MADEIRA BEACH – The latest addition to the John’s Pass Village entertainment venue will be a cruise ship, with gaming on board.

The Trade Winds Casino Cruise Line will operate a 200-foot, 425-passenger ship out of Hubbard’s Marina five days a week beginning the weekend of Aug. 24-25.

Darin Eliscu of Chicago owns the ship. It was last based in Brunswick, Ga.

Karen Donovan, the cruise line’s director of sales and marketing, said the ship’s capacity would mean plenty of gaming opportunities for passengers.

“There will be 200 slot machines, plus all the Vegas-style games including roulette, craps, blackjack, and a sports book,” she said. The boat will operate five days a week, typically offering three hours of gaming following a one-hour trip out into the Gulf of Mexico into international waters.

Evening cruises running from 7 p.m. to midnight will be offered on Tuesday through Friday, with an extra hour added on Saturday. Midday trips also will be available on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Sundays will feature a matinee cruise from 4 to 6 p.m.

The Trade Winds vessel will be the fourth gaming boat to operate out of John’s Pass and Madeira Beach in recent years. The others have all departed, going out of business for various reasons.

Donovan, who also served with the other lines, said she believes this ship has a more promising outlook than any of the others.

“This is a different ship but is better than any we’ve had here before,” she said. “I’ve been with the rest, and this is the best.”

The cruise line is “very customer-service oriented,” Donovan said, adding the crew and personnel were hired based on customer service.

“What we are selling is fun,” she said. “We want people to come out and have fun, and serving the passengers well is a big part of that,” she said.

As to the new ship’s future at John’s Pass, Donovan predicted, “This one is going to stay.”

The boat will be docked at Hubbard’s Marina at John’s Pass, and join Hooters, Bubba Gump’s and other noted enterprises there as a tenant of Hubbard Properties.

The Hubbard family has been a big player in the retail, restaurant, and marine scene at the Pass since the 1970s.

Hubbard Properties CEO Patricia Hubbard said she and her family are “very excited about having this new addition to John’s Pass Village. We look forward to working with them. It is going to be a first class operation.”

Copyright © Tampa Bay Newspapers: All rights reserved.

Click on any of the video links below for information
and interviews of our local John’s Pass Attractions
or visit our You Tube web page for a complete selection:

http://www.youtube.com/user/WhatsNewInJohnsPass/videos

Publisher’s Note: When Donna Parrey began working on her story about the new Secrets of the Sea for the April and May issues of  THE ISLAND REPORTER, she thought about the day she carried her new goldfish home from a pet store in a plastic bag years ago and became interested in learning about the actual mechanics of executing such a large move of sea life from their home at The Pier Aquarium to John’s Pass in Madeira Beach. “Anyone who has gazed up at the three tall acrylic cylinders, teeming with marine life in the lobby of the St. Petersburg Pier, might wonder just how it is going to happen,” she wrote. So she talked with Butch Ringelspaugh, curator of exhibits at The Pier Aquarium, to get some answers.

THE MECHANICS OF THE BIG AQUARIUM MOVE:

TIR: Exactly how big is this job?

BR: Altogether, we’ll be moving approximately 400 animals, including various fish, corals, anemones and other invertebrates, and close to 2,000 pounds of live rock and coral. Additionally, nearly 3,000 gallons of s altwater from our current home at The Pier Aquarium will need to be handled. About half of that will be moved to our new home in Madeira Beach, as we will use this opportunity to do a nice water change for all of the animals. We will then need to make close to another 13,000 gallons of synthetic seawater to fill all of the new exhibits and holding/quarantine aquaria since we’re creating a much larger environment for the marine life and acquiring new species. We currently have about 2,000 square feet of space, but our new home is more than six times that size, with 12,500 square feet of space.

TIR: Let’s start with those iconic acrylic tube aquariums in the lobby of the Pier. How in the world do you remove the fish from that environment? Pull a plug and let them swoosh out to a waiting tank truck? Vacuum them up to the top? Catch and release?

BR: Marine life loves to hide beneath rocks and coral, so the first task will be to remove as much of that environment as possible. Because of the unique configuration of these tanks, I’ll probably scuba dive them to net the fish.

TIR: In addition to the three tubes, how many other aquariums have occupants that will need to be captured and moved?

BR: There are 15 other tanks – 13 displayed in The Pier Aquarium, one small quarantine tank and the aquarium on display at the Columbia Restaurant. For these aquariums, after removing the rocks and coral, we’ll also lower the water level so the fish have less territory. We’re quite accustomed to the art of catching them quickly in nets.

TIR: What then? How do they get from here to there?

BR: The process is not as different as you might think from what people do when they bring store-bought fish home to introduce to their own aquariums. The secret is in preparing the new environment to be as close to the environment the animals are already accustomed to.

TIR: What are the steps involved in facilitating the relocation of the aquatic residents of The Pier Aquarium to their new home?

BR: The first step will be to set up the system that will eventually be home to our current population of animals as well as the rocks, corals and other items that make up their marine environment. Then we’ll create a quarantine area to be ready for the fish. We’ll begin to acclimate the new environment by dripping water from the system into their temporary homes until the environments match up perfectly.

TIR: I know that water temperature is important for tropical fish. What temperature are you aiming for?

BR: We typically keep our aquarium waters between 72 and 80 degrees. That’s the range of most tropical waters.

TIR: What else do you need to match?

BR: Two other important factors are the salinity (level of salt in the water) and the pH level (the range from acidic to basic). For saltwater fish, it’s easier for them to go from a high-salinity environment to a low-salinity environment than vice versa, which can be very stressful to the fish. In the course of our normal maintenance, we change out 15-30 percent of the total tank water volume each month, so creating safe

TIR: Tell us more about the sea life’s temporary homes. What happens between the time they’re happily swimming in the tanks that have been home to them and the time they arrive at the new center?

BR: Well, just like pet tropical fish are transported in bags of water, our animals will be transported in a variety of containers, depending on their size. The really small guys will be in plastic bags; others will be in buckets; and larger specimens will be in containers that range up to 50-gallon barrels, even trash cans on wheels! All will have powerful aerators to ensure they get the oxygen they need to breathe.

