also made it to breakfast and lunch. The
Coast Guard icebreaker Sir Wilfrid Laurier was taking a whipping from the weather in the middle of the Bering Sea. But not a meal was missed.
While the two cooks dished up three squares, the seas served up a storm that included winds gusting to 90 knots and 10-metre waves that broke over the bow, drenching the bridge four storeys above.
The captain ordered all loose items secured and all outer decks off-limits – any one of these larger waves could wash a person overboard to their death in near freezing waters. Continue reading Of Ice and Men
I received the following email the other day promoting an article on a friend’s website:
The freighter Vanlene ran up on the rocks on Austin Island in the Broken Group islands on March 14, 1972. She was carrying 300 Dodge Colt automobiles while enroute to Vancouver BC from Japan. The crew was rescued and taken to Port Alberni. How she ended up on the rocks is still a matter of conjecture but it appears that the Master simply did not know where he was at the time of impact (he thought he was off of the coast of Washington) and his navigational aids were inoperable. See the article at Nauticapedia.
Risking it All – Oil on our Coast is a short film that outlines the plans for the pipeline and tanker route and what it means for our beautiful coast. It is produced by Twyla Roscovich in association with Hartley Bay & Gitga’at Nation, Oil on our Coast is meant to inspire, empower and help fuel the battle to save what sustains us. – Twyla Roscovitch
Risking it All – Oil on our Coast from Twyla Roscovich on Vimeo. Continue reading Risking it All – Oil on Our Coast
One of the duties of a lighthouse keeper on some stations, was to do a daily Sea Water sample. It was started very early on (see the story here), before the advent of Global warming, and the observed data has been beneficial in many ways as you will see at the bottom..
In the above-mentioned story from Kains Island lighthouse, the samples started in 1935, so we have seventy-seven (77) years of ocean data. Also in the story is the fact that in the early years . . .
. . . the small glass bottles of sea water with cork stoppers were stored in wooden boxes with many little squares, one for each bottle1. These boxes would be shipped out when the supply ship re-supplied the station once a year, usually in July. Continue reading Ocean Water Samples