Portsmouth police boat spills onto Route 24

PORTSMOUTH — A local marina came to the rescue after the Portsmouth police boat fell off its trailer on Route 24 Thursday afternoon.

Ironically, the Parker Marine boat was on its way to a different marina when the incident took place at about 3:30 p.m.

“The boat was in transport from the Carnegie Abbey Marina, where it’s normally docked, to Don’s Marine for maintenance in Tiverton. Somehow it came off the trailer,” Police Lt. Brian Peters said.

The incident is still under investigation, he said.

Traffic was backed up for at least 30 minutes along Route 24 before the Sakonnet River Bridge on the Portsmouth side.

Pirate Cove Marina owner Brandon Kidd and his crew responded to the scene with a boom crane to get the boat back on its trailer. Getting there was half the battle, Mr. Kidd said.

“It was hard for me to see,” he said. “I came up the Boyd’s Lane off-ramp on the northbound side and approached the boat, in essence, the wrong way on the highway. The police had one lane open until we arrived on the scene.”

The cable attached to the trailer winch was broken, but other than a few scrapes and scuffs the boat didn’t look too bad, said Mr. Kidd.

“The boat had very little damage, but those Parkers are very beefy boats and that thing skidded down the road a bit. It looked like you could have put that boat right back into the water,” he said.

“The damage to the boat is still being evaluated,” said Lt. Peters, adding that he also doesn’t yet know if the damage is covered by insurance.

After Mr. Kidd posted a few photos of the rescue effort on Pirate Cove’s Facebook page, a few commentators promptly took some shots at the police. Mr. Kidd said he was embarrassed by the comments since it was never his intention to poke fun at the police.

“I would have put it on Facebook no matter whose boat it was,” he said. “I’m surprised by how much joy people derive when something (bad) happens to the police.”