Treacherous Coastline and Dedicated Coast Guard - Columbia Maritime Museum

On Friday, we visited the Columbia Maritime Museum. We had looked up information on TripAdvisor about top things to do in Astoria, and this was one of the listed attractions. At $14 for adults and $12 for seniors, it was a bit on the pricey side of the attractions we choose to visit, but...  we decided to go ahead - and we were very happy with the "investment"!

The museum is right down along the Columbia River.

Columbia Maritime Museum

One of the first items in the museum is a map that shows where vessels have sunk...

Each of the small boat symbols is the location of a wreck.

For some of the wrecks you can push a button next to the vessel's name and it will show up with a light on the map.

Another list of some of the ships lost to the Graveyard of the Pacific

The Columbia River

"Each year, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers removes enough sand to fill 500,000 dump trucks -- 5 to 6 million cubic yards."

 Coast Guard information:

"A Specially Hazardous Area"

"... lifeboat crews have rescued an average of 600 people a year on the lower Columbia River alone."

From http://columbiariverimages.com/Regions/Places/cape_disappointment_coast_guard.html :

U.S. Coast Guard Station Cape Disappointment, located at the eastern shore of Cape Disappointment, is the largest Coast Guard search and rescue station along the Northwest Coast. It has (in 2006) 50 assigned crewmembers. Commonly known as Station Cape "D", the crew responds to 300 to 400 calls for assistance every year. The busiest time in between early June to mid-September when numerous recreational boaters cross the Columbia River entrance in search of salmon and other fish.

"... they are equally involved in preventing disasters before they start."

An example of a rescue boat inside the museum.

Hmmm... is this a warning sign for the river or for the area of drinking establishments in town???

Several early explorers missed the mouth of the Columbia River. Robert Gray found the Columbia in May of 1792.

To deal with this "Rough Bar", one thought was that a jetty could be built to decrease the opening with the hope that the river's flow would cause sediment to be spilled on out beyond the mouth of the river.

"... constant wave action moving stones weighing up to 25 tons damaged the jetties..."

"With today's larger ships, a draft depth of 54 feet on the Bar is needed to transit safely and is maintained by dredging on a regular basis."  (The photo referenced is just below:)

When we were at the Astoria Column and saw the ship going out under the bridge, it emphasized to us that the main channel runs along the south shore of the river.

There was also information in the museum about the fishing industry in this area...

For my readers who are fishermen or fisherwomen, you might want to be aware of these 10 things that are supposed to bring good luck (or prevent bad luck) when fishing!

From back when we were watching barges go through locks on the Mississippi, I had wondered about Towboats versus Tugboats. "If it pushes barges up and down the Columbia, it's a towboat. If it guides large ships in and out of harbor and helps them dock, or pulls vessels on the ocean, it's a tugboat. Towboats and tugboats are essential to safe navigation of the Columbia River waterway. These small but incredibly powerful boats can tow tens of thousands of tons at a time, and push vessels that are 500 times their own weight."

Some of the types of tugboats

We watched a video while we were in the museum about the River pilots and bar pilots who join the ship for part of its journey (you might find information at this link interesting: http://shipreport.net/).

Notice the Japanese characters on the side of this boat...

Information about the Japanese boat!

Outside the museum the Lightship Columbia is tied up and accessible for tours.

The Lightship Columbia

A lightship is a floating lighthouse, used where navigation aid is needed but lighthouse construction is not feasible. The Lightship Columbia was replaced by an automated navigational buoy on November 2, 1979 and decommissioned after 29 years of service.

The light ship has a main and standby beacon, as well as fog horn and radio antennas.

"A rare photograph of Columbia in rough seas and high winds. Winds of 60 knots and waves 30 feet high were common in winter months. Seasickness was a regular occurrence when the weather was at its worst. Columbia weathered 29 years of rain, wind, and waves before being retired in 1979."

 I have to admit - I thought folks who were on the seas all the time were somehow immune to seasickness, or they wouldn't do that job. I can't imagine having a job where seasickness was a normal part of life - UGH!

RVers know about "Navy showers"!

I had to take a picture of this -- one of the things we deal with in Miss Doozie is that the refrigerator doors and freezer drawer comes open during travel. We have various techniques to keep them closed, but nothing quite as robust as this! I think the locks on it may be an addition after the boat became a tourist attraction, but I suspect that there were some sort of bars across the doors when it was in operation as well.

We thoroughly enjoyed the Columbia Maritime Museum and would recommend it to others. (Note: we did not pay for the additional movie which, at the time we visited, was on hurricanes.)