Date: Feb 24, 2017
Trip #13 (#33)Weather: Scorchingly hot
Waters: Calm out west
On board: C, A, J1, J2, R
Another day out, and we were looking forward to it. The last time we had been on the boat, it had been days before Christmas, and we hadn't even gone out to sea. We had booked a berth in the marina to celebrate Christmas on board.
The trip out west (towards Puteri Cove, Johor) had started out without incident. Then, while we were in the channel, a high-pitched beep sounded. This is what C saw on the dash: Sensor fault.
The beep stopped soon after, but we continued our way. The beep was to sound twice more, each time squealing thrice, and then stopping. Subsequent times, instead of "Sensor fault", the dial gave an oil pressure reading.
Then the LW2 stalled. The engine just cut on its own and we were adrift, right on the edge of the Singapore Armed Forces live-firing area. (No, we didn't hear firing going on then. It was around 3pm.) The engine refused to fire up again.
C called Eric of SG Boating, but he wasn't picking up his phone. We called Raffles Marina, but they said they "couldn't" send any boat to tow us back to the marina "if the boat wasn't within line of sight of the marina". Another call was made to SG Boating's office, but the connection was bad and the person on the other end couldn't hear C. The thought did occur to us to call the Police Coast Guard for a tow, as it wasn't at all wise to hang out in those waters.
After a few minutes, the engine could be restarted. We moved beyond the live-firing area and dropped anchor.
Finally, we got Eric on the line, and he advised us to take a slow drive back to the marina, and not to gun the engine beyond 2,000 rpm.
We figured that since we were already out there and it was a pleasant-enough afternoon, we would just float and do our usual weekend relaxing thing board. After some beers, music and conversation - J1 went to sleep because the dramamine from a Japanese pharmacy was working too well - we made tracks back for the marina.
A couple of brahminy kites circled overhead, squawking loudly. We did agree that for a majestic raptor like that, its call sounded decidedly unmajestic.
The trip back was uneventful, though it was the slowest we have ever gone on the boat, which had just come out of its annual servicing just before the Chinese New Year. So did some wiseacre not put back the parts properly? This baby is less than a year old.
It's back to the workshop, I guess.
