# Halifax to Bermuda in December...not! What was he Thinking!



## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

*What was he thinking?*

North Atlantic...December...29 ft. boat! 










*Rescue ship reaches sailor adrift in Atlantic*

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/nova-scotia/story/2007/12/21/collon-rescue.html?ref=rss

BTW...he is safe and sound now.


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## eherlihy (Jan 2, 2007)

During an interview on TV News (NECN) it was reported that he: 1 - was an experienced sailor. (cha - right), and 2 - that he had to wait for after Hurricane season to begin a trip from Halifax to Bermuda (?!?).

A side consequence of his ordeal is that the crew of the Coast Guard cutter, Tahoma, that picked him up returned to port in Boston 4 days early, and will now be able to spend Christmas with their families.

Hopefully no other mariners will need their services during their unplanned break.

Go to www.necn.com for details....


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## seabreeze_97 (Apr 30, 2006)

He was probably thinking, "I wonder what that big stick with the canvas rag is for?" Experienced sailor, sailboat, engine fails, call for help. Riiiiiight.


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## Sapperwhite (Oct 21, 2006)

I don't want to be an armchair sailor, but WTF? The engine failed and....and....and... Oh that's it? Good a reason as any to call the coasties. Reminds me of the idiots that called the coast guard for fuel becasue they had been motoring for so long, gentlemen don't beat!


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## PBzeer (Nov 11, 2002)

Usually, the question, "What was he thinking" is immediately followed by, "Duh, he wasn't".


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

Damn, i must be a friggen hero for sailing mine into the slip after the fuel tank dumped itself into the bildge, and the furler locked in the unfurled position at Channel Islands


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## Sapperwhite (Oct 21, 2006)

They forgot to mention that Capt. Collon (you can't make that up!) had a critical equipment failure other than the engine. His coffee maker bit the dust two days prior and he really wanted a latte.

Really though, there has to be more to the story than just his engine breaking down.


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

I tire of stories like these, as they make recreational sailors look like clueless idiots and waste search and rescue resources. If the engine fails in a sailboat, you SAIL...duhhhh..

On top of that, a series...a quite predictable series...of big fat colliding lows has been marching across North America for the better part of a month. A 29-footer could have stuck to the coast most of the way down, and maybe made a run from North Carolina, but December is never a good option with the sheer number and intensity of nor' easters running against the Gulf Stream. He would have done better leaving in February or March...except for the ice.

******* it, I'm just a Great Lakes sailor, and I can figure this stuff out...Grrr...

I guess the only upside is the training it gave the Coast Guard.


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## sailingfool (Apr 17, 2000)

Here's a cable news news report from Boston today about the rescue of a Canadian attempting a sail from Halifax to Bermuda http://www.boston.com/partners/worl...395&autoStart=true&mute=false&continuous=true

No commentray from me on this situation, other than maybe 29" ain't long enough...


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

Umm.... this is pathetic.... aren't sailboats supposed to sail??? Isn't that kind of the reason you get a sailboat??? 

And what was he thinking... North Atlantic... December... Hmm... not too bright...


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

I think Cam beat you to it.


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## Freesail99 (Feb 13, 2006)

Yes Cam did, but I liked the video.


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

In the photo accompanying the CBC article the boat looked intact, floating on her lines, the rig still up.... you gotta wonder.

One would certainly hope that motoring to Bermuda was not his main plan.

The upside is the Coasties get rewarded with a Christmas at home!


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

The only thing I liked about the video was the reporter.


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## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

Two threads merged now! 

Apparently the waves breaking over the boat and being seasick also prompted the call for help. 15 foot waves in the north atlantic in winter. Unusual and unexpected?

The comments he makes about waiting for hurricane season to end are bogus. He's 6 weeks late.


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

RickBowman said:


> Again the USCG provides assistance for those that need it regardless of nationality. The American taxpayers dollars at work rescuing those from the terror of the sea. I am damn proud of those coasties.


I think the same can be said of the coast guards of all nations. They are skilled, courageous groups all round. The Australians, especially, seem to get called upon for the most dramatic/long distance rescues, usually of singlehanded round-the-world racers in distress.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

Valiente said:


> I tire of stories like these, as they make recreational sailors look like clueless idiots and waste search and rescue resources. If the engine fails in a sailboat, you SAIL...duhhhh..
> 
> On top of that, a series...a quite predictable series...of big fat colliding lows has been marching across North America for the better part of a month. A 29-footer could have stuck to the coast most of the way down, and maybe made a run from North Carolina, but December is never a good option with the sheer number and intensity of nor' easters running against the Gulf Stream. He would have done better leaving in February or March...except for the ice.
> 
> ...


