Chapter 42: Ship Collision! Rescue! Powerless
"Mr. Derrida? 'Bavarian Boar'?" Xiao Peng didn't understand what was going on. Why did the signal go dead?
He stuck his head out of the cabin and took a look at the sea in the distance. He gasped: "Oh my god! Did we have a shipwreck?"
The ships on the sea formed a defensive line with their hulls in an attempt to stop a small cargo ship. Although the cargo ship slowed down, it still lost control and crashed into a sightseeing boat.
This was a boat in Marseille's Old Port that specifically took tourists on sightseeing trips offshore. It was a large ship among the protesting vessels, but compared to the cargo ship, it was nothing! Many people on board were holding protest signs. The collision caused the boat to tilt severely, and many people fell into the water!
The nearby boats wanted to lend a helping hand but didn't know how to do it: their boats were not very big, and there were only life jackets but no lifeboats on board. It would definitely be dangerous to drive the boat over directly!
There was a lifeboat on the sightseeing boat, but it happened to be at the location where the two ships collided. It was immediately destroyed and could not be used at all!
The cargo ship has already begun to drop anchor. It absolutely cannot move now, otherwise there will definitely be casualties! If there is a collision, there are insurance companies, but if there is a loss of life, it will be troublesome! For the cargo ship, the more you do, the more mistakes you make. Stopping is the best option.
But the nearby ocean currents have made it a mess. It is very dangerous for people or ships to approach there now!
The people on these boats were all experienced sailors, so no one dared to jump in to rescue them. They could only throw lifebuoys and life jackets to the drowning people from a distance! Xiao Peng saw Mr. and Mrs. Derrida tying a rope to a lifebuoy and throwing it into the sea for the drowning people to grab and pull them back out!
For the current situation, this is undoubtedly the best way, but they really can't throw it that far, so they can only call out to the people who fell into the water and signal them to swim quickly to the lifebuoy!
Those who fell into the water were tossed up and down in the waves stirred up by these boats, which was very dangerous. It was okay for some people on the boat who were wearing life jackets, but those who were not would be in trouble. Even if they could swim, such waves would greatly weaken their physical strength!
"The sightseeing boat is taking in water!" someone suddenly shouted.
The boat, severely capsized, began taking on water. Everyone gasped: With water now flooding the boat, the people on board had no chance of saving themselves! Was it going to sink?
Mr. Derrida saw Xiao Peng and waved desperately at him on the boat, signaling Xiao Peng not to go over there. Xiao Peng's sailboat was difficult to control, and in such water conditions, it would be difficult for him to protect himself and it would only cause trouble!
Xiao Peng also knew this, but he had no time to consider the matter of human life, so he immediately lowered the sails and dropped anchor.
This should be a two-step process: first lower the sail to reduce the speed of the boat and then drop the anchor, but Xiao Peng does not have time now and can only do both at the same time. The anchor keeps scraping against the seabed, and the hull is constantly impacted by the force of the anchor hitting the seabed, making a squeaking sound!
Xiao Peng didn't care whether the hull could withstand the pulling force. He simply adjusted the direction of the bow to let it slow down and then plunged into the seabed!
Others don't dare to go into the sea in such a current? I do!
"Xiao! Are you crazy? It's too dangerous! Come up quickly!" Mrs. Derrida was frightened when she saw Xiao Peng swimming towards her, and shouted at Xiao Peng from the side of the boat.
Xiao Peng shouted to Mrs. Derrida, "Mrs. Derrida, throw me the lifebuoy and let me get the rope in longer! Don't say it's useless when lives are at stake!"
Mrs. Derrida gritted her teeth and threw the lifebuoy to Xiao Peng: "God bless you!"
Xiao Peng took the lifebuoy and swam back towards the drowning victims. He really wanted to tell Mrs. Derrida that he didn't believe in God, but now was not the time for such witty remarks. With so many people drowning, he was racing against time.
The waves hit Xiao Peng again and again, which was a test of Xiao Peng's physical strength!
He painstakingly handed the lifebuoy to an elderly woman who had fallen into the water closest to him. The elderly woman must have been in her sixties. "Why are you joining in the fun at your age?" "Do you have to give up your life in advance before you're happy?"
Xiao Peng helped her put on the lifebuoy and signaled Derrida and his wife to pull the rope.
Now he realized what it meant to be powerless. There were too many people drowning here! One lifebuoy was not enough to save them all!
"Help me! I can't swim!"
"Help! My leg is cramping!"
"God! Someone please save me!"
"This is murder! I'm going to call the police! Forget it, I won't call the police, just rescue me first!"
Xiao Peng was surrounded by cries for help, and he was alone, unable to save anyone! Furthermore, the currents here were too chaotic, making swimming difficult and slow! This wouldn't work! He had to find a way!
At this time, neither the octopus nor the jellyfish can do anything, as they are not good at swimming. The octopus is better, but the jellyfish spends most of its time drifting with the current, and only moves to the deep sea to avoid the typhoon when it comes.
Um?
Suddenly, an idea flashed through Xiao Peng's mind.
Why can jellyfish always avoid typhoons? It is because jellyfish have amazing hearing. The hearing organs in their bodies can sense infrasound, which is the frequency that travels the farthest. In this way, jellyfish can sense typhoons before they arrive and dive into the deep sea to avoid them.
That's not the key point. The most important question is: Why do they swim to the deep sea? Because it's safe! Except for areas with unusual seafloor topography or where ocean currents flow, the seabed is generally calm. Even when the surface is pounding with stormy weather and heavy waves, a few dozen meters below the surface, it's completely peaceful, as if nothing has happened. Such surges are completely imperceptible when diving only three or five meters below the surface.
How much easier and less strenuous would it be to swim that way? Plus, your vision would be much better at the bottom of the sea, so you wouldn't miss someone dying!
That’s it!
After figuring this out, Xiao Peng dived directly into the seabed!
However, when he reached the bottom of the sea, he did not take action immediately. Instead, he used his underwater super vision to observe the surroundings to see if there was anyone in distress.
Next to him was the capsized boat, and then there were the people who fell into the water swaying with the waves. The better situation was that although some people seemed to be struggling and their hands and feet were moving frequently, so far no one had sunk to the bottom of the sea and was in critical condition.
Further away are the bottoms of those demonstration ships. Where are our own sailboats?
He turned around and saw his sailboat. The anchor had finally hooked onto the reef on the seabed and stopped.
But a big black shadow at the bottom of the boat made Xiao Peng speechless - isn't this the big nurse shark that he called 'Nightingale'?
How did it get here?
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