BON SECOUR, Ala. (WKRG) — The view from Penny Eilert’s waterfront property on Bon Secour river has changed. “It’s like Woah!!”
For almost two years a sailboat that had been stuck in the mud and muck 150 yards upriver from her home is now front and center. Her neighbor Kent Staub predicted something like this would happen back in September when the boat sat across the river from his property. “The right storm comes along that boat will end up in the middle of the river.”
Now it has. Half sunk, the barnacle-covered sailboat seems to be stuck again 20 yards from the end of Eilert’s pier. “I knew the Coast Guard had been out here and removed the gas and oil because they talked to us but they were confident that it would not be moving anywhere and there was nothing they could do about it,” says Eilert.
Property owners have been calling everyone they can think of for help for about two years now. “I haven’t heard back from them,” says Eilert. “Absolutely nothing.”
The Coast Guard may have thought it would never move but Mother Nature had other ideas. “It’s an eyesore but that’s not the biggest problem. The biggest problem is that it is hazardous,” says Eilert.
Whether to property or an unsuspecting boater Eilert fears the abandoned boat is an accident waiting to happen.