TIR: How long can the fish be safe in those temporary environments?

BR: You’d be surprised. Tropical fish from around the globe are transported in plastic bags and successfully make their journeys to pet stores on the other side of the world, sometimes spending two days in their bags.

TIR: What about the coral and rock? Is that easier to move?

BR: No, actually rock is very demanding and requires stable water quality. The coral also needs to be monitored. Some of our colonies have grown to a pretty significant size. While some pieces may break off in the move, the fragments are used to grow more coral.

TIR: What is the timeline for accomplishing the move?

BR: We expect the move process to take about two months, beginning in early 2013, with our grand opening planned in the spring.

TIR: What will become of the acrylic tube aquariums in the Pier lobby?

BR: The cylinders have had plenty of life. At fifteen years, they are past their prime and will be retired. We’ve had inquiries from artists and other facilities about those tubes, but they’ll be behemoths to move.

TIR: With all the expanded room at the John’s Pass facility, what new features can visitors expect to see?

BR: Currently, our largest tank is 500 gallons, but in Secrets of the Sea, we’ll have a 6,000 gallon aquarium. This will allow us to bring in some bigger animals, such as bonnet sharks, large grouper and drums. Our touch tank will be grander, too.

TIR: Thank you for sharing some of your own “secrets” of the sea.

SECRETS OF THE SEA PROMISES INTERACTIVE EXPERIENCE:

With all the hoopla about what the next St. Petersburg Pier will look like once the iconic inverted pyramid is demolished, there’s one notable fact about what it won’t look like … it won’t include The Pier Aquarium that once served as a local focus point for marine life education. The aquarium is being reinvented in a big, bold way with a move to Madeira Beach where Secrets of the Sea Marine Exploration Center and Aquarium plans to open its doors alongside the boardwalk at John’s Pass Village. Officials have been planning an expansion of the 2,000 sq. ft. facility, first established in 1988, and researched location options for several years. In fact, some of the renovations done five years ago were modular in design so that they could more easily be moved or repurposed in a move – but a move this far was not part of the original plan. “Initially, remaining in downtown St. Petersburg was a goal,” said E. Howard Rutherford, CEO of The Pier Aquarium, “but finding the right spot with sufficient contiguous space located on or next to the waterfront proved difficult.”

Officials finally found their solution in the John’s Pass complex and announced the decision last April. The move will allow the aquarium to be developed into a larger, research-oriented marine discovery center, more than six times the size of the original. The logistics of making that move are mindboggling. First, the layout of the new cuttingedge facility had to be designed. Officials selected Harvard Jolly Architecture for the job. With 12,500 sq. ft. of space over two levels, the center will house 11 separate aquariums, six galleries/exhibits, 12 “mystery stations,” a gift store and a learning lab/classroom.

Next comes the challenge of actually moving the water and sea life. How, exactly, do you prepare the fish and other marine life for a move across town? Butch Ringelspaugh, curator of exhibits, says the timeline will span two months. Once settled in its new home, the center is sure to be a feather – er – fin in the cap for Pinellas County tourism efforts. The new facility is expected to attract some 250,000 visitors to the area, pumping $8 million into the local economy. Madeira Beach Mayor Travis Palladeno is eager to welcome the facility to the John’s Pass complex. “Being in fisheries, I’m a big fan of aquariums, and the idea of having one in my own city will be great. I’m very excited; the residents are very excited; it’s a coup for the entire beach area,” he said.

The appeal of Secrets of the Sea lies in its ability to capitalize on the reputation that The Pier Aquarium developed as a smaller boutique aquarium that truly personalized the visitor’s relationship with the exhibits, according to Emily Stehle, public relations/marketing director. “The aquariums in this region may have similar missions but different goals. For example, the Clearwater Marine Aquarium is known for providing rehabilitation; it’s what they’re really good at. And The Florida Aquarium in Tampa provides a large-scale attraction, as a zoo might. But we’re appreciated for our ability to connect visitors with the greater marine science community, to be more interactive, to get parents and children talking and teaching one another.” What’s more, officials are pleased that 40,000 students from six counties will have access to the educational offerings that Secrets of the Sea provides. The center is introducing a Sea Sleuths program that is designed to engage visitors in a series of interactive mystery stations. Students and other visitors will solve mysteries in a fun fashion by exploring the aquariums, galleries and exhibits, some focusing on dolphin identification, animal tracking via satellite, monitoring reef changes and other marine and environmental issues relevant to the Tampa Bay area.

The Pier Aquarium is fortunate to be part of the St. Petersburg Ocean Team – a robust team of 14 marine science-related groups representing a consortium of governmental agencies – local, regional, state and national – as well as research and development firms, environmental organizations and educational institutions. This team provides much of the technology for the exhibits, and The Pier Aquarium helps to bring these research projects to the public in a friendly, engaging manner. Rutherford points out that our area is a prominent base of marine-related activity. “It’s exciting that Secrets of the Sea Marine Exploration Center and Aquarium will be the public face of that activity, showing everyone exactly how they benefit from the mysteries that are being solved. We are facilitating the development of a new generation of environmental stewards.”

Rutherford agrees that if you remember walking down the St. Petersburg Pier, entering the facility and staring up in awe at the trio of acrylic cylinders housing tropical fish, you should be prepared to be amazed at the splendor of their new home. The Secrets of the Sea promises visitors a fun and learning experience that includes game fish and predators, crustaceans and coral, estuaries and reefs, a Tampa Bay touch tank and … jellyfish in the lobby! The Pier Aquarium staff is working on updating its membership program and pricing, but they expect to continue offering reciprocal membership arrangements with selected museums and other attractions, as they currently do. Rutherford said that Secrets of the Sea is making progress in its $5 million capital campaign, but expects that the beach community will want to step up and take advantage of the opportunity to sponsor some part of the gulf beaches’ new attraction anchor.

