BY JOHN JOHNSTON
The Cincinnati Enquirer
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Capt. Sue Sawyer on the deck of the Grand Victoria II
(Michael E. Keating photo)
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RISING SUN, Ind. -- People see the black and white uniform and sometimes mistake her for a bus driver.
They're half right. Capt. Sue Sawyer is a driver. Her route is a one-mile stretch of the Ohio River. Her rig is the Grand Victoria II.
At 322 feet, the gambling boat is about football-field length. It weighs 9,413 tons, almost equal to three Saturn V rockets. Capacity is 3,000 people, which would fill 50 Metro buses, standing-room-only.
On Sunday, the riverboat will begin its third year of operation in Rising Sun, Ind., at Grand Victoria Casino & Resort by Hyatt. Capt. Sawyer, who lives in Lawrenceburg, has been part of the crew from the start and was promoted to captain last spring.
The vessel's four captains work rotating shifts. She's the only woman; there are perhaps fewer than 10 female captains among the more than 150 gaming boat pilots in the U.S., industry officials estimate. Not that she lets gender matter.
"From my experience here, and working with her on tankers, she has always commanded respect," says deck mate Jason Hall, who has known her since both were freshmen at Maine Maritime Academy, in her hometown of Castine, Maine. "Not because she's a woman, but because she's good at what she does."
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GRAND VICTORIA II
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What: A replica of a 19th-century paddle-wheeler.
Dimensions: 322 feet long, 90 feet wide, 103 feet to the top of the forward smokestacks.
Weight: 9,413 tons.
Draft (depth of water needed to float): 9 feet.
Capacity: 2,700 passengers, 26 marine workers, 270 casino employees.
Maximum speed: About 10 mph.
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"You can just tell she's got the right stuff," says Capt. Donald J. Sanders, a Covington native now living in Metropolis, Ill. He is the Grand Victoria II's senior captain.
"I can tell right away, after just a few times with somebody, if they're going to make it. She's got the technique. She's an exceptionally fine boat handler." subhed:First captainship body:
It's late morning, and Capt. Sawyer, 43, is preparing for the last cruise on her 12-hour shift. A slight breeze barely ruffles her dark hair, which is short and wavy. She stands at the controls on the port bridge wing, a few steps outside the boat's pilothouse.
From her hand-held radio, a voice: "OK, cap, we're all free and clear, fore and aft."
"Roger," she responds. "All clear, all gone, all aboard, here we go."
She plugs her ears with her fingers. A deafening whistle blast signals that she is easing the boat away from the dock.
All aboard, here we go. That's the story of her life in the eight years since she graduated from the maritime academy. She's a single woman who loves being on the water; a good thing, too, because she's seen a lot of it.
She worked on a 1,200-foot commercial carrier, hauling crude oil from the Persian Gulf to South Korea. She had a stint on a private surveillance ship that contracted with the U.S. government to track submarines in the Mediterranean Sea. She joined a tanker crew in the Gulf of Mexico, then worked on a passenger ferry in Maine.
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Sawyer in the pilothouse.
(Michael E. Keating photo)
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This is her first captainship. And although she's dead serious about her work, she harbors a sense of humor.
"It's a lot more fun than driving a car," she says as the paddle-wheeler heads upriver on its two-mile round trip, hugging the Indiana shore. She steps back into the pilothouse. Plate-glass windows offer a panoramic view of forested Kentucky hills and Indiana cornfields. But it's a towboat pushing barges down river that grabs her attention.
Through trees, she catches a glimpse of the towboat's pilothouse before it rounds a bend in the river. It's in a blind spot that radar can't pick up.
She radios the towboat captain: "Good morning, cap. We're that gambling boat just around the bend."
Last-minute surprises can be dangerous. "Because of our respective sizes," she says, "you don't just go willy nilly up and down the river." Soon, the Harry Waddington is passing on Grand Victoria II's starboard side.
Once when a towboat captain wouldn't respond on radio, Capt. Sawyer tucked her riverboat close to the bank, so as not to meet him on the bend. Then she let go with long, loud horn blows.
"Our responsibility, bottom line, is the safety of everyone and everything," she says. On this trip, 836 passengers are aboard. On the floors below the pilothouse, lights flash as guests feed slot machines. The ride is so smooth, gamblers can easily forget they are on a boat.
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FREE MUSIC, CRUISES
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To celebrate its second anniversary, Grand Victoria Casino & Resort will offer free passes for all cruises Sunday. Cruises are at 9 and 11 a.m., 1,3, 5, 7, 9 and 11 p.m. and 1 a.m.
Country music performers the Lynns, Loretta's daughters Patsy and Peggy, will perform free 45-minute concerts in the pavilion at 2:15, 4:15 and 6:15 p.m.
Reservations: (800) 472-6311.
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Indeed, an irate customer once demanded to know why the boat wasn't cruising. Capt. Sawyer needed only point out the changing shoreline.
Wind makes for choppy water, which can be perilous both for waitresses carrying drinks and gamblers perched on the edges of their seats. Indiana law says gambling boats must make a reasonable attempt to sail; the captain has final say after checking weather and river conditions.
If the boat doesn't sail, gambling continues dockside.
Long before Sue Sawyer was a captain, boating was in her blood. She grew up on the Maine coast where her father, a former lighthouse keeper, took her onto a boat when she 11 days old.
But her marine career started relatively late. After high school, she left college without a degree. She was waitressing, wondering what to do next, when she heard an ambulance squad needed help. She became a paramedic and loved it.
By age 30, she needed a change. She thought about what was most important to her: financial security, a chance to travel.
So she entered the maritime academy, one of four women in a class of 150. She was a dozen years older than her classmates.
It was marching and running. Lots of "Yes, sir" and "No sir." It was "getting run over by 18-year-olds every morning." But she persevered.
Today, women are sprinkled throughout the marine industry, she says, although they are still a rarity.
Mr. Hall, the deck mate, says Capt. Sawyer would never ask a crew member to do anything she wouldn't do.
He's seen her descend a rotted rope and wooden ladder, 100 feet down the side of a 1,200-foot-long tanker, and jump onto the bow of a small boat being tossed around by rough seas. "That's indicative of her -- get right in there and do what you're supposed to do."
She says she doesn't desire to be captain of a supertanker. The Grand Victoria II is big enough.
On shipping vessels, a couple months of leave was sandwiched between several months of time at sea. Now she works two weeks' worth of daily 12-hour shifts, then gets two weeks off.
She enjoys being home part of every day. She's buying a house in Lawrenceburg and looks forward to having plants and pets. She will garden and explore this part of the world she now calls home.
"This is the most normal lifestyle I've had since I started shipping."
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