Ron Jones Sr. Articles 4.5.07 - Miracle in Montreal 2.4.07 - A Tribute to John Leach

4.5.07

Miracle in Montreal
by Ron Jones Sr.

This story is a little harder to tell, not so much because of the content, but because of the lack of ability to convey the depth of emotions which occurred, by the boat racers, fan, medical workers, and especially the family of the one involved.

Since the story itself will probably be long, I will leave out much of the background ad set-up and begin with the actual event.  Because of the kindness of my daughter, Becky and her husband, my awesome son-in-law, Wes Carman, I was able to attend a Grand Prix Hydro Race at St. Timothee, P.Q., Canada..  Becky flew to Seattle to be with her mom, and I flew to Montreal, to meet Wes and the crew.  Wes had a Grand Prix boat in conjunction with Pierre LaVigne of Canada, and had been working on it feverishly getting it ready for the St. Timothee event.  Only one problem ____ the canopy was on the boat and working but some of the interior bracing was not yet complete.  The decision was made to go to that particular race, by the sponsor --- need I say more.

So there we all were, a day in advance in the pit area, which by the way was a long way from the course, and it was not very nice weather with the weatherman promising even worse for the next day, race day.  There was a field of smaller limiteds there to add to the show, plus enough Grand Prix boats to require split heats.

Race day dawned pretty ugly, what with occasional rain, lots of clouds and way too much wind.  The fans began coming to this unusual site, and before long there began to be a crowd.  Because of the wind conditions, the referee and racers agreed to stand by and see if things got better.

I said it was an “unusual” site.  I had already mentions the pits were a long way from the course, but beyond that, to get there you had to come, on foot, across a small bridge to get on the “island” where all this was to be held.  I hope the Canadians will forgive me, but a great race course it was not.  But the fans came pumped up, as those were the glory days of GP racing.  Futhermore, alcoholic beverages were sold to the fans, and because we kept delaying racing, due to the wind, the fans were getting pretty wound up.

When I talk about “wind conditions” a further work is needed here.  All racers, all their racing careers, have experienced “wind”, and its effects on racing.  I fully believe that had other factors not existed, the event would have been cancelled.  We are used to seeing trees swaying back and forth on windy days, but these trees were not swaying.  They were bent over due to the terrific force of the wind and stayed bent over all day.

About this time the crowd grew active and the race officials became frightened.  The Referee called another owner/driver/officials meeting and he laid it out, in no uncertain terms.  The property owners feared damages from the now wild crowd, and told the race officials they must race, immediately.  So the driver were told to just go out and run around the course close together trying to look like a race without really racing.  The limiteds were told to go home but the GPs were to put on a show.
I told Wes to be extra careful, and while they were lowering the GPs in the water, I took off walking, hoping I could find some place to see them run from a closer vantage point.

As the first heat got underway, I somehow had a sick feeling, as when all conditions are great I’m nervous, but these conditions were terrible.

The heat got underway and I was still walking through the woods trying to find a place to see them.  But it was immediately apparent that there was no sense in  going further, as viewing wasn’t going to get any better.  These were a number of good boats, and Wes’s heat had Jimmy King in it and Jim was the boat to beat.  So at first everything seemed OK as different boats lead at different times, but soon, Jim King had taken a lead and Wes didn’t want him to have it all his way.  So the two of them kept forging ahead of each other, a little faster, until they were going full out, neither one wanting to give in to the other.

Although the crowd was whooping it up, I was beside myself worrying and wishing they wouldn’t race, and the heat would get over.  But of course, while trying to re-capture the lead going into the wind Wes’s boat went over.

Because I was so far away from everything I had no way to know what went on next so I took off on a run to the pits.  I had not realized I had gone so far away until I tried to get back.. Wes’s boat was upside down in the water when I got back, and everyone was in a very somber mood so I finally found Pierre, LaVigne and asked him what was going on.   I can’t describe the look on his face as he said “Wes is dead”.  I immediately replied with, “No he isn’t, where can I see him?”  Pierre seemed perturbed and said “I said he is dead ____ rigor mortis has already set in, as him arms and shoulders have rolled in as well as his feet and legs.  He is already in the ambulance on the way to a morgue, and besides, our race medical official pronounced him dead.”

