# U.S. Coast Guard rescues French sailor by Hudson Canyon



## mbianka (Sep 19, 2014)

French racing sailor left New York heading for England Sunday and set off his EPIRB on Monday morning near the edge of the the HUdson Canyon. May have hit something. 
https://newyorkmediaboat.squarespace.com/blog/2016/5/us-coast-guard-rescues-french-sailor


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## cb32863 (Oct 5, 2009)

I am thinking the "Can I sail around the world in a 4kt SB that I bought for $4000 even though I have never stepped foot on a sailboat before?" folks could learn a bit from this guy. Prepared with everything he needed and what happened? He is standing next to the rescue chopper. He popped is EPIRB, deployed his raft, had flares, and so they found him quickly and had an efficient rescue. Nothing beats being prepared.


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## svHyLyte (Nov 13, 2008)

He may have been well prepared materially but, evidently, his navigation left something to be desired considering he headed 90 miles southeast when, supposedly, he was hoping to set a speed record (for his boat size) to the UK, northeast of his point of departure, eh?


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## MarkofSeaLife (Nov 7, 2010)

I don't try to set speed records.

I just try to get there without breakages.



Mark


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## Yorksailor (Oct 11, 2009)

Mark has it right, as usual. We broke a couple of battens crossing the Pacific and once sailed over 2,000nm breaking only a $9 shackle. However, we keep the boat at 2/3 to 3/4 of hull speed and never race.

Phil


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## tellemark32 (Aug 25, 2015)

GPS and other technological advances have instilled too much confidence in many folks. Following an electronic bug across an ocean or even a Bay or river does not make you a navigator. That's poor seamanship. But today, you don't need to know much navigation to sail across an ocean and make landfall within a few feet. As Webb Chiles said recently, folks need to prepare themselves as well as they prepare their boats before they cast off to go cruising. 

As far as navigation, you do not need to be a shipboard navigator, but you need to know the basics and understand how to compare and correlate data. That's part of seamanship. Relying on one system is foolhardy. Redundancy these days seems to mean having several handheld GPS units as a backup. That will not help if the signal has been degraded or becomes unreliable. You need basic knowledge of coastal navigation. 

This includes how to plot and update DRs, plot and properly label a fix or running fix, determine set and drift of current (tidal and offshore) and determine the course to steer. If you sail offshore, you need at least a rudimentary knowledge of celestial. 99% of the time, this will be sun lines and LAN. The sun is visible more than any other celestial body and it's easier to work with on a small, unstable platform. Common sense seems to have taken a holiday aboard many cruising sailboats.


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## Bleemus (Oct 13, 2015)

svHyLyte said:


> He may have been well prepared materially but, evidently, his navigation left something to be desired considering he headed 90 miles southeast when, supposedly, he was hoping to set a speed record (for his boat size) to the UK, northeast of his point of departure, eh?


Uhhh that was because of the weather pattern and trying to intercept the Gulf Stream. It is called routing.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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