THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, November 12, 1995 TAG: 9511080062
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: K4 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Real Slices
SOURCE: BY EARL SWIFT, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 100 lines
THE PASSENGERS come aboard under a might-rain sky the color of putty, easing three cars and a pickup onto the deck under the skipper's watchful gaze.
Eyes shaded by a ballcap, gold stripes glinting on his shoulder boards, Gerald Rollinson turns to face a console studded with knobs, buttons and dials and grasps the engine room telegraph.
It hisses as he slides it forward. A tremor runs through the wheelhouse floor. And the Gov. James Baxter Hunt Jr. slips away from the North Carolina shore, the green-gray water of Currituck Sound boiling behind it.
The time is 1:02 p.m., and the Hunt is beginning another of its 12 daily voyages between Currituck and Knotts Island.
Rollinson is the boat's master, commander of a five-man crew, responsible for the welfare of passengers and cargo aboard the state-run ferry. It's a job vital to the people of Knotts Island, for whom the Hunt is the only link with the rest of their state. It's also one that keeps Rollinson in the wheelhouse for 14 hours a day, seven days a week, 26 weeks a year.
``I used to have my own boat,'' Rollinson says, eyeing a radar monitor that sweeps 1 1/2 miles of water surrounding the ferry. The Currituck shoreline is a glowing curve on the screen, and channel markers are gleaming blobs.
``But I got rid of it - I see enough water,'' he says. ``I have people say to me, `I'm surprised you don't have a waterfront lot.' I say, `Shoot, I look at the water six months out of the year.'
``When I go home, I like to see the sun set over a cornfield.''
The ferry's diesels are turning its propeller shaft 820 times a minute, shoving the Hunt through the windblown sound at just over 6 knots. At that rate, it takes about 50 minutes to make the 5-mile crossing.
Up in the wheelhouse, Rollinson sits in a tall brown armchair, steering the Hunt with a thumb. No oversized ship's wheel controls the ferry; the helm is a lever no bigger than most computer joysticks, and Rollinson handles it with practiced, nonchalant ease.
Today the Hunt has the sound pretty much to itself. No crazies are on the water, no neophyte boaters lacking sense or courtesy.
``It's too bad they don't make people take a test of some sort before they let them go out in a boat,'' Rollinson says, noting that he's seen some bad behavior during his 20 years in the Coast Guard and 15 years as a merchant seaman.
On the radar monitor, a dotted line runs through the sound's center. ``That's the Intracoastal Waterway,'' he says, pointing through angled glass to a row of channel markers. ``When I'm coming up on the Intracoastal Waterway and I see a boat approaching, I'll slow down and let 'em pass, because so many people don't know the rules of the road.''
Such caution is S.O.P. aboard the Hunt, perhaps even more so than on other passenger vessels: Every weekday morning during the school year, Rollinson ferries the children of Knotts Island to classes in Currituck. The Hunt also carries a few kids living in Corova, a beach settlement a dozen miles from the nearest blacktop, who have to boat to Knotts Island to catch the ferry each morning.
All of them - the number varies from 88 to 106 - ride back to Knotts Island on the 3:30 p.m. crossing.
``That's really our primary job here,'' Rollinson said, noting that the kids are generally well-behaved. They're reminded of the rules - no smoking, no swearing, no horseplay - in a sign posted down in the passenger lounge.
At 1:31 p.m., the Corolla Light is a post rising from low shore far to starboard, and the houses of Knotts Island are taking shape up ahead.
The Hunt sloshes on, four feet of water under its hull. The sound is only eight or nine feet deep in the channel, sometimes only waist- or neck-deep outside it. Winds here don't produce the waves one encounters in deep, open water.
In fact, weather only rarely makes the crossing dicey. ``Two years ago it iced over and we had to stop running,'' Rollinson said. ``Going through the ice you cut a trail, and you push that ice on top of the ice off to the sides. The next time you cross, the ice is twice as thick.''
Dense fog is a more frequent adversary. But when that hits, Rollinson can crank the radar down so that it sweeps only a quarter-mile at a time. All sorts of things - floating logs, even - appear on the screen.
Currituck Sound, in other words, isn't the duty Rollinson pulled at sea.
Drama is rarely high, and the Hunt, at 125 feet and 323 tons, is far smaller than the tanker he helped run as a wage sailor. Its maximum cargo - 18 cars - is on the light side.
Under way, however, routine is a friend. Rollinson says he isn't bored, despite the sameness of the view, despite the long hours.
It's 1:47 p.m. when he guides the Hunt between the pilings guarding the Knotts Island landing. Crewmen disconnect the ferry's bow gate. The pier's metal ramp clangs onto the deck. The on-shore safety gate rises. Four cars roll off and head into town.
Rollinson descends two stories from the wheelhouse, strides across the deck and steps ashore, stretching his legs. A handful of cars are already lined up, awaiting the next run.
It's 10 minutes away. ILLUSTRATION: EARL SWIFT photo
Skipper Gerald Rollinson, left, watches Larry Williams guide the
ferry on one of 12 daily trips between Currituck and Knotts Island.
KEYWORDS: KNOTTS ISLAND FERRY by CNB