Progress Energy has already provided a grant to underwrite the “Energizing Research Mystery Station,” and a family foundation is sponsoring the lobby’s jellyfish tank. Additionally, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has pledged to support the display of the Science on a Sphere exhibit, and the Southwest Florida Water Management District is doing the same for the Planet Water exhibit. “Senate Bill 1274, on Governor Scott’s desk now, contains language that will make aquariums eligible for proceeds from the bed tax dollars, which also brings good news for Secrets of the Sea,” added Mayor Palladeno. Looks like the gulf beaches community is in for a wet and wonderful gift when the Secrets of the Sea Marine Exploration

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Donna J. Parrey is a freelance writer based in St. Pete Beach, Florida, and the founder of Write Brain Wordsmiths. She can be contacted at dparrey@tampabay.rr.com.

THE PIER AQUARIUM ANNOUNCES MOVE TO MADEIRA BEACH
John’s Pass Village to Be Home of Marine Discovery Center & Aquarium

St. Petersburg, FL (April 19, 2011) – The Pier Aquarium’s Board of Directors today announced a major relocation, expansion and re-branding of the 22-year-old aquarium in its new location at John’s Pass Village on Madeira Beach. The new 11,500 square foot facility, which more than triples the current exhibit space, is scheduled to open by the end of 2012.

In its new home, the attraction, now called the Marine Discovery Center & Aquarium (MDCA), will be designed to bring the public together with state-of-the-art marine research, innovation and technology that is being developed by the St. Petersburg Ocean Team and other marine related agencies and organizations. Four major new exhibits will be premiered – Science on a Sphere, Planet Water, Ocean Today and Climate Change – as well as the addition of larger live exhibits and an expanded Touch Tank.

“By marrying cutting-edge technology with live marine exhibits, MDCA will entertain and engage our visitors and create appreciation for our planet’s marine environment, above and under water,” said Board Chair and USF Professor of Marine Science, Mark Luther, Ph.D. “We will show visitors a world they cannot see anywhere else.”

MDCA will occupy the first and second floors in John’s Pass Village, adjacent to Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. and the new Hooters restaurants. 

“The Marine Discovery Center & Aquarium is a wonderful addition to John’s Pass Village, already a great shopping and dining destination,” said Patricia Hubbard, CEO of Hubbard Properties which owns the building. “We can now offer our visitors, and especially our local families, a full day of quality entertainment in one convenient waterfront location.”

 “With direct access to both the bay and Gulf of Mexico, MDCA will serve as an expanded resource for teachers and students for tours, projects and special programs. Currently, more than 30,000 students participate in our education programs,” said MDCA President & CEO E. Howard Rutherford.

Rutherford said master planning and naming opportunities are in development. A $3 million capital campaign will be announced later this year.

Contact: Emily Stehle, APR
Office: (727) 803-9799, ext. 207
Cell: (727) 688-7993
estehle@pieraquarium.org
www.pieraquarium.org

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By Katherine Snow Smith, Times Staff Writer
Copyright 2011 St. Petersburg Times

ST. PETERSBURG — Sorry St. Petersburg, the Pier Aquarium has deeper waters to plumb.

Faced with dramatically declining attendance, an uncertain future at the Pier and failed attempts to relocate in downtown, the aquarium is leaving after 23 years and is moving to John’s Pass. The non-profit marine research attraction plans to open in 10,000 square feet by December 2012.

“We will have three times the exhibit space. It’s going to be a much more interesting and exciting experience,” said Mark Luther, chairman of the aquarium’s board and a professor at USF’s College of Marine Science. The renamed Marine Discovery Center and Aquarium will showcase the marine science and technology in the area with interactive exhibits. The current aquarium is 2,200 square feet.

The Pier is slated to be demolished in 2012 or 2013 to make way for a $50 million makeover. Since the talk of changes began, residents have been unsure of the attraction’s current status. Add that to a dismal economy and extremely cramped quarters and aquarium attendance has dropped from about 175,000 people in 2005 to around 85,000 last year.

“I was hopeful they would maintain a presence downtown,” said St. Petersburg City Council member Herb Polson. “But you’ve got to strike when you can and if they got a good offer in a waterfront setting I hope it works well for them. It will be our loss..”

“I know nobody ever came to me and said, ‘We’re reaching a point where we’re going to have to leave,’ ” said council member Steve Kornell. “We’re the hub of marine science research in the whole Southeastern United States. I think we should have an education component for the Pier.”

The aquarium has considered seven different downtown venues including BayWalk, the St. Petersburg Museum of History and a city-owned facility next to Al Lang Field, Luther said, but the rates or availability never panned out.

Aquarium officials announced in May that it would move elsewhere downtown. A later survey of members, sponsors and donors found there was support for a location at the beaches if downtown didn’t work out. With $700,000 in grants and donations in hand, the aquarium will try to raise $3 million more for the new space.

Luther thinks the new facility will still draw many residents from St. Petersburg and throughout the area as well as more tourists.

“It caused me great concern moving away from downtown, but the reality is the Pier is going away,” he said, “and we don’t want to be the last ones to turn the light out when they leave.”

The BATS Taxi Company Story . . .

BATS: The Early Years

Jerry and I moved here from Vermont in 1980. We had a hard time finding a job when we moved here. Jerry was in graduate school earning his masters degree in Public Administration and I was a student at St. Pete Jr. College. I worked at a convenience store and Jerry worked at a gas station.

We started a van service to Tampa Airport. (We started with $800, a prayer and a distinctive logo that stood out.) The $800 belonged to the IRS and we got it through a mistake in our taxes and eventually had to pay it back! Our attorney came up with the “catchy” Beach Airport Transport Service that became BATS. Our first office was in my sister’s beauty salon on St. Pete Beach!

BATS City Transit

In the scheme of all this, Jerry saw that the public bus service contract was up for bid in St. Pete Beach. We won the contract with a ridiculously low bid and had the bus contract for over sixteen years: BATS City Transit. We saved the City of St. Pete Beach some $6.8 million dollars during this time.

BATS: Birthing the CAB and Town Car business

We had a van driver by the name of Jamie Fiore who worked for us. Jamie frequently talked with us about starting a cab company. (He was a cab starter at Tampa Airport.) After a time we decided we could start another company, with a family loan we started the cab company, which is Bay Area Taxi Service, Inc. At one time we had some five different companies within the transportation realm. It was only natural we would eventually have an executive town car service (Bay Area Town Car Service).

