Survivors, barely

It started out as a safe and uneventful ride home. It nearly ended in death.

Shaw islanders Eric Hawley and Gwen Lowry brought their boat over to be serviced at Orcas Island’s West Sound Marina the morning of Oct. 23, then climbed into their eight-foot motorized dinghy and headed home.

It seemed like a sure bet. Hawley and Lowry live at Broken Bay, on the north end of Shaw, and a straight shot from the marina. When they began their return trip, the winds were calm, and the waves virtually non-existent.

But old-timers will tell you that the weather can change in an instant, and two-thirds of the way back, a wave swamped their boat, throwing the pair into the water.

Eric and Gwen tried to right the boat, but when that proved impossible, they they had to swim for shore. But which shore? Eric looked in the direction of the Orcas ferry landing, which appeared to be nearby, then turned and spotted a house in the vicinity at the top of a steep incline. They decided to head for that house.

The pair had their life jackets on, but they weren’t making much progress swimming, and the icy waters were starting to take their toll. Gwen was having a terrible time. “I felt I wasn’t getting anywhere,” she said.

Eric, who is much bigger than his wife, not only began to pull her toward shore, he also kept offering comforting words.

His efforts weren’t doing much good, however. “Initially, I was too numb to panic,” Gwen said, “then it turned to sheer terror.”

After about 10 minutes in the water, Eric noticed that he was still a long way from shore. Gwen was in the early stages of hypothermia, and beginning to lose consciousness.

But then -- miracle of miracles -- the wind turned. “It helped blow us to shore,” Eric said.

They were then at the bottom of this cliff, still a long ways from the warmth and comfort of the house they hoped to reach. Neither could stand and, worse, Gwen was dizzy and only semi-conscious. “My legs were totally numb,” Eric recalled, “and I was exhausted form swimming.”

But being unable to walk wouldn’t deter them from reaching that house. So they crawled, and crawled, with Eric pulling himself and his wife from tree to tree. Halfway up the steep incline, they found a deer trail which eventually brought them to the property line.

But getting into the house was still no sure thing. In front of them stood a forbidding-looking fence. So they crawled some more, until they came across a gate, opened it, and entered the yard.

Eric was determined to get into the house no matter what. He was even prepared to grab a rock and throw it through a window. First, however, he beat on the door. When nobody answered, he turned the knob. The door opened.

Eric immediately called 911, and began by telling dispatch, “We just broke into a house.” They then climbed into the shower, clothes and all. Unfortunately, the shower didn’t produce much warm water, and when they were done they grabbed as many towels as they could find to dry themselves off.

The house belongs to Orcas islanders Duncan and Kat Taylor. The Taylors weren’t home, but neighbor Bob Nutt, an Emergency Medical Technician with the Orcas Island Fire Department, was in the vicinity. Nutt heard dispatch send out word about the couple, including the address of the house where they were located. Eric and Gwen didn’t know it, but the new E-911 system provided essential help by flashing the address on the dispatcher’s screen.

Nutt immediately got in his truck and raced over to the Taylors’ house, bringing blankets and hot compresses. A few minutes later the AID unit arrived, checked out the couple, and determined that they didn’t need to be taken to the clinic or a nearby hospital. “He was OK, and the lady was shivering, but they were not suffering from severe hypothermia,” Nutt said.

Gwen was told that her shivering was good news. She found the diagnosis hard to believe.

Emergency Medical Technician Maureen Crowe, who arrived with the AID unit, then transported the couple in her car to her house, put their clothes in the drier, gave them hot tea and lunch, warmed them up, and took them to the ferry back to Shaw. Orcas EMS division chief Dave Zoeller said Crowe’s action was just the latest of many examples of a volunteer acting “above and beyond the call of duty.”

Still another who made it to the Taylors’ house was Sheriff’s Deputy Herb Crowe (no relation to Maureen), who determined that no crime had been intended.

Late that afternoon the Taylors arrived home, where they found a pile of used towels on the bathroom floor. My first thought was, “That’s odd,” Duncan said. But then Kat spotted a note from Deputy Crowe explaining what happened.

The next day Eric and Gwen got a phone call. It was Kat. Gwen wondered if Kat would chastise them for breaking into their home, and they were overwhelmed and pleased, as well as a bit embarrassed, by her warm and friendly tone. “I want everybody to feel that my house is a haven,” Kat told them. For that matter, the pair couldn’t believe how friendly and helpful everybody on Orcas had been.

The first few days back were terrifying ones for Eric and Gwen, who had trouble sleeping, and couldn’t stop thinking about how close they had come to dying. “I kept thinking that we almost didn’t take our life jackets,” Gwen said. She also thought about being unable to use the couple’s cell phone, because they failed to put it in a plastic bag. And she vowed that she and her husband will never venture more than a few feet from shore in their dinghy, even on a bright summer day. Her advice to other boaters? “Don’t be as stupid as we were.”

And what was Duncan Taylor thinking? “We missed all the excitement,” he said.

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