SSS Tsunami 678

The selection of Sea Scout Ship Tsunami as 2011 National Flagship was announced at the Nor' Wester Regional Regatta on April 17. Tsunami applied for the title in March, based on activities completed during the 2010 calendar year. This award means Tsunami will be the representative for Sea Scout ships in the United States. Several adults, youth leaders, and possibly the whole crew will be travelling to San Diego, CA near the end of May to attend a presentation ceremony. Boat US is the main sponsor of the national flagship award.

On an equally important note, Tsunami was awarded Clipper Class and took second place in the Nor' Wester regatta. The entire crew has been holding regular practices for several months to prepare for the event.

Congratulations to the crew, officers, and committee for helping make both of these fine accomplishments.

Sea Scout Ship Tsunami cruised from the Portland Sea Scout Base to Oregon City/Willamette Falls from march 4th to 6th. The ship was joined by SSS Dolphin Too, who cruised on their motor vessel Odyssey.

The waters of the upper Willamette were a new challenge to the members of Tsunami who are used to the wide and comparably slower waters of the Columbia. This was the ships first overnight cruise since starting to fuel Tidal wave with bio diesel. The engine seems to be running well.

At the quartermaster ball on February 26th, Sea Scout Ship Tsunami was named the Cascade Pacific Council Flagship based on activities during the 2010 year. The commodore remarked on Tsunami's commitment to the Cascade Pacific fleet, and the ship's attendance of all fleet activities.

Sea Scout Ship Tsunami's first quartermaster, Reed Calkins, was presented with the award at the quartermaster ball on February 26th. Reed Has been a member of Tsunami since February of 2009 and served as boatswain of the ship for one and a half years until reaching the rank of quartermaster.

Having the position of boatswain open, ship petty officer positions have made a couple of changes: Dakota Tumlinson is now the ships's boatswain, & Scott Maxfield the boatswain's mate.

Sea Scout

Advanced

Leadership 

Training

Early this November, members from tsunami traveled to Scouter's Mountain near Clackamas, Oregon for SALT Training. The large group of sea scouts at the event participated in a high ropes course then traveled to the Clackamas aquatics center for an intro to SCUBA class, and practice with full sized life rafts in the wave pool. The event was closed with a dress uniform dinner at the Scouter's Mountain mess hall.

This Year, SSS Tsunami Cruised from the Portland, OR Sea Scout Base to Arlington, OR on their motor vessel Tidal Wave. The cruise lasted for 10 days. The crew made stops at Cascade Locks, the Dalles, Hood River, Marysville (WA), and a boater's recreation area on the John Day River.

Significant highlights from the trip included catching a very big catfish, exploring an uninhabited island, and climbing a mountain. On the second to last day, very large seas and wind were encountered near hood river.

Only minutes from returning home, the crew of Tsunami learned an important lesson after being stranded on a submerged rock for over an hour. Efforts to escape by using the vessel's anchor to pull off failed. Thankfully, some very kind vessel assist employees helped Tsunami out of the situation, free of charge.

Despite a the occasional challenge along the way, Long Cruise proved to be a very valuable learning experience for everyone involved.

Midway through August, 2010, the crew of Tsunami participated in the annual Cascade Pacific Council Regatta at Sand Island, OR.

The First event was a 55 mile sail race from Portland to Sand Island. The following day, members competed in events testing their proficiency in seamanship skills.

The event provided many opportunities for new crew members to get a feeling for regatta competition.

The last week has seen many improvements in the appearance and functionality of our power vessel, Tidal Wave. Mr. Sutton has been working hard to paint almost every surface on the boat. New deck paint, wall paint, interior, helm varnish, it's all being fixed up and it is looking awesome so far.

At Tuesday's meeting, the crew started work on a new sound system and stereo installation. We also Improved the chains that support the crew's bunks by using new chain, and eliminated un-needed chain on the bottom. The bunks function much better now, and we are working on getting all new mattresses/pads for them; something the crew has all been waiting for (We currently have 40-50 year old bunk pads that are deteriating and are damaged).

Today, the Skipper, Boatswain, and Engineer (Mr. Fogle) attached new rails to the stern of Tidal Wave. The welding, grinding, and cutting were worth it, to see a much better structure develop. The crew will no longer need to climb over those horrible bars to exit the stern, and there is even a new flagpole integrated into the rails for displaying colors while docked or moored.

The leadership of Tsunami is extremely pleased to see Tidal wave exit the construction fase and begin to be finished up and fine tuned. Keep up the good work, Tsunami Crew!

This spring, our older Cascade 29 sailboat was swapped for another Cascade 29 in the fleet that is in much better condition. It is the youngest Cascade 29 in the fleet this will be invaluable to our sailing program, as any maintnance needed will be minor, where our older sailboat had a rotting structure and inoperable hardware.

We have already been sailing a few times this summer, and the new sailboat is working great!

This weekend (July 24-26), five youth members and two adults traveled to Cathlamet to tow back a sailboat that was donated to the fleet. We departed Friday on Tidal Wave, and made it to Sand Island before docking for the night.

We got up early Saturday and travelled the rest of the distance to Cathlamet. We spent some time exploring the town and eating lunch. We departed the harbor around noon with sailboat in tow. We spent Saturday night at the St. Helens dock after hours of continuous travel. We made it back Sunday, early enough to clean up the sailboat and participate in the sail race that afternoon.

This trip was an excellent opportunity for the crew onboard. We all learned a lot about river navigation, especially at night. A system for managing shifts was also developed, which worked quite well.

Crew from Tsunami and several other units traveled to Government Island to practice using emergency flares and signals. Coast Guard volunteers rode on the reliant with the scouts to the East dock, where we tied up.

All the scouts had opportunities to fire and display floating/handheld smoke flares, hand flares, flare guns, and parachute flares. Launching the parachute flares could be described as launching an RPG from your hand.

After we all fired smoke flares at the same time, one of the Coast Guardsmen received a phone call from a dispatcher. Someone on the Washington shore had called 911 and reported a barge on fire in the river. Of course, this barge was the dock we were standing on.

The new cabin is on and the boat has a crew area with a galley and 9 bunks.  The Officers Ward Room has 2 bunks there as well.  There is still plenty of room to create other sleeping areas.

We are now working on interior lighting.

Mr. Fogle has worked very hard on the engine and we now can travel in excess of 12 knots.