# 8 boats lost.



## hannah2 (Nov 15, 2012)

Eight sailboats were lost on the Caribbean side of Panama this last winter season. Mostly in the San Blas Islands, reason sailing into islands at night, using inaccurate charts. I think it was 5 French and 3 American boats lost. Sailors get tired from long passage, make mistake of not heaving to off shore till morning, maybe no one knows how to heave to anymore. Sad to say most of the boats were lost or salvaged by being stripped bare. One Frenchman even took his keel off his Benny and floated boat pulling it to the inside of reef where he could find an escape. Don't know why as the boat was useless without any thing left aboard as he salvaged everything and sold it all to other cruisers and the Kuna Indians stripped what he did not want. Luck has it no one was killed and that is a good thing.


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## Mor22 (Jun 18, 2012)

Goodness that is a lot of lost sailboats and hopefully no loss of life. Where did you get the information? It would be interesting (and maybe educational) to get more details.


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## hannah2 (Nov 15, 2012)

Wife and I were sailing on Caribbean side of panama this last cruising season. 6 or 7 of the boats were lost in a one week period in January due to windy Christmas wind conditions. But it was not the sea conditions that was at fault just poor judgement of coming into an unknown destination at night with totally inaccurate charts and chart plotters. The San Blas Islands are a mine field of coral reefs. During the day the reefs are not very hard to navigate but moving at night is suicide. The Kuna Indians even have a law that no boats can move at night because the waters are so dangerous. We met some of those who lost their boats on the reefs, nice people who made a mistake a mistake that cost them their beautiful boats their homes. Learn to heave to and use it. It will save you a whole lot of sadness. 

At least one of the boats lost was a hippie back packer boat and that is whole new discussion point. The panama goverment has to clamp down on these fools before a lot of innocent life is lost.
Cheers


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## aeventyr60 (Jun 29, 2011)

Boats are hitting reefs all the time using "electronic navigation" and plotters. Coming into those areas at night, is just stupid. A real false sense of security being created by the over reliance on one form of navigation device.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

H
Don't understand this. Just completed BVI to R.I. Passage. Voyage was benign. 2 days out it was clear we would landfall at night with little moon light and fair degree of cloud coverage. Even with well known and well marked home waters decreased speed so that we would arrive at the boats summer home marina shortly after sunrise.
It's not hard to make a boat go slower and time a land fall. Even without hove to techniques.
Ps the bride says hi


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## hannah2 (Nov 15, 2012)

Hey Outbound,

Good to hear from you, hope your sailing season was as good as ours. Your right about other ways of finding a solution to too early of arrival to an unknown destination. Over the last 15 years we have been using our drouge to time our arrival at an unknown port. It makes for a comfortable completion of a passage so we are well rested, and it's good practice in deploying drouge, if you have one use it. 

Most cruisers fully understand that the use of one single guide to navigation is foolish and most use more than one guide or way to navigation. But people who get tired do so many strange things I think the most important thing of a passage is not getting over tired, which means cooking good meals and resting as much as possible during the day. And staying aware of your crew and boats situation at all times.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

We had too much fun. Thinking about doing western carribean next so your input appreciated.


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## aeventyr60 (Jun 29, 2011)

There was a recent article on noonsite about a couple on a catamaran who hit an "uncharted" rock here in Thailand using navionics....I sent a note to the administrator showing that the rock is clearly charted on paper charts and is high lighted in the local cruising guides....funny enough the article was "pulled" after my note...


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## hannah2 (Nov 15, 2012)

Outbound,
Email us when your ready for some info. or call anytime.

All paper charts and all electronic charts do not match up. You may have obtained French paper charts and your electronic charts may have come from American paper charts originally. Therefore they can be different. Two paper charts on the same area made by different countries can be as different as one would ever have nightmares about. I hate to carry charts manufactured from two different countries of the same area I'd go crazy with doubt.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Have already learned sometimes it's wise to just find someplace safe to anchor for a bit. Then launch the dinghy and go exploring before deciding where to spend the night. Even in well charted areas. Especially when it's not practical to have the sun behind you or the whole area is uninterpretable for other reasons. 
Amazing in this day and age how many charts regardless of publisher are based on old British admiralty charts. Good for Aubrey or Lewry but not so good for us.


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## Capt Len (Oct 9, 2011)

Using a plotter for close in work can lead you astray too. the charts seem to distort at the quilting edges. (this was an older noble tech) All your senses may be needed to over come this. Even offshore depending on a single source can be nasty. I remember a big schooner approaching from south of Atu Taki at night taking a radar fix on the beacon on the north end of the island. Didn't allow for island and reefs .Eventually the vessel broke up.


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## jtulls (Mar 7, 2015)

Wow, that's a lot of boats for that one area. If you have the ability to stop and anchor and tackle a tricky passage in daylight, then that should always be the way to do it, but I understand that sometimes you don't really have a choice and you just have to go for it. I'm not sure it's a matter of electronics that's the reason, but likely more along the lines of what someone else wrote about every chart being slightly different. I've been finding that app on electronics (I'm using Navionics on my plotter and ipad) often have more up to date charts than my plotter and my paper charts for sure, since they push updates to the apps so frequently.


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## hannah2 (Nov 15, 2012)

jtulls said:


> Wow, that's a lot of boats for that one area. If you have the ability to stop and anchor and tackle a tricky passage in daylight, then that should always be the way to do it, but I understand that sometimes you don't really have a choice and you just have to go for it. I'm not sure it's a matter of electronics that's the reason, but likely more along the lines of what someone else wrote about every chart being slightly different. I've been finding that app on electronics (I'm using Navionics on my plotter and ipad) often have more up to date charts than my plotter and my paper charts for sure, since they push updates to the apps so frequently.


But you do have a choice and it is easy you HEAVE TO when on passage and coming from open ocean to poorly charted and a new area for you if it will be dark before you arrive. There is always a choice! A wrong one and a right one.


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## hellosailor (Apr 11, 2006)

So, eight "water" vehicles were lost when they hit "land"?

Do you know, in Florida, more than a dozen "land" vehicles are lost every year when they go into canals and other bodies of water? And they and their crews are usually lost as well?

Water vessel hits land, land vessel hits water...I see no difference there. And, like Florida and Texas and the other "leading" states in the US, I see no reason for government concern or intervention.

Sure, some states put up guardrails by canals and on mountain roads, others don't. Good luck convincing Panama to put up shoreside rubber bumpers around all those islands, I don't see any other way they can improve things.

Unless they lock up all the would-be-sailors in padded rubber cells?


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Be interesting to see how much crowd sourcing will impact on the various electronic charts. I just blew ~$100 on updating navionics. It only would allow a relatively small amount of my current cruising area to be down loaded. It required a high speed internet connection which is often not available.
Be real nice if before or when you get to a new cruising ground and have Internet you could painlessly update a base chart with free, current,reliable data.


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