Warden Tales: The ABCs of Rocket Science

www.ncwildlife.org

In recent years, North Carolina’s wildlife officers have received much recognition for their efforts in making our state’s waterways safe from those who operate their boats while impaired.  In particular, Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) recognized North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission’s Division of Law Enforcement as MADD’s agency of the year in 2010 for their efforts.  More recently, wildlife officers have taken a lead role in the On the Road, On the Water - Don't Drink and Drive campaign that targets impaired operators on and around our waterways.  Wildlife officers are true professionals in these types of law enforcement activities.

However, this wasn’t always the case.  In the early days of my career, we had very limited training in detecting impaired boat operators.  The drunks we arrested were usually severely impaired or had been involved in an accident.

That began to change in the late 1980s.  We received training in Standardized Field Sobriety Testing.  The tests were those used by officers who worked traffic enforcement and were difficult to transfer to the marine environment.  A friend of mine who was a state trooper said that his favorite preliminary test was to ask the operator to recite the alphabet (this later became a common test that was validated).  He reasoned that if you were too drunk to say your ABCs then you were too drunk to drive.

Sometime in the early 1990s, Fred Weisbecker and I were patrolling on Lake Lure, a small lake in western North Carolina.  I really disliked working on that lake.  First, it was very small - we could go from one end to the other in less than ten minutes.  Second, the lake is surrounded by lake front homes occupied by people who considered themselves affluent to the point that they expected to be left alone to do as they pleased.  These people may only visit their lake house a couple of times a summer, so their boats were often not in compliance with the law.  The combination of rich people getting citations will almost always result in complaints against officers.  And finally, in spite of its small size, the boat traffic was heavy, making for a bone jarring day on the water.

Birds-eye view of Lake Lure

But, something that made working Lake Lure interesting was the variety of people we encountered on the lake.  It wasn’t uncommon come across people from all over the country.

So, Fred and I were out there putting around the docks of million dollar homes, watching $75,000 boats filled with teenagers zip around when we saw an old runabout bobbing near the end of a dock.  Those old boats always drew our attention because there was almost certainly some type of violation occurring.  We approached the boat and saw two men, one older and one younger, just sitting in the boat.  The older man was obviously impaired, but neither were operating the boat.  We checked their equipment and warned the older man not to operate the vessel - the younger guy wasn't drinking.  He gave us a slurred “Okay” and we pulled away.  Then we did what all good game wardens do – we pulled around behind the next dock, and waited for the drunk to get behind the wheel – which he did as soon as we were out of sight.  We stopped him as he began to pull away.

I began to put him through my limited repertoire of field sobriety tests.  He basically clapped his hands when I asked him to do the hand pat test.  Then, I began the setup before asking him to recite his alphabet.  I asked about his educational background (college graduate) and what type of work he did. 

"Houston, we have a problem"

“I am an aerospace engineer with NASA.”

I clarified by asking, “So, you are a rocket scientist?” 

“I guess you could say that.” 

“So, as a rocket scientist, you shouldn’t have any problem reciting the alphabet, beginning with A and ending with Z.”

“Absolutely not.”

He ran through “A,B,C,D,E,F,G” but then began to stumble incoherently to a Spanish sounding, "El emento P" (L,M,N,O,P) and then more babbling and random letters before triumphantly ending with a strong “Zzzz!!!” (there was an implied, "Tada!!!").

We placed him under arrest and we made our way back to my vehicle.  On the drive to jail, he said, “I’m really not that drunk.”

I said, “You are an aerospace engineer that can’t recite your ABCs.  What do you think the judge will say?”

He hung his head and after a few seconds he whispered, “Damn.”