BATS: The people and drivers behind the company

Our children Rene and Jerry II grew up in the cab business literally… their playpen, and their swing were all part of the office. It was not anything for a driver to come in and pick up a crying baby while Jerry or I were on the phones or dispatching! The driver’s saw us through two pregnancies and watched our children become young adults. In doing so they became part of their lives.

They became part of science projects, participated in Rene’s outstanding “vocal performances”, and attended Jerry’s Little League games, to name just a few of the activities of our children. Some drivers became dispatchers, mechanics and general managers! Our drivers became our extended family.

We often worked some 60 to 80 hours per week each during those difficult years. We had family members that came and went but we stuck it out. We remember “very well” eating a lot of spaghetti!

BATS: You are part of our history and our future!

We appreciate the lean times and we appreciate all of you who made BATS possible. We hope that this small history lesson of the company for which you are part, gives you some insight as to our fortitude and longevity in the industry.

Jerry & Carol Vallee

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BEACH TROLLEY – Hop on the Suncoast Beach Trolley and you can explore all of the unique beach communities from Sand Key to Pass-A-Grille. Enjoy the sights at John’s Pass Village or just take in a beautiful sunset! The trolley runs every 20-30 minutes from 5:05 a.m. to 10:10 p.m., Monday through Sunday, including holidays, with service until midnight on Friday and Saturday.

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Sea of sadness: Remembering all the fishermen lost in the gulf
By Andrew Meacham, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Sunday, May 2, 2010

Bill Renney was 10 years old when the Gulf of Mexico erased his father.

On March 29, 1943, Sam Renney took four men fishing on the Miss Detroit, a 37-foot cabin cruiser. When he didn’t return, young Bill didn’t worry. Authorities were rationing gas in wartime and he had probably run dry, his mother told him.

The next day, a fishing boat found a gas tank and a charred life preserver — but no sign of the rest of the Miss Detroit or her crew.

Sixty-seven years later, Renney still wonders what happened to his father. Dozens of other people bear the same sad burden, pining for loved ones who died or vanished while fishing in the Gulf of Mexico.

A group of John’s Pass Village merchants has been raising money for a memorial to the Tampa Bay fishermen who have died in the gulf waters. They want to pay homage to the dead but don’t know how many there are. While the true number is unknowable, we wanted to get as close as possible.

The St. Petersburg Times reviewed newspaper archives and arrived at a disquieting number: at least 142 since 1933.

Fifty-five percent were recreational fishermen.

The other 45 percent were professionals, including longline fishermen who knew how to lean into waves standing at 45 degrees while their boats spooled out 2,500 hooks on 10 miles of cable. But their experience could not save them from explosions at sea or the rogue waves fishermen call “widow makers.”

Of 142 known local fishing-related deaths, the bodies of 87 — nearly two-thirds — were never found. The absence of a body can leave family members with a thin hope that their loved one is alive somewhere, which exacerbates the anguish.

Tourists who know the island communities for sand beaches and tourist-trap shops may not be aware that a sizeable commercial fishing fleet still exists. An estimated 100 commercial boats unload cargo in Madeira Beach, according to the Southern Offshore Fishing Association, bringing tons of fresh fish and hundreds of jobs to the area.

In the late 1980s, SOFA erected a sign honoring fishermen who died or were lost. For about a dozen years, the sign greeted shoppers entering the boardwalk on John’s Pass Village.

Then in 2000, John’s Pass underwent renovations.

Like so many fishermen swept to sea, the sign disappeared.

• • •

Up and down Gulf Boulevard, signs link Madeira Beach to its founding occupation. The Friendly Fisherman. Dockside Dave’s. Madeira Beach Seafood Company.

The Church by the Sea served as a beacon for fishermen, who used the light on its steeple to guide themselves home.

But accounting for the fishing community’s maritime tragedies — those who didn’t make it home — is not easy. The U.S. Coast Guard declined to release a list of names of fishermen who have died at sea. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission also didn’t have a comprehensive list.

But an archive search of the Times and Bradenton Herald turned up 142 fishing-related deaths over the past 80 years. Most of the fishermen are from Pinellas County, mainly Madeira Beach, though some left ports in Citrus, Pasco, Hillsborough and Manatee counties.

The stories are harrowing:

Nov. 17, 1933: The Xios, a sponge boat, left Tarpon Springs with a crew of four. The boat and crew were never seen again, though another boat reported seeing smoke in the area where the Xios may have been located.

June 27, 1948: Hazel, a fishing charter, departed Cedar Key with 15 people aboard. Thirty miles out, there was an explosion from the engine room. Thirteen people died.

Oct. 30, 1983: Tony Lathan, a promising outfielder in the Boston Red Sox farm system, was shark fishing off Bradenton when the boat took on water and sank. Lathan, 21, couldn’t swim. Two teammates in the boat survived.

Aug. 24, 1984: Tomisene Washington and Larry Griffin left Cedar Key to go fishing. Griffin, 28, was never found. Partial remains of Washington, 31, were found 10 days later — in the belly of a tiger shark.

• • •

At 5:18 a.m. on Sept. 28, 2000, Whitney Taggart disappeared from the Blue Chip 50 miles west of Venice Inlet. Four crew members told the Coast Guard they were below when Taggart, the 41-year-old captain, went overboard.

“If you want to know suffering, tell me somebody is off the boat,” said his sister, Jane Taggart. “It’s the most horrible thing I have ever been through in my life.”

Her brother was a lean man with shoulder-length, twisting blond hair.

Taggart, 43, is still carrying the pain of the loss.

“The mind plays evil games with you,” she said. “When did he take his last breath? What was he thinking? What happened?

“You want some answers. You want a body. You want some evidence.”

The family held a wake on the beach two days after the Coast Guard called off the search.

Jane Taggart could not bring herself to attend, and has yet to memorialize her brother in any formal way.

• • •

All the deaths occurred in the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

“You think it’s like the Atlantic Ocean, where you get big rollers and swells,” said Bob Spaeth, an owner of Madeira Beach Seafood Company. “Here we get closer-together waves, but higher.”

