Nine crew members of the Sea Scout Ship Sea Witch volunteered at the annual Clearlake Seaplane Splash-In assisting in directing the seaplanes on takeoff and landing, and crowd control.

The event Sept. 25-27 is the oldest and largest in the western United States, and included spot landing and water bombing contests, and a grand flying parade of seaplanes as the finale.

Sea Witch Participants were Martinez teens Cheyenne Clarke, 14; Chad Mandery, 17; Taylor Lindenhayn, 15; and Brooke Metro, 14.

Alex Phillips, 14, of Pleasant Hill; Braedon Cuming-Timms, 15, of Walnut Creek; Hiroshi Redic, 14, of Lafayette, Sierra Lameira, 14, of Antioch and Parker Smith, 16, of Benicia also participated.

The Sea Witch crew also attended the Safety at Sea Coast Guard Training on Yerba Buena Island on Oct. 23-24, where they participated in fire extinguisher training, learned how to use flare guns, hand-held and smoke flares, donned Gumby suits for ocean survival techniques, watched life raft demonstrations and learned about law enforcement duties of the Coast Guard.

At other teaching stations, they also practiced how to deal with a hole in a ship and leaking pipes, practiced with a bilge pump, provided first aid to an "injured" person, and learned fire hose training.

Crews from across the Bay Area attended Safety at Sea weekend, which has become the largest maritime safety training program for Sea Scouts in the country.

Sea Scouts is a

nonprofit coed boating program for teens and young adults, with about 20 ships and crews in the Bay Area. Crew members learn how to operate large ships and small boats, and gain seamanship skills such as navigation, weather, first aid, water safety and knot tying.

The S.S.S. Sea Witch crew meets 6 to 8:30 p.m. Tuesdays at 225 N. Court St., Martinez and from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays on the ship at the dock in Martinez. For more information, call 925-917-0573 or go to www.seascout.org.