UPDATE: Boat rescue call near Alki Point

10:47 AM: Big Seattle Fire response is en route to the 3200 block of Alki SW for a report of a boat fire. Updates shortly.

(Added: Photo by Gary Jones)
10:59 AM: This is wrapping up. SFD tells us at the scene that a 12-foot boat got loose and flipped, but no one was on board.

17 Replies to "UPDATE: Boat rescue call near Alki Point "

  • mrsB December 13, 2015 (10:49 am)

    I wondered what was going on, a large number of fire trucks and rescue vehicles heading down Admiral.

  • Alki Dweller December 13, 2015 (10:51 am)

    Multiple fire trucks and response teams going down 63rd AVE.
    Hope no one is too badly hurt.

  • Katy December 13, 2015 (10:59 am)

    Seattle fire department boat, marine emergency response team, heavy response truck, 2 fire trucks, 2 medic response teams all are down here.

  • Alki Bea December 13, 2015 (11:22 am)

    Overreaction? Any way to know how many emergency vehicles responded? I saw at least 10 whiz by my window.

    • WSB December 13, 2015 (11:35 am)

      There is no such thing as an “overreaction” – if there is the possibility a life is at risk, whether a fire or rescue, the policy is to send a big response and then pull back. Lives can be lost in the time it takes to call for more backup if you send a small response and then assess. Luckily, in this case, it turned out to be something of a false alarm, but they don’t know until they get there. Some of the units that have to respond to major calls come from the other side of the bridge. – TR

  • Chu D Phat December 13, 2015 (12:15 pm)

    Totally disagree@WSB [with due respect of course :-)]…we seem to have a total lack of consistent protocol here in Seattle for such responses. Not only do the apparent knuckleheads down here love calling in bogus 911 info…balloons are someone parachuting into the Sound; a standard kayak wet-exit is someone drowning; a loose 12′ aluminum skiff (being towed at the time!) is a freaking boat fire; etc; etc…but, the SFD & SPD response is anywhere from 5 to 20 vehicles…who can’t do ANYTHING for an off-shore “emergency.” I believe this is a political phenomenon (e.g., concern for public perception of a non-response.) It’s time to get protocols in place for responses like this…just like are in place for One Alarm, Two Alarm, Three Alarm fires, etc. Oh, and some education (and/or free eye-sight exams?) for Alki waterfront residents regarding the importance of respecting the importance for accuracy of the 911-call might be might be a good idea. Frankly it’s embarrassing down here–to the point where us paddle boarders, swimmers, kayakers etc joke about getting hand-held “I’m OKAY!!!” signs for while we’re off-shore of Me Kwa Mooks Park and Rocky Beach/Alki Point :-)
    Thanks for the great coverage and public forum @WSB. Cheers

  • Greenlakeslover December 13, 2015 (2:15 pm)

    I’m the one that called in the report and the one you are denigrating for lack of judgement. For your information I reported only what I saw which was an unmanned boat floating off Constellation Park– no more, no less. The words “boat fire” were never used. You give the impression that you think nothing bad can happen on the water, and for your sake I hope that bears out. Unfortunately for others there have been tragic accidents/deaths involving capsized boats in the very same area and in similar weather conditions as today.

    • WSB December 13, 2015 (2:35 pm)

      Here’s one such deadly incident: https://westseattleblog.com/2013/11/coast-guard-helping-boat-in-trouble-off-south-alki
      .
      And yes, shore crews ARE of use in offshore incidents, in a variety of ways. One of the units dispatched today, for example, was the Marine Emergency Response Team.
      .
      Meantime, also note that a 911 caller certainly has no control over how the information she/he provided is used. In this case, we reported “boat fire callout” based on SFD’s real-time automated log – see the 10:38 am call.
      .
      http://www2.cityofseattle.net/fire/realTime911/getRecsForDatePub.asp?action=Today&incDate=&rad1=des
      .
      Even when a call turns out not to be what it was originally dispatched as, the designation on that log seldom changes from the original label. (We updated our report as soon as we could speak to a supervisor at the scene – which we rushed to from The Junction, soon as we saw the units go by westbound on Alaska and checked the log.) The only change you can count on, on the log, is the color of the callout line – it’s “green” until there is no longer any SFD unit still assigned to the call, at which time it is “closed” and everything turns blue. This sometimes confuses people because even if 10 units were dispatched and 9 of them dismissed before they ever reached the scene, so long as that one last unit is on the case, the entire line with all 10 original units will still show green.
      .
      TR

  • JanS December 13, 2015 (3:11 pm)

    Imagine you are on that 12 ft. overturned boat…is the callout an over reaction? Because we know that if you’re on a boat you have a life jacket on…right? So, the water is cold…you can swim…right? Just because there was no harm today doesn’t mean there wouldn’t be tomorrow. So..please think before you post about overreactions, just because your life was maybe inconvenienced by the callout. Geez !