These kind of stories agitate me.. Ken Barnes kicked it off, now every time I hear about someone getting rescued from a perfectly good (or floating & serviceable) boat I get really mad. Not helping "our" image.. and only giving the licensing proponents more room for discussion. Now.. about that perfectly good 29' sailboat? DOH, wrong coast


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

As pointed out...there is an upside for the Coast Guard at least... some of them are able to spend some time with their families on Christmas... so not everything from this bozo needing rescue is bad. 

What really sucks about stories like this is that they completely overshadow the ones about sailors like Donna Lange, who managed to sail around the world in a 28' and not get into trouble. But the major difference is that Donna, unlike Ken, et al, did her preparations properly, and got both the boat and the captain prepared for a journey of that magnitude. She also planned her passages around expected weather conditions... which the most recent bozo obviously never thought of. 

We've had three or four decent Nor'easter type storms roll through here in the past month. Anyone with half a brain would think twice about trying to go across the north Atlantic with that kind of weather coming through on a weekly basis.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

Once again we've interupted the laws of natural selection, allowing a dumbass the opportunity to procreate and bring more dumbasses into the world for us to take care of...


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## Giulietta (Nov 14, 2006)

Once again, man (the CG) renounced Mother Nature her claim....

Darwinism is being strongly contradicted by the rescuers (I know they're doing their job, and very well at it, too) here, I'm telling you, this is bad....

Everytime man tries to "change" the natural course or natural selection, mother nature gets even by sending a few disasters to claim the souls shen didn't get from idiots ....

I'm telling you...this will not be pretty...


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## chucklesR (Sep 17, 2007)

Dude couldn't sell his boat in the depressed market, get's aboard and set's the iron jenny until it runs out of liquid wind, calls CG and hops a ride back. Insurance pays off the boat, dude and CG folks have a merry Xmas on the hard. Questions?
Cynical by nature


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## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

Rick...I'm sure the full report will be some weeks in the making...but when the captain himself is on video stating that he was being tossed about by15 foot waves and was seasick for the first time in his life and that he was out there at THIS time due to needing to wait for the end of hurricane season, I think we have all the information we need to make some rather harsh judgments.


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

On the face of it, I have to agree with the general thrust of the commentary in this thread, but all to often I have seen that the general press fails to cover nautical stories with anything resembling a reasonable degree of accuracy. As some have said above, "There must be more to this story." My sense is that there probably is a lot more to the story than we have seen so far. 

A well found 29 footer, with boat and crew properly equipped for heavy air could make this trip in December. It would not be comfortable and probably is not the best time of year, but if you timed it right and hooked into a norther, it could make for a fast passage south. The boat looks like a Rawson, which many on this board have touted as a small blue water cruiser. 

The fact that the press did not mention sails is curious, but I would not conclude that it definively meant that Colon was not using sails. In fact if you look at the pictures, it would appear that a hanked-on jib is hanging over the bow of the boat in the water and a that the mainsail was hastily dropped and secured. I can only assume that there are other details beyond the fact that he was sailing that are missing from news reports. 

I always hate to judge another sailor without being there or from such scant info. 

Respectfully,
Jeff


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## SEMIJim (Jun 9, 2007)

camaraderie said:


> Apparently the waves breaking over the boat and being seasick also prompted the call for help. 15 foot waves in the north atlantic in winter. Unusual and unexpected?


Hmph! From the news article at the top of this thread:


> Downs said the sailboat appears to be safe for Collon, who is tired and hungry but in good spirits.


And *for this* the Coast Guard was called?!?!

Jim


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

I'm not a blue water sailor and I'm not sure if I ever will be, but I know an idiot when I see one. The man's an idiot. If I had a vote on how my tax dollars were being spent I'm not sure I would have sent the CG out to get him. But in the spirit of Christmas I'm glad he's safe to do it all again someday.


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## Johnrb (Sep 21, 2002)

Luckily he's not from Canada. He's from Quebec.

From Sailboy: _"Not helping "our" image.. and only giving the licensing proponents more room for discussion."_

Agreed. Not very many years ago there was a rash of idiots trying to reach the North Pole by almost any means imaginable with the predictable result the Canadian Forces spent a lot of money finding and rescuing the dolts. Finally, enough was enough and the government started requiring a very large bond being placed to cover search and rescue operations where the person was deemed an idiot (they didn't actually use the term "idiot" but that was the intent).


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

I would also prefer to give the benefit of the doubt, but my gut tells me that if you have no broken limbs and you walk from a dry boat into a large RIB, you just weren't trying hard enough.

One of the first things I learned in the sailing game is "stay with the boat", followed by "step up from the sinking boat into the life raft". He appears to have left a boat with standing rigging floating high in the water...can we assume he left with one main and one jib and simply ran out of fuel?

