Customer Reviews

Burning Cold: The Cruise Ship Prinsendam and the Greatest Sea Rescue of all Time

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4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I was there, as were several of my fellow Sitka Fire Department EMT's and State Troopers from the Sitka Academy. The 6 of us, along with two parajumpers from the Canadian Armed Services were flown through the typhoon winds, on a helicopter, out to the Williamsburgh where we spent the next 33 hours attending to the rescued passengers - literally giving them the clothes off our backs and keeping them calmed. We knew there was a doctor onboard, from Anchorage, but we literally never met or saw him - I'm sure he did good work in the little clinic he had set up - but that is where he stayed. The real story was out in the rest of the ship that weekend. But I was disappointed to see that Mr. Jeffers failed to fully research this book - the role the Sitka rescue teams played (both on the Williamsburgh and trying to assess/fight the fire on the Prinsendam) was totally overlooked - despite the fact that there is a lot of documentation available that tells our story - which was the human side & had some quite amusing moments in the face of this event. I was so looking forward to this book and then to find out he left a large part of the story out, was very sad. At least we all have our commendations from both the Coast Guard commendant and the Canadian armed services - they knew we were there! Too bad Mr. Jeffers didn't due diligence.

Initial glaring error creats many questions of Authors research, facts, and credibility. Considerable space is given to an "Admiral" Richard Schoel, USCG, including a full page quote following the Table of Contents. The "Admiral" of the Seventeenth Coast Guard District during the PRINSENDAM incident was Rear Admiral Richard J. Knapp, who is not even mentioned in the book. As Commanding Officer of the Coast Guard Marine Safety Office in Valdez, Alaska, I worked closely with Admiral Knapp throughout this incident, including matters involving use of the T/V WILLIAMSBURGH as a rescue platform, and then return of the survivors to Valdez. The Admiral was the key person representing the Coast Guard in this rescue and deserves full mention and credit. Numerous other errors in personnel rank, title, and areas of responsibility exist.

Additionally, no mention or credit is given of the major decision by the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company to allow the fully loaded T/V WILLIAMSBURGH to return their terminal. This was no small undertaking.

Not allowing the PRINSENDAM to be towed into sheltered waters of the State of Alaska was a major decision of Commander, Jake Jacoby, Commanding Officer of the Marine Safety Office, Juneau, Alaska.

Award ceremonies were held throughout Alaska by Admiral Knapp, including bringing the CGC BOUTWELL to Valdez to serve as a "Platform" for the citizens of that area. A little effort might have been made toward listing the persons receiving these awards.

James K. Woodle, Commander, USCG (Retired)

While the author obviously has done an enormous amount of research on the Prinsendam fire and subsequent sinking, he has totally ignored any and all statements and accounts of the Prinsendam's crew members. I am sure that there would have been many that would like to put the record straight after 25 years. The author is relying too much on press articles and passenger interviews while the official inquiry results of the Dutch Shipping Inspectorate are barely mentioned The book is also full of inaccuracies as to emergency operations on board a passenger ship.

For those readers interested in the disaster and rescue efforts as seen through the eyes of the rescue organizations involved, this book will be very entertaining.

A very interesting tale of hundreds of elderly passengers trapped on a burning cruise ship in the Gulf of Alaska was the tale was marred by the author obviously just dumping in material from his primary sources. Also, it would have been interesting to more closely follow one of now famous entertainers on board, Yanni, as well as have more detail on the firefighting efforts by the crew and Coast Guard.

H. Paul Jeffers has an interesting story to tell has clearly spent some time assembling interviews and a mound of factual information. The missing link here is his ability to weave this into a compelling narrative.

Mr. Jeffers will string together a couple of intruiging pages and then bore you with a page and a half of "lists", like listing EVERY post that the Comanendant of the Coast Gaurd had in his career. In an effort to introduce the characters, Jeffers spends about 4 pages just basically listing them down for you. This is not "character development" as we would know it from a more accomplished author.

Jeffers also has a very annoying habit of constantly drawing analogies to two repeating themes: Classic Old Movies and Moby Dick. He mentiones Moby Dick so many times it makes you think its the only nautical book he's ever read. His persistent penchant to try to draw parallels between a Gulf of Alaska Sea Disaster and the Classic Movies of Yore I found aggrevating beyond description. He'll be telling you about the fire supression system and then sudendly you get a page on Fred Astair and Ginger Rodgers gliding across the dance from from such-and-such movie. Arrggg!

I was able to make it through the book, with some effort. It's an amazing story and one worth reading, I just wish it had been written by a better author. I'm currently reading "The Ship and the Storm" by Jim Carrier. Now THAT'S a guy who knows how to tell a story!

This book gives you the knowledge to understand what happened when this boat sank. I was on the prior sailing and it is odd to read about the boat actually sinking following week.

I bought the book because I just found out a friend who I had known for several years was on the Prinsendam when it went down. Although she wasn't quoted herself, there were numerous quotes from her traveling companion, and it was fun to sit down with her and find out what was accurate and what wasn't. And yes, despite being on a sinking cruise ship and having to be rescued from a lifeboat in rough seas, she's been on numerous cruises since.

The parts about the book sinking were interesting, but when the author mentioned something related to the incident, such as the Coast Guard, he tended to give their entire history--those parts are easy to skip because they were "filler".

This book must have been written and reviewed by a travel editor. Any author with even minimal nautical experience would not have made the multitude of mistakes throughout the manuscript. Still, this author's mediocre effort can in no way diminish the epic rescue performed by the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Air Force and Canadian air crews off Sitka during October of 1980.

A very interesting tale of disaster at sea. An enjoyable read with a few technical errors. Having been involved in this event as a member of the U. S. Coast Guard in Juneau at the time of the disaster I was very interested in the story. Overall a very good job on the part of the author.

The Story Of The Prinsedam is one that was long overdue. As the only Nurse onboard the Prinsedam as it caught Fire and Sank I would have greatly enjoyed sharing my accounts of what happened on that day to Mr. Jeffers. The Story is still very intriguing, swaying here and there from the truth. Overall I enjoyed reading about an event in my life that makes a really great story.