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A pounding on his cabin door followed by the unmistakable sound of a ship hitting ground.

That's how Colin Henthorne was stirred from sleep on March 22, 2006. He was the Captain of the Queen of the North, trying to get a few hours sleep before his next shift on the bridge.

The BC Ferries ship was sailing with 101 passengers from Prince Rupert to Port Hardy. The inside passage is so narrow at times that navigators have to make more than 70 course corrections along the route.

On this night, a mistake was made and the ship hit land, and then drifted into deep water where it started sinking.

"Probably every compartment under water was ripped open," Henthorne tells The Current's Anna Maria Tremonti, but he didn't know it at the time.

On May 31, 1980, the Queen of the North began service on BC Ferries' Inside Passage route. (Wikimedia/Jim Thorne)

When he arrived on the bridge a few minutes after impact, he didn't know where the ship was, if the ship was aground or how bad the damage was. All the information he needed was under water. He ordered flares to be launched, anchors to be dropped and watertight doors to be closed.

"I was looking down and I could see my chest actually moving in and out wih every beat of my heart which was just pounding like crazy," says Henthorne trying to control the ship from sinking. "I thought my ribs were going to break from the force of that."

Henthorne knew all of the passengers needed to be removed from the vessel. Cabins were searched as the alarms rang — alerting the passengers to head up to deck 7 where they would be loaded into life boats.

Watching it sink was heartbreaking. - Captain Henthorne of the Queen of the North

When Colin Henthorne finally climbed down a ladder into a boat himself, he believed he was the last one off the vessel. But it later became clear that two people were missing — Gerald Foisey and Shirley Rosette. He still doesn't know how they didn't make it off the boat — Henthorne believes every cabin, and common area had been searched.

As the life boats bobbed on the open ocean, Henthorne watched the Queen of the North sink.

"It was just an incredible thing to watch. I was watching my home being destroyed," he tells Tremonti. "I had lived in that ship longer than any house I've been in."

"It was a beautiful, beautiful ship, I was so proud of it and loved it. Watching it sink was heartbreaking."

At first, Henthorne was praised for his calm demeanor that night.

But eventually, BC Ferries fired him and all of his appeals of that decision were rejected. It took a few years to find steady work again but Henthorne now works for the Canadian Coast Guard Search and Rescue Co-ordination Centre —helping other mariners in distress.

Listen to the full conversation.

This segment was produced by The Current's Liz Hoath.