Pah.


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## thekeip (Aug 8, 2007)

The part of the discussion having to do with 'Natural Selection' is particularly apt. I, (being a bona-fide San Fran sailor), am comfortable in the knowledge that our chief executive officer has produced no male heirs. What further proof do you need that Darwin is right?
Howard Keiper
Sea Quest
Berkeley, CALIFORNIA


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## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

Keip...*What further proof do you need that Darwin is right?
*Perhaps the fact that the same can be said of the Clintons?!


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## sailaway21 (Sep 4, 2006)

Mr. Keiper,
This is a general discussion of sailing issues forum. "Off Topic" is where we post our political and pseudo-scientific views. Thank you.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

Unfortunately, he does leave heirs. His genes can propagate, even if it's under a different name.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

Damn Cam, I was just about to say the same thing!!


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

Its easy for us to sit here safe and warm at our computers throwing stones at this guy without all the facts, and at least in part, misquoting some of the facts. For example, at least the one interview that I saw referred to 12 to 15 meter waves (not 15 foot waves). That's 40 to 50 foot waves. 

I think that it is too easy to focus on the engine as a means of propulsion, but for a small boat like this the engine is critical to keep the batteries up in order to operate the autopilot and refrigeration. On my boat, with the autopilot operating, in heavy going I have roughly 6-8 hours of battery life at most. After cranking an engine that would not start, you have to wonder how much reserve power he had to operate with.

To me, giving even the smallest amount of benefit of doubt to the guy, it is easy to conclude that we are discussing a hypothermic, seasick, exhausted single-hander, examining his chances of repairing and getting his engine started while hand steering (or hove to) in gale force conditions, deciding to take shelter from a US Coast Guard ship that was on patrol in his area (less than 4 hours steaming time). 

You may all be right that guy may truly have been an idiot, but having fought my way in a small boat through an Atlantic winter storm nowhere near as intense as the one this fellow was in, I'm not willing to be the first one to throw stones. I am glad he survived, I am sorry he lost his boat, and I will be interested in hearing the rest of the story both as a cautionary tale and to perhaps help me arrive at an opinion with basis. 

Respectfully,
Jeff


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## Zanshin (Aug 27, 2006)

[humorous interlude] A couple of weeks ago, when I was still in the warm BVI waters, I was taking a passenger from the main island to Jost van Dyke when I noticed a 52' charter boat apparantly drifting. I thought it strange that I hadn't heard anything on the radio until I realized I had it turned off  After switching it on I caught the tail end of a message on channel 16 about "we are drifting towards the rocks and need help" so I called in to ask if it was the vessel off Great Harbour and it was. I told them I'd be there in 10 minutes and proceeded to fire up the diesel and drop sails [luckily my passenger was a delivery captain who had just delivered a swan and was bumming around waiting for his flight back].

We made it there at top speed - but realized by talking on the radio (switched to another channel) that the nature of the "emergency" was that they couldn't get their engine in gear. n.b. - this was a big Beneteau *sail*boat. I should have gone away when I go near, but the sight of 2 bikini clad beauties was enough to let me continue helping. I got my toolbox together, got my passenger to take control of my vessel and dinghied across.
After playing with the linkages for a bit I realized that repair would need more than a little box of tools and that most likely their transmission was shot.

I convinced them to drop anchor so they wouldn't drift too far towards the USA (the wind was sweeping them parallel to the shore and they were in no danger) and almost offerred to assist them in sailing into the anchorage since there was a crew of 8 aboard when I realized that none of them knew how to sail... so I did the next best thing and said I'd contact their charter company from ashore if they couldn't reach them.

They still have some of my tools onboard...  At least that night we met them at Foxy's restaurant and they were generous enough to send us over [1] beer. And yes, they were powerboaters.


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## soulesailor (Nov 18, 2007)

Are electric autopilot and refridgeration necessary to complete this trip or any trip? Come on, now.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

From a buoy 50-100 (est) miles from his location:










Benefit of the doubt.. looks like he had a ride.

On second thought.. manhug anyone????


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

You're right that refrigeration would not be necessary if he planned for the contingency that he might lose it along the way, or was not planning to use refrigeration along the way. I had made a poor choice of words. 

But I think that the electric autopilot is a harder question. You can argue the prudence of going offshore on a small boat without a windvane, but I think that some form of autosteering is very important for the survival of a single-hander. 

From the pictures it does not appear that he had a windvane, but even if he had, he would have been hard pressed to use it due to the wild apparent wind shifts that occur between the trough of the wave and the crest when you are sailing on a small boat. 

And while it can be argued that he could hove to, in waves that large, being rolled or pitchpoled is a real possibility. Heaving to would have provided some relief, but it would have come at great risk. 

