There was a piece in the Surfer's Journal on him a while back. Written by OneWorldEd I think? Great piece.
Words by Chris Dixon
Feature
Light / Dark
In issue 24.2 of TSJ, I wrote a profile of of Ealey, whom I first met while researching my book
Ghost Wave. After the book was published, even more folks contacted me with stories about Cortes. One of the most interesting people I met as a result was a guy named Brad Mongeau. Brad lives in Long Beach. He’s a retired aerospace engineer whose life revolves around the islands, kelp forests, and reefs of the outer California Bight. San Nicolas and San Clemente islands are his playgrounds. But to Brad, nowhere is more special than the Cortes Bank. To date, he’s spent 40 nights solo atop the Bank, aboard a 21-foot skiff that he built by hand. He freedives out there, over the wreck of the SS
Jalisco—which was sunk in 1966 as part of an ill-conceived attempt to turn the Bank back into an island. Mongeau’s spirit of adventure and love of Cortes carried obvious parallels to Ealey, which came through in this interview.
So tell me a little about your history.
I grew up in the San Fernando Valley. My family moved to Fountain Valley during my early high school years, and my dad had a boat—an old wooden Fellows & Stewart. We’d go a couple of miles out, off the harbor, and that got me hooked. Then, when I got out of the service, I went out on a couple of sportfishing boats, and said, “I gotta do this on my own.” That’s when I bought my first boat—a 16-foot skiff. Then five years later, in 1991, I designed the boat that I still have now.
How’d you get into freediving?
Years ago, when I’d go out on my first skiff, I figured, as long as I was out there, what the hell? So I bought a mask, fins, and a wetsuit. A couple of years after that, my wife Jenny bought me a camera for Christmas and I just started swimming around with that camera. Up till about ’99, I fished—in fact that was the purpose of the boat. But I gave up fishing and have just done underwater photography since then.
What made you decide to build your own skiff—and how did you go about it?
My old skiff —the first one—I just endured these godforsaken afternoons pounding back from the islands. I didn’t even have enough sense to put on waterproof clothes. After those windswept afternoons, I thought, “How would I have built this thing differently?” The floor started to get soft on the other boat, so I designed a new one in my head. I got some cardboard, scotch tape, and made a model. Then I drew up a set of plans, but just put ’em away in a closet. Then I just went out and cut my wood and built the boat. I didn’t use my plans. I just knew what to do. I used marine plywood, mahogany, stainless steel, and fiberglassed just over the bottom portion of it.
“I built my boat like an airplane,” Mongeau says of the backyard-designed skiff. “I made every component as big as can be—and with as few components as possible. Photo: Brad Mongeau
Just working by sight.
Yeah. I just knew exactly what I wanted. When I worked in aerospace, I got to witness some of the greatest examples of structural engineering imaginable. C-17 airplanes have stringers inside the wings. They actually transport these quarter-inch-thick, 2″ x 2″ x 90-foot-long angles. They go through all the hassle to get that one 90-foot-long piece because they know they can’t splice it and maintain that strength. So I built my boat like an airplane: I made every component as big as can be—and with as few components as possible. Seams are where boats fall apart, so I scarf-spliced every piece except the side panels—and applied those as one single piece of wood.
What were your other criteria for these offshore runs?
Well it had to be very strong, obviously, but it also had to have a tiller engine. A tiller affords you instant lock-to-lock steering should you need it in rough seas, and articulate throttle control. I can drop my engine 3,000 rpms instantly and have that bow go down over a swell rather than have it bang over the surface.
Also, I made it wider at the impact point, one-third of the way back from the bow. That’s the widest point. I decided to put a lifting strike on the transom. I actually have two lifting points—one in the forward end and one in the back.
So I have a conflicting lift on the boat, with a flat bottom in between. That keeps the hull sucked to the water. It works really well. I’ve never seen it in another boat, but that’s the secret that makes a flat bottom work in heavy seas.
If you set my boat on the ground, the hull is flat, but about six feet from the front, it makes a parabolic curve up six inches, then three inches up to the transom as well. The one single feature on every boat that makes it capsize is water accumulating at the transom while the boat’s at rest. If water comes into my boat at rest, it accumulates in the belly of the boat, so if my boat sinks, it sinks level. But in the center, I also have a 2,000-gallon-an-hour bilge pump and then a self-priming bilge in the transom for when the boat’s underway. At night, when I go to sleep, I arm the bilge in the belly of the boat with a buzzer—and that lets me know if the pump goes off at night.
You also put little windows in the sides and on the hull looking down into the water.
Yeah, I have a half-tent that I sleep under to keep the dew off. I put those in because I was in a little dark hole up there. Then the window to the undersea is in the cockpit—in the floor. I did that in the late ’90’s. Engineered it on vellum, then took it to a machine shop. I paid $1,400 bucks for it. But it works awesome. I’ve seen blue sharks, blue whales, Bluefin tuna, orca, yellowtail, giant sea bass, dolphins, and gray whales through it.
How about communications gear?
A new generation EPIRB—I started using one of those five years ago. A satphone, cellphone, three VHF radios—two waterproof handheld and one built in, and a really nice stereo. It’s powered by a big glass-pack Group 31 battery. Oh, then I also have GPS and autopilot for tiller arm with a remote I can use when I’m, say, following a school of dolphins. Sometimes it’s just a lot of fun to have that on. I’ll just go to the islands with the autopilot on and just stand there and look around.
When you first built it did you think you’d be taking it to San Clemente and Cortes? Or has the boat evolved into a beast that will take you out for that?
I knew exactly where I wanted to go. With my 16-foot skiff, I touched San Clemente about five times. I was very familiar with being offshore in a small boat. I needed a boat I could get back in rough weather with and not worry about anything. I’m on my seventh engine on this boat. I don’t wear anything out.
A lesson from aerospace. Replace it before you have to worry it’s gonna screw up.
Right, then I sell the used motor for a good price too.
“I love the desolation [of Cortes],” says Mongeau, “When I’m out there, I’m thinking anything could happen.” Above: Mongeau’s sleeping quarters aboard his skiff; the Cortes buoy; a view of the skiff’s undersea window. Photo: Brad Mongeau
What do you remember from your first trip to Cortes?
We got GPS in 1993—a TrackStar handheld unit. I went to San Clemente Island one day, then the next day, the weather was beautiful. So I just headed out then followed my numbers. It was all digital. I get out there, and see the red buoy out there and the turbulence coming off the wreck. I’m thinking that turbulence must be Bishop Rock. I’d been out to Cortes in a sport boat once or twice, but I didn’t even know there was a wreck out there. I had no idea. So I get over there, anchor and swim over to it and realize, wait, there’s a wreck—right down there. I’ve been swimming on it ever since.