Heaving to in violent weather

SOME OF THE WORLD’S most experienced long-distance cruisers recommend the use of a sea anchor AND a trysail to heave to in violent storms and gales. While powerboats and shallow-draft centerboard sailboats will often lie quietly to a sea anchor streamed from the bow, few deep-keeled cruising boats will stay bow-to the heavy seas in this way.

But, by deploying a parachute sea anchor on a bridle, The bow of a sailboat may be angled within 50 degrees of the wind and waves, and the boat’s forward motion will be checked. That’s important, because it means that she will stay directly to leeward of the turbulent currents caused by her sideways drift through the water.

This “slick” apparently encourages approaching waves to trip, plunge, and dissipate most of their energy before hitting the boat.

Because every hull reacts differently, and because sea conditions vary widely, the best combination of sails, and the best sea-anchor size and position, must be found by experiment.

That’s easier said than done, of course. Much easier. It involves a lot of hard work in atrocious conditions, but once you have found the right recipe it brings you great peace of mind and greater safety in really bad conditions.

Today’s Thought

He who is not prepared today, will be less so tomorrow.

— Ovid, Remediorum Amoris

Tailpiece

“The doctor forecast I’d be on my feet in no time.”

“Was he right?”

“Yeah, I had to sell my car yesterday.”

(Drop by every Monday, Wednesday, Friday for a new Mainly about Boats column.)

Heavy weather practice

YESTERDAY I WAS READING a manuscript of a book to be published next year that deals with tragedies connected with small boats.  One of the themes of the book was how easy it is for a sailboat crew at sea to become dangerously exhausted and incapable of rational decisions or even necessary sail changes.

It struck me then, as it often has before, that too many sailboat skippers simply don’t know how to handle heavy weather. They have never bothered to find out how their particular boat will behave in high winds and rough seas so that she will tend to herself safely without human help, and give her crew a chance to snatch a bite to eat and catch up on some vitally needed sleep.

One way to do this is to heave to, a catch-all phrase for any number of methods of slowing right down and letting your boat bob over the waves while you shut yourself securely down below.  Hulls of traditional design, that is to say hulls with full-length deep keels, will often heave to under a backed storm jib and a deep-reefed mainsail or a dedicated trysail. You can adjust the angle at which the sails catch the wind so that your bows are pointed more, or less, toward the oncoming swells.

The tiller or wheel should be lashed to leeward, so that if she starts to drive forward too fast, the rudder will automatically head her up into the wind again and slow her down. Forward speed in general depends on several things, of course, including the strength of the wind and the amount of canvas you’re spreading, but is usually in the region of 1 1/2 to 2 knots.  Your course over the ground will be roughly at right angles to the wind, which is something to make you wary if there is any land close at hand. Some traditional hulls will adopt a nice hove-to position 60 degrees or so off the wind under a deep-reefed mainsail only.

Unfortunately, the only way to learn how best your boat will heave to is to take her out in strong winds — preferably 25 knots or more — and experiment.  If you have a fin-keeler, that can be interesting because while some fin keelers are completely docile and easy to heave to, others of less displacement and higher freeboard tend to be skittish and less predictable in their behavior.

In fact, many light-displacement fin keelers, perhaps the great majority, are better off in heavy weather if they’re kept moving at a reasonable clip of three-quarters hull speed or so.  This gives the fin keel a chance to dissipate the rolling energy from waves into a greater area of sea water.

I mentioned the need for strong winds for your heaving-to experiments because I once undertook to show a friend with a light fin keeler how to heave to. The weather was very light, 5 knots tops, and no matter what I did with sail areas and angles, the damn boat would not heave to. She spun around slowly in dainty circles, cocking her snoot at me, while my friend looked on cynically, obviously not impressed with my prowess at basic seamanship. I discovered then that boats behave very differently in light winds, and in fact each boat behaves differently in heavy winds, too, so you just have to go out when it’s blowing and find out for yourself how your boat likes to be handled in a gale.