The difference, said University of South Florida oceanographer Bob Weisberg, is shallower water created by the Continental Shelf — which extends as far west of Florida as the state is wide.

“Twenty-five miles offshore it might only be 100 feet deep,” said Weisberg.

When high winds come over the shallow Continental Shelf — and water reacts to the hard ground bottom — seas have nowhere to go but up.

“Deeper is safer,” Weisberg said. “Waves are not feeling the bottom. In deep water, those waves tend to be not as steep and they tend to be longer.”

“If you ride down the front of a wave, the bow digs into the wave in front of you,” said Mark Hubbard, who runs the charter boat business out of Hubbard’s Marina in John’s Pass Village. “You have no time to recover from one wave to the next.”

But Weisberg said fishermen bear some of the blame.

“A lot of times you have boats that are not in the best of repair,” Weisberg said.

For years, Richard Wabberson fished in a 69-foot boat, the Missy Cindy, out of Tarpon Springs.

“I’ve seen a lot of boats I wouldn’t cross the river in go offshore,” said Wabberson, 62.

On March 20, Wabberson’s son, John, 23, fell over the side of the Missy Cindy. Wabberson searched for 18 hours but never found him.

Now Wabberson, who said he captained boats for 35 years on seven continents, lives in Georgia and fishes swamp flats.

“I have no desire to go offshore ever again,” he said.

• • •

March 13, 1993: Gene Ippoliti was sitting in his long johns on the captain’s chair of the Mary C sipping coffee. A mate they called Shorty was rousting up breakfast in the ice box, where the crew had stashed groceries and 450 pounds of grouper. It was a windy morning, the sun shining.

Then something slapped the boat upside down. “I woke up underwater in the dark,” said Ippoliti, 48. “I was starved for air.”

He saw a light spot in the water. His window. The wave had blown it out.

On the surface, he tasted diesel fuel. Groceries floated by. He grabbed some cheese and biscuits and stuffed them in his sleeve.

He tried to scale the upside-down hull. Too slippery. Neither Shorty nor another mate, Tim Floyd, were anywhere in sight.

“I knew they were done,” Ippoliti said.

As he scanned the floating rubble, he saw a long lid of the boat’s ice box float by. A competitive swimmer as a child, he jumped at the chance for a life raft.

“Mark Spitz couldn’t have caught me that day,” he said.

For the next several hours, he fought waves. They broke over his head and pushed him under. Between them, he took deep breaths and thought about his 6-month-old son, Derrick.

“I talked to God. This is what I said: ‘It’s Gene again. I know I only call you when I need you. I’m not going to bull—- you and say I’m going to go home and be a priest because I’m not. Just let me go home and kiss my kid again.’ ”

That afternoon, a Coast Guard plane passed directly overhead — and kept going. Twenty minutes later it reappeared to the north.

If he was not rescued by nightfall, he would no longer be able to see the waves before they broke.

“I just felt like, ‘Damn, I’m dead.’ It was total gloom and despair.”

The ordeal ended after six hours when a Coast Guard helicopter came to him and lowered a basket. Once on board, the crew put him in a neoprene suit and gave him an apple.

The winds that capsized Ippoliti’s boat — known forever after as the “no-name storm” — killed at least 171 people, most of them on land.

A month later, another boat found Shorty, whose real name was Loring Bryant, 42. Floyd’s body was never found. A joint seaside service was held for both fishermen.

After a year away, Ippoliti agreed to captain another boat, but had to return after three days. “It was just total paranoia.”

He has since returned to commercial fishing, but has no illusions about the gulf’s dangers.

“You think it’s never going to be that bad. But on any occasion it will kill you. As soon as you get offshore and it’s over your head, you are in peril.”

The common-law rule called for a seven-year waiting period before a person could be declared dead.

That standard has since been replaced by a law presuming death after five years if diligent efforts have been made to find the person. But legal authorities will make exceptions when there is reason to believe death occurred sooner.

“If someone sees a miner walk into a mine three minutes before it collapsed, he could probably be declared dead without much waiting around even if the body is never recovered,” said Bruce Howie, a Clearwater lawyer.

A fisherman whose boat vanishes could be seen as having died, Howie said, provided there is no competing set of circumstances that would also explain the same set of facts.

“If the fisherman’s boat is found drawn up on the shore of Costa Rica and the fisherman had withdrawn his wife’s life savings from their joint account just before leaving,” Howie said, “there is a countervailing, equally reasonable inference that he didn’t drown in the gulf.”

To declare a Florida resident dead, a person with legal standing (such as next of kin) must file a petition with the circuit court in the county of the person’s last known address. Any potential creditors or anyone else with an interest in keeping the person alive must be publicly notified.

If a judge determines that death has occurred, he or she issues a final order stating that a death certificate can be produced. The date of the order is considered the date of death. Then claims such as life insurance can be made.

• • •

Feb. 25, 2005: The Gulf Coaster, a boat captained by Mike Costello, pulled out of a marina at Bay Pines. Costello, 29, and his mate, John Molina, 42, planned to spend several days at sea fishing amberjack. They sought that fish because grouper season had been pushed back — part of recent government restrictions on commercial fishing.

For years, efforts to shorten seasons, set trip limits and cap maximum allowable catches for the year had divided the fishing community. Recreational anglers supported them; commercial fishermen said they threatened their livelihood. Occasional fistfights broke out on the docks over the issue.

Some of those efforts have succeeded and are now in place. In 2005, they were just getting started.

Costello had told his mother he needed to take one more trip to make ends meet. On Feb. 27, Costello reported that he was 73 miles west of John’s Pass, in an area fishermen call “the Elbow.”

He would head back home soon, Costello told his brother. When the Gulf Coaster did not return Feb. 28, the boat’s owner called the Coast Guard.

On March 1, they found remnants of the boat and Molina’s body 58 miles west of Anna Maria Island. Costello’s body was never found.

His mother, Shirley Costello, blames the closures and restrictions for tempting fishermen to press their limits, to go out when they otherwise wouldn’t, to pick the wrong side on judgment calls they used to get right.

