MUKILTEO – Eating breakfast and reading the paper Friday morning, Chuck Atterson couldn’t believe the view from his waterfront condo.
“I saw a boat coming too fast into the dock,” he said.
The ferry Cathlamet hit with such force that its stern visibly rose.
Just before 6 a.m., the ferry crashed into the Mukilteo landing, destroying part of the wooden structure. Motorcycles and passengers tumbled to the deck, officials and witnesses said.
Ferry service out of Mukilteo was shut down for about six hours Friday as crews cleared debris from a ruined part of the dock, known as a dolphin.
Normally a collection of pilings standing above the water, the collapsed dolphin on Friday resembled a giant game of floating pick-up sticks. Tugboats corralled the flotsam.
A ferry worker waiting on shore ran from the landing as the big boat came barreling in, said Max Minnich, who witnessed the crash from his nearby condo.
He could hear the engines roar as the captain tried to slow the massive vessel.
“He wasn’t going just a little bit fast, he was really moving,” Minnich said.
Aboard the ferry, Jason Sydnor was first in line to drive off his motorcycle.
“I remember reaching for the bike. The bike lurched forward and fell over and drug me over with it,” he said.
The bike slid about 15 feet across the deck, Sydnor said.
“Everybody was, like, ‘What the heck just happened?’ “
No serious injures were reported, Washington State Ferries spokeswoman Susan Harris-Huether said.
Sydnor said he had back pain after the crash and was to visit a doctor Friday afternoon to have a checkup.
The 328-foot Issaquah-class vessel appeared to be traveling at excessive speed, and the Coast Guard and state ferry officials were investigating what happened, Harris-Huether said.
The collision punched a hole in the hull, but well above the water line, she said. The boat was taken to Clinton for an investigation. It is now in Everett awaiting repairs.
All members of the crew, including the captain, were tested for drugs, standard protocol in accident investigations, Harris-Huether said.
When the Issaquah-class ferries were launched in the early 1980s, there were steering problems, Washington State Ferries Capt. Pete Williams said.
Those problems were addressed, he said.
“Over the past 20-some years, they haven’t had any more issues than any other boats,” he said.
The boats have propellers in the bow and stern, he said. When docking, the bow propeller is supposed to run in reverse and act as a brake.
All the steering systems have manual backups, he said.
It was too early to tell what caused the crash Friday, he said.
Investigators will review the global-positioning system on the ferry. That tracks the vessel’s location and speed, Harris-Huether said.
On Friday, the ferry Kitsap, which shares the route with the Cathlamet, made a couple of unscheduled runs to Edmonds while the Mukilteo landing was closed.
Tim and Mary Jo Keil walked on the Kitsap in Clinton expecting to walk off in Mukilteo, where they keep a car.
When the boat changed course, they searched for another way to get to Mukilteo.
“I knew if we started asking, we’d find a ride,” Tim Keil said.
Mary Jo Keil said the infrequent inconveniences caused by ferry mishaps are part of living on Whidbey Island.
“It happens, and that’s what you come to expect,” she said.
Some people didn’t wait for ferry service to resume. They drove to the island over Deception Pass, a more than 60-mile detour through Snohomish and Skagit counties.
Others had no choice but to wait on the dock until ferry service resumed by midafternoon.
Donna Johnson, a walk-on passenger, enjoyed the sunshine, a book and an Ivar’s lunch while she waited to get back on the island.
“What are you going to do?” she said. “Being upset isn’t going to do anything.
“When you commute like this, you get used to things like this and you just deal with it.”
Ferry shuffle
Service has been restored on the Mukilteo-Clinton ferry run after Friday’s crash, but only by moving vessels around Puget Sound.
The ferry Nisqually was taken off the Port Townsend to Keystone run and sent to the San Juan Islands, leaving the Keystone route with one boat in service.
The Evergreen State was sent to Mukilteo from the San Juans. That boat was to be sent to Vashon Island Friday night and replaced on the Mukilteo run by the Issaquah, a larger boat, better suited to serve heavy weekend volumes.
The ferry that crashed, the Cathlamet, is expected to be out of service for about two weeks, officials said.
Reporter Jackson Holtz: 425-339-3437 or jholtz@heraldnet.com.
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