from Caroline Buchanan

Caroline Buchanan has been crossing between Obstruction Island, her home, and Orcas since 1990, not always but often rowing her Whitehall -- a 17’ skiff built by Greg Thompson and Mike Stolmeier in 1990 at Obstruction Pass. Photo: Caroline Buchanan

Caroline Buchanan has been crossing between her home on Obstruction Island and Orcas since 1990—not always but often rowing her Whitehall, 17’ skiff built by Greg Thompson and Mike Stolmeier in 1990 at Obstruction Pass. Photo: Caroline Buchanan

How would you like this bearing down on you?

After years of not coming through Obstruction Pass, a year ago ferries started coming through the pass. This was a random event—sometimes 8 in the morning, sometimes, 10, sometimes mid-afternoon. I contacted WSF expressing my fear that they would run me down one day as I crossed between the islands in my Whitehall rowboat.

There are approximately four minutes in which there is not enough room on either side of me for the ferry to go through the pass. They would need to wait the four minutes for me to get out of their way. Or hit me and kill me.

I have been assured that the boats have radar that would pick me up, even though my boat has a profile barely a foot above the water. I have wondered. The collision recently with a sailboat confirms my worst fears. If the Hyak could not pick up a sailboat what chances does a low-profile rowboat or a kayak have?

It is understandable that the ferries may need to familiarize themselves with an alternate route to Thatcher Pass. In a storm from either the south or north—when the ferries travel north in Rosario, go through the Pass and then turn south to Lopez—they will have a much smoother trip than taking the weather on the beam.

We have many fine days between late October and early May when they can practice this alternate route. There are not nearly the number of small boats in the the waters between Blakeley, Obstruction, and Orcas as there are in the summer months.

I hope others will join me in contacting the Washington State Ferries requesting them to cease routing themselves through Obstruction Pass during the summer months. If they can’t pick up a sailboat on their radar, good luck with picking up a kayak, a skiff or a rowboat!

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