Five years after the accident, Shirley Costello, 56, has not sought a death certificate. Her son was unmarried, had no children and no life insurance.

A part of her doesn’t want one anyway. Without a body, she said, she can never be certain.

“Ninety-nine percent of me knows. One percent of me says someone picked him up and he has amnesia and doesn’t know where he is. There will always be a slim possibility because nobody ever found him.”

• • •

Efforts to memorialize local fishermen aren’t new. In the late 1980s, Spaeth, the fleet owner who also directs the Southern Offshore Fishing Association, paid for a sign at John’s Pass Village. It consisted of two heavy planks mounted on posts near the boardwalk entrance, with gold-embossed lettering that read, “John’s Pass, Dedicated to Fishermen Lost at Sea.”

The shopping center underwent renovations in the late 1990s, and the fishermen’s plank sign disappeared.

But now, a group of business people want to enhance John’s Pass Village — with its touristy shops and restaurants — with a real memorial to fallen fishermen.

For the past few years, the John’s Pass Village Association and the Outdoor Arts Foundation have been raising money for a 6-foot-tall sculpture to go in front of the boardwalk. The Hand of Fate depicts a sea-green hand rising out of the waves cradling a fishing boat.

The engraved names of fishermen from the greater Tampa Bay area will fill a 3-foot base beneath the statue. The group says it has raised nearly half of the $50,000 needed to produce the sculpture by Seminole artist Robert Bruce Epstein.

Mark Hubbard, 46, is a driving force to create the Florida Fishermen Lost at Sea Memorial. His family owns John’s Pass Village, and he runs the fishing charter out of Hubbard’s Marina.

The Hand of Fate, Hubbard said, is as much a warning as a memorial.

“It’s a big wave and a boat getting ready to be crashed,” Hubbard said. “Its message is to be careful out there. You are at the mercy of the Gulf of Mexico when you go out there. You have to have your game on, because you won’t get second chances very often.”

A year ago, the planners put up a website inviting people to submit names of lost fishermen. About a dozen people have.

• • •

Questions swirled after the Miss Detroit vanished in 1943 with all aboard, including Sam Renney, a Gulfport police officer.

Dorothy Renney’s original theory — that her husband ran out of gas — had some staying power. The Coast Guard rationed gas carefully during World War II. Perhaps the stranded boat had been run over by a freighter.

Or else it had struck a mine. Maybe a German U-boat had sunk it.

Renney’s 10-year-old son, Bill, knew submarines were on the horizon. One time, he had climbed a tree and seen one.

Dorothy Renney simply set one less place at the dinner table. She never had a sit-down talk with her son about what may have happened.

He wondered if his father had been taken as a prisoner of war in another country. Over time that theory stopped making sense.

“If he was alive, then he would have gotten word back,” Renney said.

Seven years after pieces of the Miss Detroit were found in the gulf, a court awarded Dorothy Renney a death certificate. Though her husband had no life insurance, the ruling allowed his widow to sell their modest home.

From time to time, Sam Renney came up in family conversation. His wife remembered the way Sam cleaned fish in the back yard. He always threw the heads and tails to a ring of cats that formed around him.

Bill Renney is now 78 and retired from Ford Auto Co. He lives with his wife in Parrish.

About a year ago, he came across the Florida Fishermen Lost at Sea website.

He thought of his father, then clicked the submissions button on the site and began to type.

The boat Miss Detroit, captained by Sam Renney out of John’s Pass, disappeared on a routine fishing trip and never returned. Pieces of the boat were found in the following days but no bodies, there were 5 people on board.

It’s far from a eulogy. But in 67 years, it’s the first time he has acknowledged his father’s death in any public way.

“There is no grave,” he said. “No headstone. Nothing. This would at least be something to let people know that he did exist.”

Times researchers Mary Mellstrom and Shirl Kennedy contributed to this story. Andrew Meacham can be reached at (727) 892-2248 or ameacham@sptimes.com.

• • •

Learn more about the Florida Fishermen Lost at Sea Memorial by visiting the website www.floridafishermenlostatsea.com. You can submit information about fishing-related fatalities of Tampa Bay area residents through the website, or by calling Mark Hubbard at (727) 393-1947, ext. 418.

Last modified: May 02, 2010 12:32 PM]

Copyright 2010 St. Petersburg Times

By Emily Nipps, Times Staff Writer

The explosives were in place. TV cameras and crowds gathered to watch the first blast of the old John’s Pass Bridge. Wildlife officers, construction workers and bridge demolition experts stood by with walkie-talkies. “Ten … 9 … 8 … 7 … “ “A dolphin! There’s a dolphin!” screamed Ann Weaver, as several fins popped up near the bridge. The countdown stopped. At the time, August 2006, bridge workers didn’t know this woman. Maybe just another coastal resident who wanted to be a hero. They had no idea how intimately she knew these dolphins, or how devastating an underwater blast could be for her and 255 of her closest research subjects.

• • •

Few places in the world are as rich with marine life as the John’s Pass area. Some believe it’s because of the elaborate canals within the residential islands, ripe with little fish and crustaceans. It’s warm, shallow and friendly, with easy access to the Gulf of Mexico.

Paradise for bottlenose dolphins.

Ann Weaver, a 58-year-old animal behaviorist who moved here in 2003, saw opportunity in the John’s Pass bridge project.

Having studied dolphins at five sites around the world, she applied for a federal permit in 2004 to study the effect of bridge construction on local dolphins. Funded by a federal grant, the study will be filed with the U.S. government and go before scientific journals to be considered for publication.

Her research uniquely looks at a dolphin population before, during and after such construction.

“Humans are constantly doing things to the coastline,” Weaver said. “But it’s usually not until after the fact that we go, ‘Gee, we don’t have as many manatees as there used to be here.’ “

In 2005, she and her husband, John Heidemann, 58, set out on five years of detailed and painstaking documentation of the dolphins. A dozen times a month, they head out on a little powerboat and run the same six miles from their Isle of Capri home through Boca Ciega Bay up to the Tom Stuart Causeway.

