Weight of storm fell on covered moorings

By MARK HIGGINS
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

EDMONDS -- Bill Toskey spent much of yesterday comforting distraught boat owners who arrived at the Port of Edmonds marina to find their boats sunk or damaged under the weight of a collapsed boat shed.

The covered moorings, designed to protect boats from the elements, collapsed under the weight of wet snow and damaged about 400 boats at the Port of Edmonds, said Toskey, port director.

"Most didn't sink, but the roofs fell on top of them," Toskey said. "Radar antennas, cabins and bridges were damaged."

The Port of Edmonds was one of several marinas in the Puget Sound area to sustain damage from the weekend's winter storm.

The problem at marinas is that many of the sheds, made of corrugated metal, float in order to rise and fall with the changing tides. The weight of the snow pushed the floating sheds down on the boats and collapsed them.

Toskey said the Port of Edmonds will discuss later this week whether the covered moorings should be used at all. Boats that were not under cover were not damaged.

Gene Baker, director of marine facilities at the Port of Bremerton, said the Port Orchard Marina is also going to rethink the use of covered moorings after 47 boats sank under a collapsed boat shed.

"Most all of our covered moorage was damaged," Baker said.

Marina workers worked yesterday to prevent environmental damage from leaking gas tanks. Then they will work to pull the collapsed roofs off the boats and salvage what they can, Baker said.

Many marina owners said they didn't anticipate collapsed covered moorings because the area rarely gets such heavy snow.

Phil Gray, manager of Fremont Boat Co. in Lake Union, said he has never seen such snow damage.

"Our whole marina is floating," Gray said. "If we hadn't gone and gotten snow off the docks and sheds, there would have been damage like everywhere else."

Gray said marina workers were out during the entire storm shoveling snow off the sheds and docks.

At Salmon Bay Marina, where the boat sheds are built on tall pilings, rather than floating, there was also no damage, according to marina owner, Charles Draper Jr.

Draper said he has been getting calls since the storm from boat owners looking for a safe place to keep their boats.

John Kaiser, owner of Elliott Bay Marina, also has been getting calls from boat owners. There are no covered boats at Kaiser's marina because owners couldn't get the permits to build the sheds.