I cannot tell you why, but I wasn’t upset and I was not buying any of it.  I found the ambulance just driving away and I stopped him and told him to take Wes to the hospital.  After a lot of complaints he agreed, and I got someone to drive me, following the ambulance.

Emergency unloaded him and then someone who could barely speak English asked me what was wrong with him.  I quickly explained he had been trapped upside down in the water and please hurry.  There was no one else at  the hospital and I found a waiting area and dropped to my knees to pray for him.

After about 20 minutes someone came to me from emergency and said “What do you expect us to do?  He hasn’t breathed for who knows how long, his lungs, stomach esophagus, airway, nostrils and head are full of water.  What do you want us to do?”
I said,  “You please keep on working on him and I will stay here and pray”  Before long they came out again and said “We can do nothing.  We are a very small hospital with limited resources.  He needs to go to a big hospital in Montreal”.  So I said put him in the ambulance and I will ride with him.   This ambulance driver was awesome __they have noises they can make to get people out of the way you can’t imagine __ people were pulling off the road full __ tilt when we came by.  The hospital was 45 minutes away and we flew.

When we got there, he backed in and some young guy in torn jeans and a tee-shirt was there to receive him and told me to go to the office and handle the paperwork, and “Oh by the way, what happened to him?”   I quickly explained and headed for the office.

When I finished the paperwork, I headed up to I think was the 9th floor __the floor where they take those who aren’t going to make it.  But they wouldn’t let me in his room, and said to wait in a waiting room, and they would let me know.  So I found a small waiting room and once again dropped to my knees.  It was hours before anyone came and it was the guy with the torn jeans and a tee-shirt.  It turns out he was the doctor and what a great guy and great doctor.  He said “I can find no sign of life in him, what do you want me to do?”  I begged him to keep pumping him out and treat him like the drowning victim he was.  He graciously said he would keep trying, and that I could come in twice a day,  once in the morning for two minutes and once in the evening for two minutes.  So I stayed in the waiting room another day with the same result, but the next morning when I went into this huge wad, one of the nurses ran over to me and said “We moved him, you will be surprised”.   So I followed her to him and he was sitting up trying to eat some ice cream.

I say trying, because he couldn’t seem to get the spoon in his mouth.  He put ice cream on his forehead, his nose, and cheeks, but not in his mouth.  He didn’t seem to recognize me, so I got the doctor and asked him what was wrong?  He was surprised I was concerned and said “What do you expect?  You bring us someone who was dead and now you expect perfection?”  I did not want to seem unappreciative but I said I had been praying for a miracle for two and a half days and this wasn’t what I expected.  SO I encouraged him to continue on, and I went back to my prayer room.  That evening, when I was allowed back in, the nurse all grinned at me and went with me to him.  This time he was sitting up, eating ice cream perfectly and said “Hi, dad.  I completely broke down, we hugged and the miracle was wonderful!

Now, I have been very long in writing this and I could have easily added many more pages.  But I want to bottom-line what you have read.  First of all, every word is true and verifiable, as God is my witness.  The events are these: His boat blower over in a 30mph headwind, and when it hit the F16 canopy shattered because the interior bracing was not yet installed and the broken pieces took the air mask right off his face and he was hit badly enough in other places to be rendered unconscious.

He was upside down in the water, still strapped in, and a rescue diver went down to help him.  When he couldn’t get him loose, he checked his pulse and re-surfaced.  The medic in the rescue boat asked what was going on and the diver said he checked and Wes was dead.  When asked how he knew he said he checked for a pulse and there was none.  The medic told the diver that only he (the medic) would decide whether or not he was dead and to go back down and get him.  The diver was apparently unable to free him alone and came back for help.  It took a very ling time to get him to the surface and various times have been offered as to how long he was under water.  Those estimated range from nine minutes to thirteen minutes. 

When he was brought in, the medic said he was dead, and no further effort was made to revive him at the race site.  When I finally got there he was in the ambulance, ready to go to the morgue.

Form that point you know the rest of the story, just about.  As I look back, I am amazed at my own immediate reaction __ no panic, no fear __ I just said he’s not dead, take him to the hospital.  I heard no voices nor had anyone there who closely agreed with me.  I just did it.  This has to be God.