They asked the St. Petersburg Times not to reveal specifics of the route, or the signal they use to alert dolphins of their boat.

After five years of riding the same route, writing a column about dolphins for a neighborhood paper and engaging her community, Weaver is well known for her work. Sometimes boats follow her and her husband. Sometimes they peel off and follow the dolphins.

Following or approaching dolphins is illegal without a permit, Weaver pointed out. It also interferes with her research.

“You have to live and let live,” she said.

Which is harder than it sounds when you begin recognizing the dolphins on first glance, knowing their triumphs and heartbreaks, and calling them your “kids.”

• • •

Weaver has identified about 255 dolphins who pass through the area, about half of whom are “resident” dolphins, while others come and go. She has about 62,000 photos of them — jumping from the water, cuddling with one another, close-ups of their fins and markings. Proof that they are who she says they are.

She named them, beginning with letters of the alphabet or combinations of letters. When she ran out of letters, she came up with names like Doodle, Candle, Schnoz, Midface, Oyster, Fugazi and Q-Ball. Sometimes it takes her years to figure out the sex.

They appear to recognize Weaver, flipping and jumping to show off, peering at her curiously when she wears a funny hat. She coos at them, laughs and yells “Higher!” when they leap through the air, playfully admonishes them when they disappear too long or act shy.

She never touches them or helps them.

“A good scientist would never do that,” she said.

Even when Juno got tangled up in fishing line, which dug into a fin, Weaver would only take notes. She was both fascinated and relieved when he showed up one day, free of the wire.

Weaver was devastated when Split had a baby and then watched the baby die the next day. Split pushed the dead baby around for a week, keeping other dolphins away. Then Split went into a depression and got dolphin pox before snapping out of it a year later.

In five years, Weaver has been exposed to an underwater soap opera that no one else in the Tampa Bay area has seen.

“It would be easy to make this stuff up,” she said.

But her copious notes, spreadsheets, photos and professional reputation back her up. She has logged analyses of dolphins and primates all over the world. Her 25-year career includes intense studies of whale behavior and the peacemaking skills of capuchin monkeys, but she does more conventional academic work, too. She teaches doctoral students statistics at Argosy University in Sarasota and recently published a book on the topic.

Still, it boggles the imagination to hear her speak of a pack of teenage dolphins all wearing sea grass “jewelry,” and a group of bulls breaking up from a huddle and playing “football.”

“You never want to anthropomorphize,” she said.

With animals as complex and sensitive and intelligent as dolphins, it’s difficult to create that distance. Even for a scientist.

• • •

The new $77 million John’s Pass Bridge was completed in December, more than four years after demolition began.

Few know how much care went into protecting wildlife, mainly manatees. State regulations require a wide safety zone around demolition sites, where a manatee cannot enter within 30 minutes of an explosion.

Sound or shock waves can easily deafen dolphins and manatees, which rely on hearing for safety, finding food and pretty much everything else. If the explosion is close enough, the shock waves can rupture an animal’s organs.

That’s why, on that day in August 2006, Weaver panicked.

“She thought she was helplessly watching an impending disaster,” said Bruce Hasbrouck, an environmental engineer assisting with the bridge project. Actually, workers already had stopped the countdown when Weaver screamed.

She called Hasbrouck a few days after the first blast and was relieved to learn that so many regulations and precautions were in place to protect manatees and her dolphins.

Over the years, Hasbrouck and Weaver talked at least once a month, and sometimes daily at the time of explosions or installation of pilings. Weaver never got in the way, Hasbrouck said. She only wanted information.

“She’s a good scientist,” he said. “Scientists have a hard time just collecting data, and she obviously has a lot of pride and satisfaction in what she does.”

Bridge builders in Florida are required to consider environmental factors on all projects, but Hasbrouck could not recall any that were so dolphin-centric.

“John’s Pass definitely has the highest density of them that I’ve ever seen, and I’ve done a lot of these projects,” he said. “The contractors said they saw them literally daily. They were starting to recognize them as well, by their markings and personality.”

With the bridge finished, Weaver is nearing the end of her studies. Her analysis, data and findings will be filed with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The conclusion on whether the bridge affected the dolphins is complicated, but if it had to be simplified, it would be this:

It wasn’t so bad.

“I think we can conclude that they slowly got used to it,” she said.

At times, such as when the construction was the heaviest and loudest, the dolphin population dropped. But most of the dolphins returned, including some new ones.

Weaver wonders what the numbers will look like in the coming years, now that the bridge is finished, and she also has concerns about how the oil spill might affect the gulf’s food sources, which would also affect the dolphins.

She has applied for a federal permit to study the dolphins for five more years.

Emily Nipps can be reached at nipps@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8452.

[Last modified: Jan 23, 2011 11:30 PM]

 Copyright 2011 St. Petersburg Times

When he was 17, he bought five rowboats and 40 cane poles from the concessionaire for $150. He bought his first charter boat after the war, and in 1954 established the first gulf coast half-day fishing party boat. In 1956 he began a marathon 18 hour fishing trip for hard-core anglers, and in 1971, he established overnight weekend trips to the far offshore fishing grounds.

The Eighth Avenue Pier became known as Hubbard’s Pier, until Wilson moved his operation to John’s Pass in 1976. Wilson Hubbard fulfilled another vision in 1979, with the opening of the Friendly Fisherman Seafood Restaurant, which still serves the freshest seafood available.

Party boat patrons can also enjoy eating their own “catch of the day” cooked at the Friendly Fisherman Restaurant for only $4.95 including “all the fixin’s”.

A true visionary, Wilson Hubbard was instrumental in the building and development of John’s Pass Village and the Boardwalk. In 2004, the second generation of the Hubbard family took over ownership of Hubbard’s Marina fishing operations, with Mark Hubbard as president and general manager.

Mark Hubbard’s Sea Adventures – Wilson’s youngest son, Mark, established Hubbard’s Sea Adventures, a Dolphin-Watching Nature Cruise operation that offers narrated tours of local environments, wildlife, and history. Wild pods of bottlenose dolphin, and endangered seabirds in mangrove island rookeries are now observed from a respectful distance, and hunted only with a camera.

