2025 Wrap - A Big Thank You
As 2025 draws to a close, I want to extend our thanks to the donors who have supported us throughout the year. Some of our biggest donors are our friends and family members who understand our commitment to our cause. We’ve also received donations from families and friends of those we’ve been able to help. Donors also include anonymous individuals in the general public. And we want to thank you all. Every donation, in any amount, is truly appreciated.
An Exceptionally Frugal Crew
Our team started with self-funding - we truly believe in this mission. And we are committed to do as much a possible with whatever resources are available to us. Nobody receives any income from this work. None. The money we spend has maximum impact for the people we help. Here’s a quick run-down of our main expenditures throughout the year.
Overhead
OK, pretty boring stuff here, but every organization has some overhead expenditures. Here are ours:
Insurance and registration fees for our boat, trailer, and work van
Storage fees for our boat and larger equipment (individual members store some equipment at their homes)
Web site, internet, and domain renewal fees
Accounting fees for making sure we’re compliant with necessary IRS and state codes
Repairs!
We had significant expenses over the past year for boat repairs, van mechanical repairs, tires, brakes, etc. We’re cheapskates, though!
If you’ve been around boats much, maybe you’ve heard that B.O.A.T. stands for “bust out another $$thousand”.
There’s too much truth to this joke, unfortunately. Boats are subject to a lot of wear and tear, especially work boats used in harsh conditions. And our boat, built in 1978, is no exception. It’s a terrific workhorse, but it needed major repairs this year.
This included a complete engine rebuild. Which we did at a fraction of the cost you might expect. How? We pulled the engine our ourselves, dismantled it, shipped it to be remanufactured in Wyoming, and then reassembled and re-installed it.
This might seem excessive, but whether we’re spending your money, or our own, we stretch it as far as possible. And our members are as tenacious on land as they are on the water.
We did have to call in a few favors from friends for engine lifts, warehousing, forklifts, and so on, but we got it done.
During this process, we also discovered that our outdrive (the boat’s transmission) had some major issues, and so we replaced that as well.
Other significant repair costs this year included rebuilding/replacing the boat trailer brakes, an important safety consideration. And we needed to replace tires on both the van and boat. Oh yeah, the van need some engine repairs, too…
Bust out another $thousand, indeed!
Another unforeseen expense: our ROV blew a primary circuit board. True to form, we enlisted free labor to do the installation, from a robotics expert that helps us out. Well, since he’s married to one of the crew he might not have a choice, but he sure seems happy to help.
Operational Expenses
To round out the picture, the balance of our expenditures are really just for operations - fuel, some food, and occasionally a cheap hotel room if we need to travel longer distances. There might be other minor expenses, like SCUBA tank fills, boat launch and inspection fees, and so on. But like everything else, we’re pretty frugal here.
Behind the Scenes
If you’ve read this far, and you’re getting the impression that there’s a lot going on behind the scenes, you’re absolutely right. We’re aware of a few social media hustlers out there who make it look like the process of locating and recovering drowning victims is one big high-drama reality show with new episodes daily. The reality is far different.
It takes many hours of preparation and ongoing training to be able to really make a difference when the professional first responders and law enforcement exhaust search resources. It’s a lot of hours of tedious work on mechanical and electronic issues. Hours on the phone with families helping them to understand the process and find the right resources. And even the search process, done properly, involves many hours of planning and methodical execution.
We’ve seen how important this work can be, and we’re 100% committed to doing the job right - efficiently, professionally, and ethically. And as we wrap up (hopefully) our work for 2025, I want to close with another big “thank you” to our supporters and donors. We couldn’t do it without you.