The other issue is safely tacking, I have found that it is very hard to tack a small boat reliably in big winds and waves, and safely jibing is a bit of an oxymoron. If you don't time it perfectly, during the times when I have been in big wind and waves, it is easy for the boat to get thrown backward and fail to pass through the eye of the wind, having lost momentum, whether you want to or not, the bow of the boat pays off, which is a difficult situation since you need to get enough speed to climb the next wave, but if you are too far off the wind at the crest you will take a big knock down in the higher winds that hit you on the crest of the wave. Keeping the engine churning over maintaining forward motion during the tack greatly increases the likelihood of a safe tack in these conditions, and given that this was a single-hander, I'd argue that the absense of an engine greatly added to his potential danger. 

Without knowing specifics, I can't say whether contributed to the decision to abandoning ship. 

Respectfully,
Jeff


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## eherlihy (Jan 2, 2007)

There were a couple of comments back from people that were sorry for the guy because he lost his boat. I'm not sure if they feel this way because they think that his boat was damaged in some way. However, one report that I read indicated that the coast guard left a locator beacon aboard so that he could recover it at a later date... (and do this crossing again?!)


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

It might be said that "Monday Morning Quarterbacking" normally intensifies this time of year due to the upcoming BCS and Super Bowl. As long as the commentary leans more toward learning from the mistakes made, this might seem an appropriate endeavour. In both my previous occupation as an aviator and present one as a sailing instructor there seems to be a disproportionately critical eye cast on the blunders committed by myself and others. That impulse may even be stronger in the community of armchair pilots and sailors who place their own abilities so far above and beyond their fellow man's. There have been some recent columns in popular trade magazines that take a particular incident and break down exactly what went wrong and why, as well as the victim's ideas on what they would have done differently. Those are worthy of our time and discussion. Understanding that much of takes place here is play and idle chatter, it might be an altogether different matter were any one of us to be in that poor man's shoes. 

Regards,
Red
S/V Carrie C


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

Loewe said:


> ..... Understanding that much of takes place here is play and idle chatter, it might be an altogether different matter were any one of us to be in that poor man's shoes.
> 
> Regards,
> Red
> S/V Carrie C


Red, that's very true and it IS very easy to sit warm and comfy and criticize. And, as has been noted, relying on media reporting (especially media that is not sailing-savvy) is also unreliable.

Having myself seen a person that I had considered steady, reliable and "grounded" reduced to almost helpless hysteria in only moderately rough conditions, it's not hard to envision some panic on the part of this fortunate pair, given the conditions that they may well have faced.

Still, I'd like to think that my boat would have to be in serious peril or badly damaged before I'd consider abandoning her... but until I've been there, I guess I don't really know.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

Hmmmm...this horse is most likely the color it seems to be...It's a bit foggy from years of brewski abuse...but it seems I remember a similar case down off the Dry Tortugas back in the eight-O's...we were called out to a 50'+ sailboat in distress. Once found, it seems their engine had went tits up.
When we informed them we would not tow their boat back but would only transport them personally to safety, they decided to learn how to sail engineless. We did, however give them some potable water, as they had plenty of food... I therefore stand by my previous post on this matter, that Giu seemed to agree with...either that or there's an echoe in here...


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

Jeff_H said:


> I think that it is too easy to focus on the engine as a means of propulsion, but for a small boat like this the engine is critical to keep the batteries up in order to operate the autopilot and refrigeration. On my boat, with the autopilot operating, in heavy going I have roughly 6-8 hours of battery life at most. After cranking an engine that would not start, you have to wonder how much reserve power he had to operate with.


Hey, I would be quite happy to eat crow on this if it turns out that he a) filed a sail plan; b) had battery capacity to spare; c) had all his large inventory of storm sails blow out; d) had fuel capacity to spare and a fuel filtering system that would catch any and all goo shaken loose by currently unknown waves and e) that he had access to weather information that would have allowed him to make intelligent and prudent routing decisions.

I haven't even asked if he had an EPIRB, a raft, harness and jacklines. Did he have storm shutters? What 29 foot production boat has half-inch through-bolted Lexan? Or hatches that can take a breaking, multi-tonne wave?

The point is that while 29-footers have gone out and survived in awful conditions *when properly prepared and equipped*, it is generally acknowledged that this is close to the low end for reasonable heavy weather sailing. Even Tania Aebi with her near-bulletproof Contessa 26 would agree with that. Mid-December *can* provide a Halifax-Bermuda window, but I'd want en route forecasting and a bigger, faster, _crewed_ boat to do it in.