  • Mel December 13, 2015 (3:18 pm)

    My guess is that there was more than one 911 call, and another caller overreacted or was unclear (poor eyesight, thought they saw smoke?).
    .
    In any case, there is a pattern emerging of much larger than necessary service turnouts. However, that’s likely because one single call that is less than necessary causes havoc in the media.

    • WSB December 13, 2015 (3:34 pm)

      My suspicion? Contrarians are just spoiling for a fight here. But instead of getting back to the Christmas lights, I’ll bite. No, this isn’t a pattern. This is how rescue/fire calls have been dispatched for as long as we’ve been doing this (8+ years now). But anyone who truly believes something is being done wrong has a variety of options:
      .
      (1) File a complaint and/or ask a question – you can start here: http://www.seattle.gov/fire/contact/contactForm.asp
      .
      (2) Contact the fire chief (Harold Scoggins)
      .
      (3) Write to your new city councilmember (lisa.herbold@seattle.gov) and/or the chair of the Public Safety Committee (bruce.harrell@seattle.gov) – don’t know if he will still be chairing that committee when they make new assignments after the first of the year, but it’s his committee right now
      .
      As for anyone being inconvenienced – this was a relatively short call. Road partly blocked for maybe half an hour absolute max, right at the Alki Point bend.
      .
      P.S. If you’re really interested in what SFD does and why/how the department does it, here’s their 2014 overview, including the amount of times the marine emergency unit was called out citywide. http://www.seattle.gov/fire/deptinfo/AnnualReport/EmergencyResponseReport2014.pdf
      .
      P.P.S. You can look up 911 logs for each day going back about a decade, from http://seattle.gov/fire – after finding a rescue incident (diver at Seacrest) in 2008, I went back to look up the # of units dispatched. 13 http://www2.seattle.gov/fire/realtime911/getRecsForDatePub.asp?incDate=11%2F01%2F2008&rad1=des comparable to today’s dispatch

  • JanS December 13, 2015 (3:23 pm)

    @Chu D Phat…..many of us have no idea what a kayak wet-exit is. Many of us out here only see what we see…an over turned boat, etc. Go ahead and get a sign if that gives you a chuckle. Next time you’re really in trouble, and no one calls it in, good luck with that. We’re so sorry you’ve been inconvenienced in the past. Us “chuckleheads” out here have fine eyesight….we see you out there paddleboarding with no life vest. We see you laughing at us because we’re such an embarrassment. Might we suggest Golden Gardens as your next destination? Oh, and if you have studied this enough to know better, here’s a thought…go get the job, and you do the callout protocol. And, lastly, maybe an apology to Greelakeslover for portraying them as an idiot….way to go !

  • JanS December 13, 2015 (3:25 pm)

    Hey, Mel…next time your house is on fire and they send one measly truck, let is know how it turns out, mmmK? The people in my community are truly amazing…some in a good way, some, sometimes not.

  • miws December 13, 2015 (4:06 pm)

    The only pattern I’ve noticed, is in recent months there seem to be more and more commenters think that SFD is “overreacting”, and among those, that still don’t get it, after WSB, or other commenters, for the millionth time (yes, I know that not everyone reads every story and comment, and that new readers are likely coming on board all the time), point out the reason for large callouts. Plus, even more recently the “it’s an overreaction” camp coming back to argue the point of the necessity of the callout, when the reason is pointed out (again) in the individual stories.

    .

    Mike

  • Katy December 13, 2015 (6:20 pm)

    I saw the 911 response map and interpreted it as the fire department responding to a boat incident, if you re read it knowing there wasn’t a fire, you may interpret it as such too. This leads me to agree that there probably wasn’t an over reaction – the people calling in the incident are concerned residents who probably have perfectly good vision, and the wording used was probably just because the response map can only use limited characters. I appreciate the quick response of the fire department, especially since it could have been a lot worse of an incident (people could have been on the boat)

  • Lifelong WS December 13, 2015 (8:27 pm)

    As a life long Resident of west seattle I can tell You these types of responses are relatively new.
    I Don’t mind the overreaction as much as leaving another part of the city vulnerable. Ask a retired SFD person if this has always been the norm.

  • sc December 14, 2015 (7:43 am)

    I am just thankful for fire fighters “who run in when others run out”.

Sorry, comment time is over.