What started as a quick daytime excursion to Mount Kineo by Grayson Ross, 37, his girlfriend, Susan Mullin, 31, both of Brooklyn, N.Y., and Susan’s parents, Charlie Mullin, 61, and Judy Mullin, 60, of Pittsburgh, Pa., ended when the 95 horsepower motor on their small boat failed and a wet cold front quickly left them helpless in hurricanelike conditions.

“It [the lake] was an ocean, it was the worst I’d ever seen it,” Game Warden Adam Gormely recalled Thursday. Gormely and other wardens from the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife searched for hours Wednesday afternoon and evening to find the missing boaters, but had to give up when it appeared the warden’s boat might become swamped by the 7- to 8-foot waves. There were just “walls of water” crashing down on the boat, he said. The conditions exceeded the capability of the boat, Gormely said.

Miraculously, the 17-foot boat Ross and the Mullins were traveling in had washed close enough to land to allow Ross to jump into the frigid water and pull the boat around the rocky shoreline and onto the shore. There, the foursome spent the night huddled together for warmth under a tarp in the boat.

The vacationers were spotted from the air Thursday about a mile south of Casey’s Camps near Spencer Bay in the eastern part of the lake. Ross and the Mullins were taken by boat to Beaver Cove Marina where an ambulance waited to take them to Charles A. Dean Memorial Hospital in Greenville. Shaking with cold, the four boaters were provided warm blankets, were examined and then released.

“We didn’t realize how cold we were,” Judy Mullin said Thursday, adding that she was thankful for everything everyone did to help them.

They were lucky individuals, say wardens. “The potential for them perishing in that thing was extremely high,” Sgt. Roger Guay said Thursday. Ross and the Mullins did everything correctly — they remained together and in the boat — which helped wardens help them, he said.

Ross and his party had left at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday under sunny skies and mild conditions for the trip to Kineo. A regular seasonal visitor to the Moosehead Lake region where his father maintains a cottage and a boat, Ross said he was familiar with the area and weather. It was the elder Mullins’ first trip to Maine and Ross wanted them to see Kineo. “It was just going to be a quick tour,” he said.

The water was like glass that morning as they traveled in his father’s boat to Kineo where they took some photos, Ross recalled. When they reached the back side of the mountain, however, the boaters noticed that the wind had picked up. Then at about 11:30 a.m. the boat’s motor started sputtering and eventually stalled. Thinking the problem might be in the gasoline tank, Ross poured the gasoline into another tank, but the motor still would not start.

Using a cellphone, Ross called Beaver Cove Marina and left a message on an answering machine that his boat was disabled. Next, he dialed 911 and reached the Maine State Police and told them he thought he was stranded near Deer Island on Moosehead Lake. The state police notified the Piscataquis County Sheriff’s Department and the Maine Warden Service, which initiated a search near Deer Island and Sugar Island. Actually, the boaters were four miles to the northeast of Deer Island near Stevens Point.

“At that point, we were drifting pretty close to shore and there were a lot of rocks,” Ross said. “We could see rocks everywhere — we did have enough power to raise the engine.” He said he jumped into the water to ferry the boat safely to shore with Charlie Mullin’s help.

Ross said he knew his friends Cathy Sweetser and Jock Moore would be aware something was wrong. Ross had borrowed a vehicle from the couple to get his father's boat into the water. Later, they learned that along with the wardens, the couple also was out in the choppy water searching for them.

By 5:30 p.m. the foursome knew that the bad weather would prevent anyone from assisting them that night, so they hunkered down. They all were wearing long pants, and either a fleece vest or windbreaker, but had no food with them. Recognizing that it was fruitless to try to start a fire in the rain and howling wind, they remained under a tarp in the boat, pulled out the chairs, put on flotation devices and covered their feet with plastic bags for warmth.

"We couldn't really get too comfortable," Ross said. The group kept their spirits up by talking and laughing. They also took pictures of themselves in their predicament. No one panicked, and they prayed that they would make it through the night.

Sometime during the night, Ross thought he saw lights to the northwest. He turned his spotlight on and off, but got no response.

When morning arrived, Ross and the younger Mullin walked up the shore where they managed to make a cellphone connection with Sweetser, who notified wardens. Within 10 minutes of that call, Ross said, they saw an aircraft fly over and tip its wings to indicate they had been spotted.

"Was that a sight for sore eyes," the elder Mullin said. Soon after, three motorboats carrying wardens arrived. Terry Hughes, a warden service diver, jumped into the water in his wet suit and swam to shore to make sure the party was OK. He then led them down the shoreline to a spot where they could be rescued safely.

"I had complete faith that the good Lord who allowed us to get there would get us out," Judy Mullin said. "We are really, really very thankful."
"This content originally appeared as a copyrighted article in the Friday, September 13, 2002 edition of the Bangor Daily NEWS and is used here with permission."