~~~

Kip Evans is a member of the Pacific Grove Ocean Rescue Team, which regularly trains with and uses PWCs for lifesaving.

“Where’s the data that these jet skis are causing the havoc that they say they’re causing in the Sanctuary?” Evans asks.

California state lifeguards and rescue teams like Evans’ have been using PWCs in Monterey County for years now because “nothing is faster or safer to extract victims from the nearshore,” Evans says. “The speed of response is so critical to success.”

Evans points to an incident last March when lifeguard Eric Sturm launched a PWC into extra-large surf from Carmel beach and saved a drowning boogie boarder.

“In the time it would have taken to swim out and get her, she would have drowned,” Evans says. “The conditions were extreme.”

If there’s one thing that all sides of the PWC debate can agree on, it’s that an exception will be made for lifeguards and rescue teams.

“Our chapter definitely supports the use of PWC for life rescue operations by public agency personnel,” Larenas says. “We are concerned with recreational use.”

Eric Akisalian, founder of the Association of Professional Towsurfers, an organization that is attempting to become the governing body of the sport, doesn’t understand why PWCs are being demonized.

“Why are only PWCs being singled out, and not other vessels, including speedboats and fishing boats, which can be as hazardous or worse to wildlife and habitats?” Akisalian asks. “Most of us towsurfers who are aware of this issue believe the real issue at hand is personal bias towards towsurfing.

“Honestly, if I were not a towsurfer and just a big wave paddle surfer, I too would be annoyed by the noise and commotion that a crew of PWCs makes in the lineup.”

Don Curry rides a four-stroke Yamaha FX140, which received the industry’s two-star “very low emissions” rating in 2004.

“Everyone’s got the cleaner-running machines, and even some of the two-stroke machines are still rated two stars. You want to point a finger at the environment, point it at urban runoff, or that big old cruise ship seeping God knows what into the Sanctuary,” he says ”I guess I just don’t understand why this is an issue.”

Curry contends that there are only a handful of towsurf teams in the Sanctuary on a handful of days a year.

“This was never an environmental issue,” Curry says. “It was a human issue.”

But Kasunich and others are quick to point out the issue is not big-wave towsurfing.

“Guys like Don Curry should be able to go out and challenge these enormous waves,” Kasunich says. “Everyone knows there’s no wildlife around a 50-foot wave. Even seagulls don’t fly around waves that size.”

The problem, Kasunich says, is that the havoc caused by “tow-at” surfers at Moss Landing reflects upon the big-wave towsurfing community as a whole.

“As a group the towsurfers are irresponsible,” Kasunich says. “They haven’t gotten together. Until they can organize themselves and prove that they can regulate themselves while protecting the marine wildlife, I’m going to have to support a ban.”

And nothing illustrated how right Kasunich may be than Monday night’s Surfrider meeting at Monterey’s Hilltop Community Center. While Waissbluth attempted to regain control of the meeting, Bispo and Collins took their fight outside. Surrounded by their posses and, fortunately, one levelheaded mediator, the two managed to avoid an all-out fistfight and arrests, but spent the better part of a half-hour screaming at each other while the issue’s panel of experts continued to field questions from the audience inside.

Ed Larenas says that, in general, the PWC debate is not even about towsurfing.

“The press likes controversy, and what better source of controversy than surfers?” Larenas says.

The real issue, Larenas says, is wildlife disturbance. Their silence, speed and unpredictability make PWCs a threat to murrelets, dolphins, harbor seals, and sea lions, according to expert scientific testimony from pertinent court rulings posted on the San Mateo Chapter of Surfrider’s Web site.

A study in the San Francisco Bay concluded that watercraft like jet skis, which exhibit sudden changes in speed and direction, were more likely to flush out harbor seals than were vessels passing at a steady speed and constant course. Also, research in Florida found that PWCs can increase turbidity in the ocean and redistribute benthic invertebrates, such as native mussel populations.

Another study in Florida found that bottlenose dolphins, which also frequent the coastline of the Monterey Bay Sanctuary, are endangered by PWCs because this type of boat is not acoustically detectable at the same distance as other boats.

As a result, Larenas and his chapter are advocating for responsible use within the four existing offshore zones established by NOAA in 1993.

Twelve years ago, Sanctuary regulations specifically defined PWCs and confined them to certain zones in order to protect marine mammals and seabirds and minimize conflicts.

The mistake that Sanctuary legislators made then was basing their definition of a PWC on prevailing design features—namely the number of seats on each watercraft. The PWC industry responded quickly by rolling three and four-seated PWCs that effectively neutralized the Sanctuary’s restrictions.

This spring, the Sanctuary’s joint draft management plan is expected to finally remedy that oversight. And thus the current controversy.