Once you have worked that out, and practiced a few times, you will have earned much peace of mind.  Your knowledge of how best to face gales so that you can get some rest while the boat looks after herself, will do wonders for your morale and for the safety of the boat and her crew.

Today’s Thought

Experience is the best of schoolmasters, only the school-fees are heavy.

— Carlyle, Miscellaneous Essays

Tailpiece

“Return ticket, please.”
“Yes, sir. Where to?”
“Back here, you idiot.”

(Drop by every Monday, Wednesday, Friday for a new Mainly about Boats column.)

How to heave to

I HEAR SOME GRUMBLING among the groundlings. They’re complaining that my recent offerings have been too flighty, too airy-fairy. They want more meat and less gravy. Very well, then. Here in plain simple language devoid of all literary merit, apt metaphor, or clever allusion, is the straight dope about how to heave to.

First, though, we should ask WHEN you need to heave to. The answer is that you should heave to whenever you want to slow or stop your sailboat in such a manner that she will look after herself quietly and competently while you reef the mainsail, pump the bilges, take compass bearings, prepare some food on the stove, or catch a nap down below.

Obviously, the ability to heave to will be more useful if you regularly singlehand your boat. It’s especially useful when the wind pipes up. In a moderate gale of 30 knots or so, your boat will usually lie quite safely, riding the seas like a duck with her head tucked under her wing, pointing about 50 or 60 degrees away from the wind direction.

The amount of sail you should carry when heaving to depends on the wind strength. You can heave to under all plain sail in 15 to 18 knots but in a moderate gale a sloop would be down to a storm jib and a close-reefed mainsail.

To heave to, you need to get the foresail counterbalancing the mainsail. To achieve that, you can trim the sails for a beat and simply pull the jib sheet to weather until the sail is backed. An easier way to do it is to sail on the port tack and then go about without touching the foresail sheet. As soon as the bow has passed through the eye of the wind and way is off the boat, push the tiller down to leeward and lash it there, or turn the wheel as if you were about to tack once more. At the same time, give the mainsheet generous slack. You will now be hove to on the starboard tack and have the right of way.

If you’ve previously been crashing and bashing through fierce head seas you’ll now be astonished at how quietly and obediently she lies. You’ll be drifting sideways and moving forward at between one and two knots, but your average course over the ground will be more-or-less at right angles to the wind direction.

When you first heave to, you should experiment with the sheeting position of the mainsail. Find where it lies quietly in the lee of the foresail without driving the boat forward too much. You can point up into the wind more by trimming the mainsail in toward the center of the boat and/or by giving the foresail sheet a little slack. Conversely, you can get her to lie farther off the wind by slacking the main sheet and/or pulling the foresail farther to weather of the mast.

Incidentally, it doesn’t help much to practice heaving to in very light weather. Few boats will behave with any decency under those conditions and you will unnecessarily frustrated. Try it first with a full-sail breeze, and if you have a roller-reefing foresail, roll it up to 100 percent fore-triangle area before you heave to. Most boats that are hove to properly will move forward in little scallops, alternately pointing up slightly and falling off slightly.

You should be aware that some fin-keel boats, especially ultralight fin-keelers, are more difficult to heave to. They can be very finicky about the areas of sail drawing before and behind the mast, which have to balance each other, and they often require frequent adjustments. When the fin keel is not moving forward through the water it is basically stalled, which allows the boat to slip sideways at a great rate. This is not necessarily a bad thing, especially if it leaves a smooth slick to windward that tends to break up big seas before they reach the boat, but it’s something to be aware of if there is land to leeward.

That’s about as much help as I can give you. Every boat is different, and you need to experiment to find out how your particular boat handles best. But if you follow the principles given above you will have a good head-start. It’s worth your effort. Heaving to is a basic requirement of good seamanship. It’s also a very satisfying trick to know.

Today’s Thought
He who commands the sea has command of everything.
—Themistocles

Tailpiece
“What do you want to be when you finish college?”
“I’ve half a mind to become a politician.”
“Well, you’ll be better equipped than most of them.”