The armchair quarterbacking obviously doesn't have all the details, but the details we do have do not convince me that this was the right time, the right boat or the right skipper to attempt this passage. I think he got in over his head, and lost his will to sail. The boat I saw seemed superficially OK...it wasn't suffering from over_sailing_, at least.


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## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

The sailor became disabled on Thurday the 20th, called for help and was pulled off on the 23rd....the buoy wave heights during THAT time were 10-15 feet as the Coast Guard reported. They were not anything unseasonal...nor were the 20-30 footers several days earlier. 
I would never second guess his decision to call for help...but it is clear the rig was intact, the boat was not sinking and he was not gravely injured. Whatever else transpired, it is clear he was at the end of HIS rope and decided he could not continue. 
I don't know that we'll ever know the full story, but the main problem it seems to me is one of the judgment to leave for an open water Atlantic passage, single handed in a small boat, beyond the reliable weather forecast. Everything else that may or may not have happened was a result of that decision. An incomprehensible one to me.


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## sailaway21 (Sep 4, 2006)

In the meantime, who's workin' on Christmas Day? That boat is open to salvage. An enterprising fisherman could turn a profit on her salvage. Come to think of it, we haven't heard from Dog or TrueBlue in a while.....


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

I think that Valiente's post hits at the heart of something that I have said for years about what makes a proper offshore boat. All too often there are threads asking for recommendations for small offshore cruisers. And these threads often come from people with limited sailing experience, let alone offshore experience. 

The boats that are recommended include boats like the Rawson in question or someone, quoting Vigor's book, will often cite similaqr boats like the Triton, Alberg 30 or Vanguard as proper offshore boats. At the heart of it, these are small production boats that were never designed to take the abuse of serious heavy going and have had long lives of abuse and can only achieve a level of reliable robustness with huge amounts of rebuilding and redesign. And even when made bullet proof, boats of this type and size, have such violent motions that they take exceptional crews to stand up to the abuse for days at a time. 

And on this board you see council about going cheap and going now. But going cheap rarely includes the luxury of a proper set of storm sails for a boat this size (the assumption being that the sails can be reefed). 

Boats like these are so slow that they cannot even make a trip over a 500 mile length within a predictable weather window, which I suppose gets to the heart of Cam's point that the big 'iceberg striking' mistake was even being out there this late in the season, anything else just added to the problem. Their passage times are so long that and their carry capacities so small, that they lack the carrying capacity to carry the kind of spares, fuel included that results in true self-sufficiency. 

And so do we now say, if you draw a conclusion out of the discussion above that boats of this size and type, should only be used coastally or else if the skipper gets hammered, he should be abandoned out there? Do we conclude that only qualified people should be out there, and if deemed unqualified they should be abandoned? Do we conclude that there are only proper weather windows that small boats are allowed out in? and so on.... And if that is what we say we should do, how is that different than what Australia or New Zealand did a few years ago where they would not let a boat leave thier port that they did not consider to be seaworthy or adequately crewed? 

Cam and Valiente, I see your points though....

Have a great holiday,
Jeff


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## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

Jeff...good questions! Lots of future discussion fodder there...but for now, I think I'll just say Merry Christmas to ya!


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

Sorry... I've been busy cooking all day.  Just finished a big family dinner... Turkey, potatoes, corn bread, stuffing, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes...  

Given the quality of weather forecasting information and the time of year... the fact that he set out on his voyage strikes me as not the best choice he could have made. If he was waiting for hurricane season to end, it's been over for at least three weeks... why didn't he go earlier...before the winter Nor'easters started to roll in. 

I think too many of the people who go offshore aren't really prepared for it. Look at the whackjobs who ran out of fuel and ended up getting some from a navy ship earlier this year. Ken Barnes he wasn't all that prepared... and didn't know his boat as well as he should of from his own accounts. This guy seems to be in that same vein. 

Compare what happened to them and what happened to Maud Fontenoy. She was the French rower/sailor who broke a mast 200 miles from her final landfall. She called her shore team and basically said... "Oooops, broke a mast, I'll be a bit later than I was planning..." and then jury-rigged her boat and sailed the 200 miles. Granted, she's a professional sailor/rower... but still. Look at Donna Lange, a grandmother who completed her solo circumnavigation earlier this year. She was caught by the same storm that dismasted Ken Barnes's boat... and was one of the people to respond to Ken's distress calls... She had gear problems on her boat, but still managed to finish her voyage successfully.

Jeff's point about the size and speed of the boats is a bit misleading... since boats like the Alberg 30 and other he mentions, have been making bluewater passages for years. I think the problem is more the preparation of the sailors making the recent voyages than it is a problem with what vessel they've necessarily chosen. 

