Captain Sandy Yawn wasn’t thrilled with some of the Below Deck Mediterranean team when a situation left a guest stranded away from the boat for 45 minutes.
During the Monday, June 17, episode of the hit Bravo series, bosun Iain Maclean was excited about the progress the deck crew was making.
“The season is still early but I have a really good team,” he said in a confessional. “Everyone is improving and things are going smoothly. No one is an idiot.”
It didn’t take long for an issue to come up when the guests wanted to play in the water. In addition to swimming, the exterior team prepared the slide, multiple WaveRunners and paddle boards. Deckhand Nathan Gallager was asked by a guest to join him on a separate paddle board in the ocean while the others stayed closer to the boat.
While both Joe Bradley and Gael Cameron initially had their eyes on the guests, Iain sent Gael for a three-hour break and seemingly didn’t notice that Nathan was nowhere in sight. Nathan and the guest were then seen getting worried about how far they had floated from the Mustique.
“It’s too far. We floated away,” Nathan said before elaborating to the cameras. “We are trying to row back to the yacht but we are actually going backwards because the current is that strong. So yeah, we are stuck at sea. I am s—ting myself.”
Joe was the first one to notice Nathan’s disappearance, saying, “Where the hell are these two? This is really embarrassing.” Before Iain was alerted to the issue, Nathan and the guest were already on their way back after hitching a ride on a catamaran.
Sandy, however, wasn’t pleased to hear that a guest was stranded for 45 minutes.
“This doesn’t make me happy. This is embarrassing,” she told Iain about the mistake. “No one really was watching them. Lesson learned.”
After Joe took responsibility for not noticing where Nathan was, Sandy explained why Iain was more to blame, adding, “I appreciate that Joe was accountable, but that goes back to Iain. You need two people watching the guests at all times. It is Iain’s job to delegate a watch person.”
She continued: “I am not happy. Always have your eyes on the guests if they are on any toys. The person in a tender follows them, make it a priority.”
Season 9 of Below Deck Mediterranean has gotten off to a rocky start in every department. Initially, the issue was with the provisioning company which left the interior team with none of the items that they needed for their first charter.
“I understand that sometimes you can’t get everything that the client requests. You are in different parts of the world with different stuff stocked. It is abnormal to not receive a shipment of wine and rosé,” she noted earlier this month. “Considering how badly this provision company messed up, we are going to need some changes after this charter.”
Sandy was also caught in the middle when Chef Johnathan Shillingford wouldn’t wake up to make food for guests late at night. The captain defended Johnathan but second stew Elena Dubaich got upset as a result.
“I bust my ass and it all became about waking up the chef,” Elena said through tears. Johnathan also reacted to the issues between him and Elena while on a phone call with someone, saying, “This bitch is going to drive me crazy.”
Below Deck Mediterranean season 9 airs on Bravo Mondays at 9 p.m. ET. New episodes stream the next day on Peacock.