“Prepare For Abandon Ship”

I just got off the ferry, and this morning’s ride was slightly less than typical.

As we were nearing the middle of the Puget Sound, a voice came over the speakers:

“Would the captain of the Tacoma please come to the bridge …”

Not the biggest deal in the world, as I’ve heard this request at least a couple of times before.

About 3 minutes later, however, another voice came over the speakers, and this one said:

“Would the crew of the Tacoma please prepare for abandon ship!”

My fellow passengers and I looked at each other. Finally, a man sitting next to me said “Um, aren’t they supposed to declare this to be a drill?”

We all looked around nervously for a few moments. I tried to inject some levity into the moment by pretending to take my shoes off while saying “Fuck you guys, it’s been nice knowing you, I’m swimming for it!”, but truth be told, even I was a little concerned. After all, we were literally in the center of the Sound, and hypothermia would have killed all of us long before we could swim the 4 remaining miles to shore.

As the crew continued to rush around the ferry, we just sat there looking. Nobody said anything to us, and we were left to our own devices.

The ship kept moving forward, though, and we eventually reached port without incident.

In the bottom of the ferry, I heard rumors amongst my fellow passengers. Rumors that someone had jumped, rumors that someone had threatened to jump … frankly, I have no idea what really happened. It probably would have been appropriate to have let us in on the situation, but for whatever reason, WSDOT chose not to.

And that’s that.

So, how was your morning?