In many cases, they don't have the years of experience or the preparation necessary to successfully deal with adverse conditions that they run into. Yes, luck probably plays a fairly significant role, since some sailors don't get hit by the bad weather.... but it could easily be argued that many sailors make their own luck through their careful preparation and getting the necessary experience.


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## Cruiserwannabe (Jan 28, 2006)

Giulietta said:


> Once again, man (the CG) renounced Mother Nature her claim....
> 
> Darwinism is being strongly contradicted by the rescuers (I know they're doing their job, and very well at it, too) here, I'm telling you, this is bad....
> 
> ...


*UTTO,I'M NOT LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS " I TOLD YOU SO "*


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

Jeff_H said:


> And so do we now say, if you draw a conclusion out of the discussion above that boats of this size and type, should only be used coastally or else if the skipper gets hammered, he should be abandoned out there? Do we conclude that only qualified people should be out there, and if deemed unqualified they should be abandoned? Do we conclude that there are only proper weather windows that small boats are allowed out in? and so on.... And if that is what we say we should do, how is that different than what Australia or New Zealand did a few years ago where they would not let a boat leave thier port that they did not consider to be seaworthy or adequately crewed?
> 
> Cam and Valiente, I see your points though....
> 
> ...


Jeff, I see and accept your points, as well. But the best part of seamanship is judgement, and the the other part is experience. We hear of boats in the past that might be considered daysailers crossing oceans that were a mere three feet larger than this boat (Suhaili or Wanderer or the Pardeys' boats, the _bigger_ one of which I believe was 29 feet!). Sailors in the past accepted that the price to be paid of having a slow, heavy boat capable of an endurable...if not pleasant...motion in a blow was also to have a plodding boat with a relatively small sail area, scads of stowage, and a narrow, deep cabin, not usually replete with modern conveniences.

They got plastered again and again by the weather, and either hove to or set storm jibs and trysails, and just kept going. A few of them died, but I don't think more of them did so than today, where the ability to rescue people over great distances is balanced against underprepared sailors going to sea in the wrong sorts of boats.

I feel today that the possibility of rescue is decreasing the habit of self-reliance, and that sometimes our dependence on weather prediction and means to communicate with shore are poor talismans against the real chance that sometimes we will encounter adverse and angry seas.

If it ended there, it wouldn't make much more than an empty chair at the table and a slick on the water. But these..._decisions_...to solo to Bermuda from Halifax in December are not only questionable on grounds of seamanship, but are ultimately selfish in that they put into danger those rescuers who should be saving those who by no fault of their own fall into danger from the sea.

I hope never to be in this sailor's situation, but I also hope I have the skills and frankly the grit to sail my way out of it. I would be happy to be lifted out of a liftraft, but out of a sailable boat because I was "tired"?


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## sailaway21 (Sep 4, 2006)

I'd associate myself with Val's remarks above regarding boat selection. Seemingly no one wants a slow boat anymore, even for dedicated offshore work, and it's my gut feeling that a measure of seaworthiness is going by the boards in the process of that decision making. Whatever direction one skews the boat design compromise, surely a suit of storm sails and an awareness of how to heave-to, perhaps fore-reach, or lay to sea anchor or drogue would be considered indispensible for such a passage. It seems counterintuitive to me to base one's planning on the reliability and availability of weather forecasting alone. Planning for the worst, accompanied by doing all one can to avoid it, seems the most prudent. And to carry Jeff's point a bit further, what are our obligations to the sailor who was just a $1000 short of being properly equipped?

There are real questions here and I am struck by how closely certain voyages can go from the heroic to the foolish, timely to unlucky, and foolhardy to well executed. If you pull it off, you're a hero; but not as much of one as may be thought. If you fail you're foolish; but no more than some other luckier fellow.

My years at sea have served to teach me that weather forecasting may claim a scientific basis but it's more an educated guess than anything else. It doesn't take too long for a boat to outrun reliable weather forecasting and at that point one would like to think that the proper tools were at hand to execute the unusual seamanship of survival. Even so equipped, it can be easily seen to be no more than an even money bet should things turn really dour. Stretching the luck factor in either boat selection or outfitting seems the antithesis of seamanship.

A couple of past articles from the sailnet archives seem relevant:
http://www.sailnet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19058&highlight=stability
http://www.sailnet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19200&highlight=stability
http://www.sailnet.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=20288
http://www.sailnet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=18960&highlight=stability


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

elitism... slow boats offshore? how dare they! Lets just not talk of the dozens of VO70's and similar boats dismasted, lost keels, all the freaking time! And for the record.. that boat doesn't look like a Rawson! The sea is getting too dangerous for anyone without sponsorship 

100 miles/day hoorah! Merry Christmas!


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

sailboy21 said:


> ... And for the record.. that boat doesn't look like a Rawson!


