News & Views for Southern Sailors - Southwinds Magazine

A Strange Tale from the PastBy Morgan StinemetzBob Hite, the news anchor atNews Channel Eight inTampa, came to Florida in1977 from Philadelphia. One ofthe reasons had to do with weather.Hite had just finished doing a“live shot” by an expressway assleet and snow made traffic nightmarish.He was back at the studiothawing out when a call came infrom Joe Manion, the news directorat Channel Eight. Would Hitelike to come to Tampa and anchorthe news there?He would. He did. And hebrought with him his cedar-overoakCrocker 44-foot ketch,Kinship, his pride, his passion. Hesettled in Apollo Beach, his boatat a dock behind his house. Thefact that he was able to sail whenit pleased him was not lost on afamily friend, who wrote Hite aletter that said, “I envy you yourfuture as well as your presentwith the Kinship in your (back)yard and 12 months of sailingevery year. Where did I go wrong?”The letter was signed: WalterCronkite.By 1991 Hite’s life had becomeso full of professional responsibilitiesthat he decided to close the windowKinship had occupied. He put theboat up for sale and, after trying tosell it himself with no success, listedit with Sarasota yacht broker MikeBurgess. Kinship was brought toSarasota where Burgess fell in lovewith the boat himself. He wanted tobuy it, but he didn’t have the moneyto do it outright.On the night of January 19, 1992,a Sunday, Mike Burgess took Kinshipand five other people out BigSarasota Pass on a trip to the DryTortugas. It was an awful night tobegin a voyage. The winds wereblowing 20-25 knots from the northwest.Waves in Big Pass were fourfeet. Burgess, who died in 1995, wasnot an experienced mariner. Anexperienced mariner would not haveattempted to leave on a 180-mile tripin the dark and in bad weather.It is possible that leaving afterdark held a particular cachet forBurgess for other reasons. The boathe was taking to the Dry Tortugasdidn’t belong to him. He knew that.It belonged to Hite, and Hite had noknowledge of Burgess’ trip.Burgess had not gone far whenhe grounded Kinship well inshore ofthe Big Pass sea buoy. The boat drewsix feet. Once it was stuck, the windand the waves pushed it higher onthe sand bar. By the time commercialhelp voluntarily went to Kinship’said, easily 90 minutes after the boathad grounded because Burgess hadtried to get help from other sources,Kinship was going nowhere.Danny McMakin, who wasworking for Offshore MarineTowing back then, said, “When Igot there, it was five minutes past10. The boat was heavily on thebar, leaning to starboard, withwaves breaking over the boat. Itried to pull the boat off with my22-foot Aquasport. I couldn’t evenbudge it.”The Coast Guard had beencalled by McMakin with a“Mayday” and had dispatched aboat. However, when anotherboat from Offshore MarineTowing arrived to take the sixpeople off the boat, the CoastGuard cancelled its response. TheCoast Guard is not required torespond to save property fromdestruction. With McMakinwatching, Kinship sank.It took two weeks forOffshore Marine Towing to cut theboat apart and put it, piece bybeautifully crafted piece, into aDumpster. The salvors startedwith the fuel tanks to prevent anyfuel spills. Kinship, Hite’s dream, wasgone. He had seen her for the lasttime from the beach at Siesta Key.The boat, he said, “…was hundredsof feet out of the channel.”I interviewed Burgess about theincident in March of 1992. He wasless than forthcoming. “We are obviouslyinvolved in insurance proceduresand all that,” he said. “I reallydon’t need any speculation.” That’sall he would say.But Burgess identified himself tothe salvors as the owner of the boat,Ken Randall of Offshore MarineTowing said. He assured Randall, atthe wreck site, that his insurancecompany would take care of anyexpenses. The trouble was thatBurgess didn’t have any insuranceSee STRANGE TALE continued on page 76Have an interesting story?That’s funny, sad, a tear-jerker, a learning experience, heartwarming—or just a good story?Send to editor@southwindsmagazine.com.78 October 2006 SOUTHWINDS www.southwindsmagazine.com