It Was a Whale of a Year: And of so Much More Oddness That Defines the Florida Keys

By Kevin Wadlow, Florida Keys Keynoter, Marathon

Dec. 30–The sperm whale didn’t come back from the dead, but came back while dead.

Islamorada’s new high-tech sewer system had excrement flowing – into homes.

An actual court argument debated whether a historic bridge that once linked Key West to the mainland legally counts as part of the United States.

And those were barely the tips of our subtropical iceberg of odd.

As 2006 passes into the history books, Florida Keys residents once again can look back and proudly claim: This place is weirder than your place.

No incident represented the strangeness of the Keys better than the sperm whale, which took up residence twice – once while alive (albeit barely) and again after its demise.

The 40-foot whale – think Moby Dick – stranded itself in late July on a flat off Spanish Harbor Channel near Big Pine Key. Rescue efforts were launched but to no avail.

That left the marine mammal’s multi-ton remains partially exposed, and within sniffing distance of the Seven Mile Bridge.

Federal officials contracted a work barge to tow the carcass far out to sea, where it could be sunk out of sight and smell – and maybe contribute to that whole circle-of-life thing.

But like something out of a soggy Stephen King novel, the whale came back from 17 miles offshore – currents washed it up on an oceanside flat just off the Seven Mile Bridge.

There being no governmental budget for “disposing of whale remains that have already been disposed of once,” the dead whale remained.

Local birds rejoiced.

Then, in October, a Lower Keys man was charged with a breaking a federal law that protects whales, alive or dead.

Ty Symroski was cited for collecting a bone from the carcass. Symroski also was Monroe County’s chief of planning.

Officials scurried to collect what remained of the bones, including the 10-foot skull, now slated to become a teaching aid at Florida State University’s oceanography department.

But lest you think 2006 was only the year of the whale, think again.

One group of Cubans crossed the Florida Straits to the Seven Mile Bridge – twice – this year.

In early January, a group of 15 refugees escaped the island nation, and were found on a piling of the old Seven Mile.

Federal policy says Cubans who reach U.S. shore can stay, but those caught at sea must return to Cuba. The old Seven Mile does not count as U.S. soil, said officials, who sent them back.

A court later ruled that – of course – the Seven Mile does indeed count as part of the United States. The wrongly deported refugees can return, the court said.

But Cuban authorities did not race to assist the return.

So nine of the refugees again took it into their own hands, and slipped away in a homemade boat.

On Dec. 15, they wound up at the south end of the new Seven Mile Bridge. And got to stay.

In April, a group of three fishermen bagged more than they bargained for when angling near Alligator Reef off Islamorada – a human head and part of a spine.

They brought it to their boat, then notified the U.S. Coast Guard, then the Sheriff’s Office took possession of it and brought to the the Monroe County Medical Examiner’s Office.

The body parts weren’t identified, there was no obvious sign of the cause of death, and no missing persons were reported in the area at the time.

No one claimed the head.

Like most communities in the Florida Keys, the village of Islamorada has been trying to provide sewage treatment to its residents (the state says we have to).

Islamorada’s first system, on Plantation Key, started working mid-year. Or sort of working.

In a few unfortunate homes, a vacuum-system controller device did not control very much at all – and sewage backed up, spilling into million-dollar homes.

The residents were less than pleased. We’re working on it, promised Islamorada officials. OK, said the state – oh, and by the way, we’ve opened an investigation into possible violations of law in the system’s construction.

Earlier in the year, officials contemplated importing out-of-town sewage if local levels were inadequate to “prime the well” so a new treatment plant could begin running.

For the second straight year in Keys waters, jewfish (or Goliath grouper) proved to be more of a menace than sharks.

A 42-year-old Stock Island man drowned in September after spearing a jewfish (illegal, by the way). A free-diver not using scuba gear, the man was trapped underwater when the wounded jewfish retreated into a hole in 25 feet of water. The line from the man’s spear wrapped around his wrist, preventing him from surfacing.

In 2005, a large jewfish tried to inhale a diver’s head. The diver escaped with a nasty cut.

In what could be an ominous development, anglers reported this year that the jewfish population, once a shadow of itself, is exploding.

A former Marathon Pizza Hut delivery driver, who in 2001 stole an airplane from Florida Keys Marathon Airport and flew to Cuba before crashing and becoming forever known as the Pizza Pilot, showed up at Monroe County Commissioner Dixie Spehar’s office in Key West.

An aide hit an alarm button to call bailiff deputies from the adjacent courthouse. The bailiffs were busy, so no one came until a 911 call was made.

The next day, an alarm button was pushed at the Key West office of Commissioner Sonny McCoy. Bailiffs responded in a hurry – only to learn somebody apparently pushed the button to see how well it worked.

And of course, there are the crime reports we’re not making up:

— An unlicensed motorcyclist tried to flee from Monroe County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Don Fanelli in November. The rider sped into his Key Largo neighborhood, and tried to hide in his neighbor’s yard.

The neighbor: Lt. Don Fanelli. The reckless-driving suspect was quickly apprehended by Fanelli, who knows his way around his own yard.

— Deputies looking for a Jeep driving recklessly north on U.S. 1 in February saw the vehicle parked at an Islamorada restaurant. A man, wearing only underwear and a shirt, walked out of the restaurant.

He could have been driving fast, the man told deputies, because “he was in a hurry to get to the Keys.” But he could not explain why he was driving north. Charges of possession of marijuana were lodged.

— A Big Pine Key man called deputies in February to report his false teeth were stolen from his Seahorse RV Park home. A suspect confessed to having purloined the pearly dentures as a bargaining chip in a debt dispute. No charges were filed when the choppers were returned.

— Two teenage girls told deputies in March that they were traveling with one teen’s grandparents when their van stopped for gas at mile marker 106. The girls got out to use the bathroom, but the grandparents didn’t notice.

The grandparents reached their home in Fort Myers – about 200 miles and three hours away – before discovering the girls were gone. By that time, deputies had reached friends of the family, who picked them up.

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Copyright (c) 2006, Florida Keys Keynoter, Marathon

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

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