kELI mcvean eating eggs 0n the hermitage

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Marlene McVean 

libertyrvcenter.marlene@gmail.com and her  husband, the late Omer "Mac" McVain owned the  Billy H. Marlene lives in Puyallup, Washington,  on the Puget Sound between Tacoma and  Seattle. She recalls: 

The yacht "Billy H" was homeported in Tacoma,  Washington. She bought the boat from the Navy  around 1964. It was a converted Navy diving  tender. 

In April 1965, the Billy H left Tacoma traveled  down the Pacific Coast, stopping in every country  along the way and, then stopped at the Balboa  Yacht Club in Panama (Pacific Side). The Billy H  then went through the Panama canal. In 1967 the  Billy H stayed at Cartagena, Colombia. In 1967,  Marlene and her family embarked on the Billy H  with the intention to returning to  

Panama. However, the seas were very stormy, and  the waves were very high. The engine started  acting up. Her husband Mac went down below to  check the engine. The boat boy did something 

and as a result of which the generator was  accidentally turned off by a crew man. The Billy  H was floating without power, We radioed for  help. It was our last chance. 

Initially, the Navy said they would fly over and  drop a parachute with a light and other rescue  supplies. The parachute would be used as a drag  line, which drags behind the yacht to stabilize  things. The yacht was 55 feet long, and weighed  31 tons. 

On the board were Marlene, daughter Keli age 5,  son Danny age 12, and daughter Kim Marie age 8,  her husband "Mac." Also on board were two  passengers who were friends of an American  colonel in Panama, The two passengers wanted to  ride with us from Cartegena to Panama.  

The Navy plane radioed us and said it was are  sorry but it missed the yacht. The plane was short  of fuel and would have to go back to Panama. The  plane assured us that help would be coming. 

We had a hair raising experience getting the rescue  equipment which had been dropped by parachute. We had a dinghy and the boatman said  he would go and get the equipment. My son, age  12, went with him. I was three hours up on the  mast trying to see them. After three hours, I saw  them on top of a wave and just about fell  apart. They had three more waves to come to  us. The dinghy came to the boat. Husband and I  were scared that they would hit the yacht. But the  boatman, Franco, knew what to do, tied a knot and  threw the line to us and we got to get them on  board. 

Then we pulled all the equipment in. I took the  light they gave us and put it on the roof. The Navy  plane had also sent us a radio. We received a radio  message that the USS HERMITAGE was going to  rescue us.  

When we got the message, Marlene stayed in the  wheel house. Marlene went up on the roof and held  the light. Finally, Hermitage spotted the light, but  Hermitage radar could not register the yacht,  possibly because the high seas were blocking the  radar waves. 

Hermitage pulled up along side of us. Marlene and the three children were lifted onto the Hermitage  by a chair. Two Hermitage sailors came on board  the yacht with two bilge pumps and other  equipment. A Division Officer Bill Grubb was  responsible for sending the men and equipment to  the Billy H. 

Jack Pusel jcpusel@msn.com believes the two  men from R Division who went over to the sinking  Billy H were SFM2 D. J. Schatz and SFP2 J. L.  Wellard. Jack is not certain of their identity. 

Marlene said that she slept in the captan's  quarters. Her husband remained on the boat with  Franco (the boat mate) and the two Hermitage  sailors. The children went to the Hermitage galley  and ate, and then watched movies. Captain  Matthews told me to just rest.  

Hermitage had considered getting the passengers  on board and then sink the boat. It was regular  protocol to sink empty boats so they would not  pose a hazard to any other craft. However,  Captain Herbert Spencer Matthews said he could  not sink it because it was a Navy boat, so the  Hermitage towed the yacht to Cristobal, Panama. 

I was so relieved, I thought I had met God. I had  prayed and prayed and prayed. Every prayer that a  mother could have answered.  

When the Hermitage came back from Vietnam, I  was sitting in the BalboaYacht Club, and the  Hermitage crew shouted "Billy H, Billy H" meet  us at the pier. We drove by car to the pier, where  we were greeted by a the crew. A crew member  hugged us. Captain Matthews asked us if we could  host for Christmas a crew member who was in  Gorgas hospital with a broken leg. The crew  member would not be going on the Hermitage  back to Norfolk. So Captain Matthews asked us if  we could pick up the sailor from the hospital and  take him to our home for Christmas dinner, which  we did. We took him back to the hospital.  

Captain Matthews sent us an invitation to his  change of command ceremony on the aircraft  carrier Independence which was in Europe at the  time. I was so thrilled.  

We put a new 671 GMC motor in the yacht. It  really did a good job. 

When we got the yacht fixed, we went to Balboa  and Marlene ended up managing the Balboa Yacht  Club. My yacht was used for rescues for Panama,  and I would get calls if there were a stalled  vessels. I remember rescuing a sail boat which  broke in the middle. We rescued all the rescue  boats. I ended up having getting my license to  take sailing boats through the canal. If my  husband went through, he had to be the lineman. 

We sold the yacht about four years later to a  person in Colombia.  

Marlene is looking for the names of the people  who were involved with the bilge pumps. She also  needs the name of the sailor which she hosted for  Christmas and what happened to him.

John Oertel joertel@comcast.net wrote to  Marlene McVean: 

I was an Ensign assigned to the Operations  Department in charge of the CIC team. CIC  operates in the dark radar room where the  radarman on duty was operating and visually  looking at the surface radar screen looking for the  Billy H. This was all new to me having been  transferred as an emergency replacement  Officer. Just the day before I was on the USS  Rankin as part of the Deck Department. 

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We were notified of a distress call on our way to  the Panama Canal for a service tour in Vietnam. It  was after dark. We were in the middle of  nowhere. We did not have an accurate  location. We had been underway for hours, and  were requested to see if we could find any boat in  a wide area of open sea far from land and well  beyond the distance capability of our radar. We  have an old SPS 10 surface radar system, with a  limited range and not much ability for sensitivity  and controls to screen out background noise if you are trying to maximize the search. Think of an  early black and white TV screen with a lot of white  dots or “snow” on the screen when you did not  have a clear signal.  

I happened to be in the radar room when a young  radarman called me over, “Mr. Oertel. I think a  found the boat in distress." I asked “where” as I  looked on the screen and did not see anything but  small white dots. As reported, the sea was wild as  a result of the storm with wind and high  waves. Some of the radar signal was picking up  the top of the waves filling the screen with small  white dots. The radarman told me to look at the  multitude of white dots of the wave returns, that  are constantly changing and moving. He said,  "Look, see there one dot repeating in the same  place.” Based on a speck of information and a  hunch, we told the bridge to head in the direction  of our faint indication on the radar. As we got  closer, the radar indication became clear and we  continued on course and eventually saw the light  from the Billy H.  

As the USS Hermitage approached the Billy H, we  put our officers gig into the water and rescued the passengers. The crew stabilized the boat and  towed it to Panama. I cannot recall the name of  the radarman, who had such an attention to the  detail. 

---------------------------Perhaps someone reading this can help. Thank  you for writing, this is a warm and great memory.

Cruisebook pages submitted by Jack Pusel (in photo at lower right).