Yeah, looks more like a Hughes 29 to me - not a Rawson 30 anyhow.


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## gclayton (Dec 24, 2002)

Agreed that his judgement was way off and his timing worse for being where he was when he was. At least he missed the hurricanes! In the interview he said the seas were 10 to 12 meters, obviously a big blow. My first reaction was also hey raise the sails and sail the sail boat but the pictures we see are not representative of the conditions at the time.

Never having been in this bad a position my second thoughts were that perhaps he made the right decision in that he was 300 + miles at sea, no engine for steerage, 30 to 35 ffoot breaking seas and (I assume gale force winds)so no sail steerage. 

What would the best option be? lie ahull, trail a drogue, ride it out which would most likely be abeam to the breaking seas and would possibly result in a capsize ( not fatal if properly battened down) or hail the CG.

What would the experience of the forum recommend in this situation?


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

Ummm... some of our New England/North Atlantic Nor'easters are actually stronger and more vicious than tropical hurricanes... so the fact that he missed out on the hurricanes doesn't mean much.

Why he wasn't carrying a Jordan Series Drogue, sea anchor or any other storm safety gear no one can say but him. For a serious passage at this time of year, a minimum of safety gear would be a good idea.

Personally, I'm a big fan of the Jordan Series Drogue... and think carrying one on a small sailboat makes a lot of sense. Don Jordan developed the Series Drogue after the 1979 Fastnet disaster, as a response to the damage done by the weather to the fleet.



gclayton said:


> Agreed that his judgement was way off and his timing worse for being where he was when he was. At least he missed the hurricanes! In the interview he said the seas were 10 to 12 meters, obviously a big blow. My first reaction was also hey raise the sails and sail the sail boat but the pictures we see are not representative of the conditions at the time.
> 
> Never having been in this bad a position my second thoughts were that perhaps he made the right decision in that he was 300 + miles at sea, no engine for steerage, 30 to 35 ffoot breaking seas and (I assume gale force winds)so no sail steerage.
> 
> ...


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## tdw (Oct 2, 2006)

Faster said:


> I think the same can be said of the coast guards of all nations. They are skilled, courageous groups all round. The Australians, especially, seem to get called upon for the most dramatic/long distance rescues, usually of singlehanded round-the-world racers in distress.


Ask any of the lads and ladesses who man our naval craft that are called out on those rescues and they will tell you that it is a great experience and that they are happy to do it. (Australia does not have a coast guard in the the US sense.)

The bitching usually comes from people who moan about the cost to the taxpayer and quite frankly that is so much bovine excretia.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

OK i live in the desert (az) and i wont go out in the north atlantic this time of year by myself. and whats with this engine problem?? i dont even have an engine except a 3hp out board in the trunk for emergencies. i've had it out 2 times and that was in a barrel BOTH TIMES...
WHAT A *****!


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

I was wondering about the Grail Pilgrin and what actually happened, and I found the following post:


> I have to say this discussion is both hilarious and offensive.
> Especially when a certain someone posts that the US Coast Guard would
> have been "on leave or sitting around shining our shoes" had this case
> not have happened. For your information sir, while Search and Rescue
> ...


While I don't know if this is actually from a member fo the USCG cutter Tahoma, which did participate in the rescue of the Grail Pilgrin, if it is, what is said clearly indicates that the boat's rigging was damaged and not in a condition to sail. It also appears that Collon did have a sea anchor and that it had been deployed.

What I find interesting about this post is that they do not say anything about the fact that this person chose to sail, singlehanding, into the North Atlantic at this time of year, given the weather forecasts that were in place for when he left.

Most of the other feedback I've seen on the net, regarding the Grail Pilgrin, has been much like what I've seen here on Sailnet... with people asking why he was out there given the weather and time of year.

A couple of other things this USCG crew member's post makes me think of.

First, why wasn't the head sail properly secured. If the sail broke free during the storm, there's a very good chance that it effectively eliminated any benefits of using a sea anchor, which is normally deployed from the bow and designed to keep the boat head to wind-where a jib would tend to pull the boat downwind and keep it stern to wind.

Second, if all of his rigging did break as described by the post above, did Collon even have the rigging inspected prior to leaving on a serious bluewater passage where encountering seas and winds much higher than normal would be very likely? If not, why not? If so, why did all the rigging break?

BTW, I find it fairly unlikely that the USCG member's description of the rigging being all torn from the mast, since, in the photo that accompanied many of the articles, you can see the forestay and backstay still intact. If all the rigging had been damaged as described in the post, isn't it more than likely that the boat would have been dismasted to some degree??


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

SD,
It's also interesting that he's stationed on the Tahoma, indicates he participated in the rescue but apparently the Tahoma did not participate in the rescue.