After I was finally ready to go home and he was recovering in the ward, the doctor (no more jeans and tee-shirt) and nurses and I stood together to say goodbye.  After a few appropriate remarks all around, we all looked at one another and there was a very tearful group hug.  Then, the doctor told me this:  “Every one of us in this little group know, assuredly, that we have been a part of a miracle.  By the time you got him here over an hour had gone by since his accident.  He was still full of water, and we all knew he was dead.  Your faith told you to press on, and we did.  If I were to write my report, which is required of me just as it happened, my superiors would throw it away and make me write a believable one.  But this little group right here all knew we have witnessed a miracle.  God did this, not medicine.”

I hated to leave them as we all shared a small part of each other’s lives.  But the absolute truth is this:  There is a God, he does want to be a part of each one of us.  It is our decision.

Oh, by the way, Wes’s present “hobby is deep-sea diving __ I mean deep, Andrea Doria, or deep underwater cave deep-diving.

Ron Jones

2.4.07

A tribute to John Leach
by Ron Jones Sr.

Many years ago, about in the mid 1950’s, a friend of mine from high school days at Highline High, came to me and said he would like me to build him a race boat. He was “interested in the 136 c.ubic inch class (today’s 2.5 L stock). I had rented a shop located where, today Associated Grocer’s has their huge warehouse at the south end of Boeing Field in Seattle, so I said I would be glad to do so.

I proceeded to draw up a hull, lay it out full-size and begin construction. I was about 23 or 24 and was building the 7 litre “Whiz Ski” in my basement at home at the same time. So during the day I would work on “Whiz Ski” and at night work on the 136 hull for my good friend, John Leach. I wasn’t exactly a full-fledged woodworker as yet so I think it took a few months to build.. And I also remember that once John got the engine installed, you couldn’t get in the cockpit unless you wanted to cut off your legs.

Ultimately John got himself fit into the boat and we were ready to test. In those wonderful days you could test your boat on Lake Washington, anytime, any day and without permits. So we went to where the pits are now but there were not pits there then.

So we tested and thought we were pretty hot. There was to be a race on Lake Sammamish, where we race now, in a week or two, so we got ready. By the way, there was no park there then, just an open field next to the lake.

Neither John nor I had any idea what we had to do to enter, etc.., but eventually we got it handled on race day. But something new rose its ugly head – very rough Sammamish water. But we watched other people racing and assumed we could do it too.

So, when John’s heat came up, first one of his career, I pushed his boat and trailer out into the lake and went back to help John get into the boat. Once he was ready we waited a few minutes for the 5 minute gun. When it went off (they used little cannons in those days) I pushed him away and off he went. There were quite a few participants in his class, and finally they made a start. Not only was the water rough, but 8 or 9 entries left a lot of wakes, especially when you were behind, and John’s first heat of inboard racing was a nightmare, and he couldn’t wait to get it over with and get back on the beach. I was standing in the water waiting for his return, and didn’t expect what was to happen next.

He got out of the boat, walked right past me without saying anything, backed the trailer in the water and got me to help him load the boat and then told me that was his first and last race. The water was so rough that he said he would never race again and the boat was For Sale.

Well, John was my friend, and I wanted to help him. So I re-fueled the boat, drained it and got it ready for the final heat. While I was working on it the oil pressure gauge sprung a leak and was shooting oil inside the cockpit. I got that handled and the boat was ready for the final. The only thing was John said if it was going to be in the final I would have to drive it because he wouldn’t so when the heat came up, I got the boat launched, asked someone to hold it for me, and I went up on the beach, literally picked John up, and I carried him out to the boat and stuffed him in the seat, and say very firmly, “you drive this thing, and you drive it hard!” I gave him his jacket and helmet and pushed him away. He drove a reasonable race and came in feeling quite different than after the first heat, even though the water was still very rough.

Now, if you know anything about John Leach’s racing career, you know he became one of the best, if not the very best driver ever to compete in boat racing. There was nothing he couldn’t do with a hydro, and his litany of wins, championships, world records in both the straightaway and on the race course testify to his greatness.

All the years he raced limiteds, I tried to get some of the unlimited owners to consider him for their driver, but in those days owners were hard to consider, and they would often choose some friend’s cousin or an airplane pilot before they would choose a limited driver. If anyone could and should have driven an unlimited it was John.

Yes, I am very favorable toward John, but I think my years of experience (58) qualify me to judge boat drivers, and John deservse the credit. He has been one of my very best friends for 50 years, and I would like to express my thanks to a great guy who did a lot to advance my boat designs as well as being a good friend.

Ron Jones