Mark’s commitment to environmental education prompted him to create a new, more in-depth nature cruise of Upper Boca Ciega Bay Estuary. Visited by many Pinellas County school children annually, Hubbard’s floating classroom, Environmental Explorer, enables students to observe native wildlife in its natural habitat, explore and understand wetland environments, and discuss current environmental issues with the ship’s on-board naturalist.

Mark Hubbard, like his father, likes to keep one foot in the future. A forward looking company, Sea Adventures was merged with Hubbard’s Marina in 2004. It maintains a staff naturalist, updates cruise narration regularly to include current research, and encourages staff and visitors to make comments or suggestions on ways to improve the company and its cruises.

When Panfilo de Narvaez, a red-bearded, one-eyed conquistador, sailed into Bahia de la Cruz (now Boca Ciega Bay) in 1528, large kitchen middens of thriving settlements dotted the shoreline. Beyond the shore, elevated middens kept thatched sleeping quarters above seasonal flood levels, and high ceremonial middens with timber framed temples topped with effigies rose at the opposite end of the village.

Narvaez, and the Europeans that would follow brought disease for which the natives had no medicine or immunity, and ushered in an age of unprecedented greed that would change the face of Florida forever.

Back in the early part of the 19th Century, Florida was kind of a sore spot for the rest of the South. Then only a territory of the United States, Florida was a lawless land – a rugged terrain of pine woods, swamps, and mangrove tangled islands where folks could just “disappear”. Southern planters were particularly upset, because some of the folks that were disappearing South of the Georgia border and into the wilds of Florida were the planters’ runaway slaves.

Escaped slaves found refuge among the displaced Native American people who had been chased from their homelands and escaped to Florida, forming a mixed tribe band known as the Seminoles, or “wild ones”. Southern planters put increasing pressure on General Andrew Jackson to eradicate the Seminoles, and enable the capture and return of escaped slaves.

President Jackson, by 1830, gave his full support to a plan to remove “Indians” from the state, and began transporting Seminoles to a holding prison on a local key to await ships that would export them to reservations out West. Seminoles banded together to resist relocation efforts, and Jackson launched Florida neck deep into the Second Seminole War.

A crazed determination to eradicate Seminoles and populate Florida with White settlers led to desperate policies like The Armed Occupation Act of 1842, which gave homesteaders 160 acres of land, so long as they agreed to farm some of it, and (most importantly) fight the Seminoles should the need arise.

Two of the Gulf Coast’s early “pioneers” that took advantage of this act were our “opportunistic” heroes Joseph Silva and John Levique. Levique settled along the mainland coast of Upper Boca Ciega Bay near the area now known as St. Petersburg’s “jungle district”, while Silva’s acreage was farther north, around present-day 38th Avenue. It is unlikely that either man had any intention of anything more than “subsistence” farming (if that), and both men were more likely to fish with the Seminoles than fight with them. Levach and Silva would probably remain only curious names on early plat maps, had it not been for one ill-timed fishing expedition.

Late in the summer of 1848, Levique and Silva sailed to New Orleans to sell a cargo of Green Turtle. Sailing home after bacchanal celebration in the Big Easy, they encountered a horrific storm, and decided to wait it out in a “hurricane hole” in some sheltered area along the coast. The hurricane had knocked down trees, rearranging the shoreline, and obliterated former landmarks.

John Levique searched for an entrance into Boca Ciega Bay. He was probably looking for Blind Pass, or even Pass-a-Grille, but instead he found a more northerly opening where there had not been one previously. Levach awakened a bleary-eyed Silva, and together they navigated through the new pass on the morning of September 27, 1848. Since that time, so the legend goes, the inlet between Treasure Island and Madeira Beach has been called “John’s Pass” in honor of it’s discovery, and maiden passage by John Levique.

John’s Pass has shifted south, some speculate as much as 5,000 feet, since its formation during the Great Gale of 1848. As Madeira Beach has enjoyed land building to its south, the north end of Treasure Island seems to be eroding. Barrier islands are naturally dynamic; the waves and wind constantly shifting the sand, eroding one shoreline and building on another.

Prior to the Armed Occupation Act, few people thought to make permanent homes on the “keys” as the barrier islands were then called. No bridges then spanned the mainland to the beaches, and the barrier islands were primarily utilized for hunting and fishing expeditions.

Prior to plume hunting, land grabbing, and the building boom, the barrier islands were home to a tremendous variety of wildlife. Deer, gopher, tortoise, sea turtle, alligator, small mammals, and great flocks of seabirds and shore birds made their homes among the varied habitats of the islands. Spanish explorers customarily used the barrier islands and mangrove rookeries to stock their shipboard larders with fish, roe, a variety of game, and tremendous quantities of both seabird and turtle eggs and carcasses.

Florida’s native people, as well as the early settlers only killed what they needed to eat, however a growing population of opportunistic white settlers and greedy plume hunters quickly depleted barrier island wildlife populations, and nearly drove island bird species to extinction. Nefarious plume hunters, like the despicable Chevelier, whose encampment is still known as “Frenchman’s Creek”, boasted of collecting tens of thousands of bird skins, plumes and eggs in one season.

Whole rookeries and generations of birds were wiped out overnight. Some species are still considered endangered, or threatened. The barrier islands, by the turn of the century, were nearly devoid of wildlife, and ready for development. Wilson Hubbard helped convince the city to permit building of a public waterfront boardwalk along John’s Pass in 1980, and was instrumental in the development of the larger community of John’s Pass Village.

Hubbard added quaint boardwalk shops over his Marina in 1982 and 1983. John’s Pass Village and Boardwalk has become a popular attraction, yet it retains the feeling of a rustic fishing village where people can still find humble lodging and enjoy Florida’s simple pleasures: discovering and collecting treasure, strolling along the waterfront, dolphin watching, nature cruising, and of course, catching and eating fish. New stores and entertainment attractions, and a new garage have opened recently, and a renovated boardwalk with more shops will be competed later in 2007. And Levique is remembered every year with a popular John Levique Days Festival at John’s Pass Village, this year May 14 & 15, 2011.