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## camaraderie (May 22, 2002)

Tom...the Tahoma WAS the rescue ship...it was their rubber tender that did the actual rescue.

Dawg...*"Next time you want to criticize my service or the 
missions we perform come find me and say it in my face. I will stick 
you on a small boat in 15ft seas for 36 hours and ask you how you feel when we come save you. "
*That statement gives some credence to the rest of the post don't you think? I wouldn't take his rigging comments too seriously as if he is a non-sailor, he could be thinking of the jib hanks or sheets as "rigging". It also sums up our mutual feelings that 15 foot seas and 3-4 day gales are normal weather for this time of year so what the hell was he doing out there in the first place?

...oh and we all SHOULD be thankful for the great job our Coasties do on a lot of different fronts. The only thing I would have done differently...is to scuttle the boat. Why leave a hazard floating around...and what better price to pay for idiocy than to lose your boat?


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

tdw said:


> Ask any of the lads and ladesses who man our naval craft that are called out on those rescues and they will tell you that it is a great experience and that they are happy to do it. (Australia does not have a coast guard in the the US sense.)
> 
> The bitching usually comes from people who moan about the cost to the taxpayer and quite frankly that is so much bovine excretia.


I can vouch for that. The officers get to talk it up over a tot and it gives the NCOs something more to do that clean, sleep and eat. I saw an interesting discussion on public access about mountain rescue. They don't charge because they PREFER people call in a mayday before things get extremely out of hand. They didn't even charge a group of hikers they had to rescue TWICE from the SAME PLACE in two days. The navy/coasties are going to burn their fuel rescue or not. So.. while you could start tallying the cost from the point they get the call, fact is they were going to use that fuel anyway, and their all on salary so no hourly cost is incurred. In hindsight, when you actually look at the weather this guy went through, and it is documented, its not surprising he made the call. I've lost a halyard in 40 knots... the thing took off and turned into a flailing death whip.. can't imagine 60! Like the original news story said.. he probably would have made it if his engine had not failed and he got to warmer water. No shame in using your engine offshore when you need it!


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

sailingdog said:


> I was wondering about the Grail Pilgrin and what actually happened, and I found the following post:


Good find, SD. I don't think there's any doubt that this fellow had been through some nasty stuff.

Not sure the poster's account of the condition of the boat is necessarily all that valid, either.

In the end, I think the biggest problem here was the original decision to go when he did.


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

I agree, I have no complaints about how the USCG reacted or the job they did... and I also fully agree that the boat should have been scuttled...


camaraderie said:


> That statement gives some credence to the rest of the post don't you think? I wouldn't take his rigging comments too seriously as if he is a non-sailor, he could be thinking of the jib hanks or sheets as "rigging". It also sums up our mutual feelings that 15 foot seas and 3-4 day gales are normal weather for this time of year so what the hell was he doing out there in the first place?
> 
> ...oh and we all SHOULD be thankful for the great job our Coasties do on a lot of different fronts. The only thing I would have done differently...is to scuttle the boat. Why leave a hazard floating around...and what better price to pay for idiocy than to lose your boat?


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

I have yet to see (or post myself) any criticism of the USCG in this matter. Something is off in that alleged USCG "account", however.

I don't care how experienced the Canadian sailor is supposed to be. Choosing a Hughes 29 or some similar lightweight production boat to go to Bermuda in December indicates to me that his experience may be more luck than anything else, because just like I wouldn't take a Porsche Boxster on a trans-Saharan rally, I wouldn't choose a 29 foot coastal boat to go to Bermuda in December.

I am currently reading Jimmy Cornell's quite entertaining "A Passion for the Sea", and I am struck by how in three circumnavigations, including visits to Antarctica and to Alaska, he has rarely faced over 40 knots, because he has spent a great deal of time analyzing pilot charts, poring over weather maps and generally being conservative about when he's chosen to sail. On the other hand, he is quite happy to take 25 knots "from the right direction" if it means a fast if lumpy passage. As he has sailed a 36 foot fibreglass ketch, a 40 foot steel cutter, and now a 40 foot, flatbottomed centerboard cutter made out of aluminum, I find his arguments persuasive and his experiences convincing.

I do not get the gut feeling that the Halifax sailor was working from the same set of assumptions.


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## saltygator (Dec 13, 2006)

sailboy21 said:


> elitism... slow boats offshore? how dare they! Lets just not talk of the dozens of VO70's and similar boats dismasted, lost keels, all the freaking time! And for the record.. that boat doesn't look like a Rawson! The sea is getting too dangerous for anyone without sponsorship
> 
> 100 miles/day hoorah! Merry Christmas!


Amen. That's seven posts. Well, Seven minus one.


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