Fantome and Mitch Jim Carrier tells the story of The
Ship and the
Storm by using crew accounts, passenger interviews, surviving crew relatives and official weather related records. Anchored in the quiet waters of the Bay at Omoa, Honduras
passengers excitedly board the Windjammer Cruise Ship Fantome. Feted with the finest cuisine and free flowing rum swizzle the fun and excitement is just beginning as the tall ship prepares to sail from one tropical paradise to another. Two mornings later as the Fantomes’ guests finished their Bloody Mary and sticky bun breakfast a weather station on the West Coast of Africa was recording a drop in the barometric pressure. The Miami
Hurricane Center labeled the system #46 and indicated in the margin that it was impressive. One week later on the evening of October 17, 1998 while Fantome passengers partied tropical wave 46 was moving west past Barbados in the Windward
Islands. A day later the National Hurricane Center predicts that tropical wave 46 will become a hurricane. October 21st the day Fantome arrived at the island of Guanaja and Fantome passengers were still enjoying their cruise vacation. But change came the next morning and Captain Guyan March advises crew and passengers about the storm. BULLETIN: 5AM EDT SAT OCT 24, 1998. MITCH STRENGTHENS RAPIDLY INTO A HURRICANE Storm tracks in the direction of Cuba and the Cayman Islands and forecasters are calling Mitch a potentially dangerous hurricane. Fantome was at Omoa, Honduras where locals advised Captain March to drop both anchors and stay in port. March consults his boss in Miami by phone and following a prolonged discussion with Windjammer Headquarters in Miami it was decided to cancel the Fantomes’ cruise. Passenger safety was uppermost in their minds and they discharged the passengers at Belize City. They didn’t consider Belize a safe harbor to ride out the storm so Fantome with 31 crewmembers aboard left Belize to try and outmaneuver the storm. Hurricane Mitch was coming up on Swan Island and conventional wisdom as well as the National Hurricane Centers computer models predicts that the storm will turn to the northwest. Fantome headed southeast from Belize toward the Bay Islands north of Honduras and had the storm tracked to the northwest as was expected there would have been plenty of separation between the ship and the storm. But the monster storm called Mitch with a mind of its own defied convention and turned south where it continued to spin its Category 4 and sometimes 5 winds over the waters and islands destroying everything in it’s path. High winds and waves produced by the storm extended out some 200 miles from its center. Fantomes’ engines and Captain March’s skilled seamanship was no match for the tall waves and winds produced by Hurricane Mitch. Eventually the powerful waves broadside Fantome and breach the ships watertight bulkheads. The story of The Ship and the Storm is tragically compelling. Tom Barnes, author of ''''Doc Holliday’s Road to Tombstone,'''' ''''The Goring Collection,'''' and ''''The Hurricane Hunters and Lost in the Bermuda Triangle,''''
www.tombarnes39.com
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