Around-LI rower forced ashore by rough seas
Rower Rick Shalvoy said Tuesday that rough waters are forcing him to come ashore Tuesday night in Northport before reaching the finish line of his around-Long Island journey.
He had said earlier that he hoped to complete the project by reaching West Neck Beach in Lloyd Harbor Tuesday.
Monday, Shalvoy had to beach his first rowboat at Wildwood State Park in Wading River after it was damaged in a collision with an underwater rock.
His wife, Holli Dunayer-Shalvoy, said this afternoon that with more favorable weather expected Wednesday he would "definitely" finish rowing to the beach where the trip began eight days ago with a team of four rowers and a 24-foot skiff.
The 300-mile adventure to raise funds for wounded veterans was rough from the start. Shalvoy, 57, and a teammate were forced off the boat this past Tuesday, when choppy seas the previous night sickened them. Two others and a replacement rower, ended their trip Wednesday in Moriches Inlet, where Shalvoy decided to resume their quest Friday.
He called his wife Tuesday to say rough water conditions would force him ashore near Crab Meadow Beach. He'd hoped to complete a trip delayed the previous day when his boat's hull hit "a very, very large boulder, situated apparently just below the surface of the water," Shalvoy said in a phone call late Monday.
By the time he neared Wildwood State Park, he said, "I knew that I had to make an emergency landing because half the boat was filled with water. So I beached the boat in a very sloppy set of circumstances, because the waves were so big and so rough; they were not being gentle at all, and heaving my boat up" on to the rocky beach.
"I needed to bail out of the boat at the last second," Shalvoy said, "before that final wave came crashing down onto shore."
After a night at home in Long Beach, he resumed the trip in a second rowboat launched in Port Jefferson and towed east to the site of the collision. He had intended to finish by nightfall before conditions turned too rough.
Shalvoy had previously circumnavigated Long Island by rowboat to raise awareness and funds for breast cancer research.
