Simple safety

IT CAN BE QUITE A SURPRISE to see how much safety gear there is aboard some sailboats, and how little aboard others. A lot of it has to do with the owner's philosophy.


During the 1950s, when men such as Marcel Bardiaux and Bernard Moitessier were sailing around the world singlehanded, they spurned even such elementary safety features as stanchions and lifelines.

"They give you a false sense of security," Moitessier once told me. "They catch you below the hip. They can catapult you overboard. Better to learn to cling like a monkey, like me."

Times have changed, of course. There's a lot more nagging now from the people who are trying to save you from yourself and your obviously suicidal ways. It's difficult now to find a boat that doesn't have lifelines.

But the old spirit hasn't entirely vanished. And some of the safest boats have the simplest equipment. It is, however, combined with a thorough knowledge of how to use it should the need arise. After all, it's pretty pointless to own thousands of dollars-worth of lifesaving gear if you and your crew haven't practiced using it.

You should be very cautious, though, when choosing safety equipment. Safety is an emotional subject and manufacturers trade on it. Promise yourself that you will not buy anything you couldn't handle in pitch darkness in a heaving sea on a stormy night.

So what do you really need? You'll have to choose for yourself, of course, since it depends on the boat, the crew, and where you intend to sail. But here are five areas you should consider when the subject comes up. Think hard about each of them and buy the simplest, sturdiest gear that fills the bill:

1. Equipment that will keep you on board.

2. Gear to save you if you fall overboard.

3. Equipment to keep the boat safe (including a reliable engine and sturdy anchor tackle).

4. Gear to attract help if you get into trouble, and

5. Equipment to save you if your boat sinks.

Today's Thought

Rashness brings success to few, misfortune to many.

— Phædrus, Fables.

Tailpiece

“What happened to your leg?”
“Broke it jumping over the net.”
“But isn’t that what you’re supposed to do in tennis?”
“Apparently not if it’s table tennis.”

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

Your own best lifeboat

A READER who is planning to go solo world cruising in a 28-foot sloop wants to know if she really needs a dedicated life raft.  "I really don't have space for one," she says, "and I can't actually afford one anyhow. I am considering carrying a half-inflated inflatable dinghy on deck and keeping a well-stocked grab-bag down below — within arm's reach of the cockpit. Do you think this is irresponsible?"

No ma'am, I don't. I have grave doubts about the usefulness of life rafts on small sailboats. I once edited a book about a large storm off New Zealand that caused havoc among a fleet of yachts heading north, and the only deaths involved a family that took to their life raft. They were never seen again. All the yachts survived, even though some were abandoned when their crews were taken aboard rescue boats.

The committee that investigated the famous Fastnet Race disaster was very critical of the value of life rafts in storm-force winds and seas. Time after time I have read about sailboats whose exhausted crews called for help because they thought their boats were sinking — only to discover days or weeks later that the yachts were still afloat.  Half-filled with water mostly (or more) but still floating, still salvageable, and still affording shelter.

This has led me to the belief that most cruising boats are their own best lifeboats.

There should be a watertight bulkhead up forward, of course, in case of collisions, and you should carry spares for a jury rig — plenty of wire rope and clamps, and as many whisker poles and spinnaker poles as you can find room for.  You may need a way to make an emergency rudder. How about a spinnaker pole and that nicely varnished locker door?

Two bilge pumps are the minimum, at least one of which can be worked manually from the helm. Plus all the usual stuff like a storm jib, and towing warps or a drogue. If you think carefully about it, your personal lifeboat will have a lot more going for it than a dedicated life raft could possibly have.  And yes, keep that half-inflated dinghy on deck somewhere as a last resort.  I suppose lifeboats sink, too, sometimes.

Today's Thought
The storm is master; man, like a ball,
Is toss'd twixt wind and billow.
— Schiller, Wilhelm Tell.

Tailpiece
California cops recently pulled over the Bionic Man after they spotted him doing 120 mph on Interstate 5.

He was fined $1,500 and dismantled for six months.

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

Where are the Yugo yachts?

I WAS WATCHING a car review on television the other day when it struck me that there are no bad cars any more. And that made me wonder if there are any bad boats.

The car in question was a smallish family sedan, nothing special, but the reviewer had lots of good things to say about it.

My wife, a former journalist, pointed out the obvious: “They won’t let you drive their cars if you give them bad reviews.”

Well, that explained why there are no bad cars. But if you have an ear attuned to the special language of car reviewers, you can read between the lines. You pick up the subtle hints.

“Car enthusiasts might want a little more feedback in the corners,” he said cautiously. That meant the steering was sloppy, the suspension was soft, and you had no idea how much you could twitch the steering wheel before the darned thing fell over on its side.

“Acceleration is adequate for a car in its class.” That meant it was slow and underpowered. That’s what you call damning faintly, with praise just strong enough to win you another car to review next month.

Now when it comes to sailboats, who can remember when last they read a magazine review panning a new boat? Where does someone, specially someone unfamiliar with boats, go for advice about the virtues and vices of a particular model? Where are the waterborne Edsels lurking these days? Who’s churning out the yachting Yugos? Are there really no bad boats?

Those of us who follow these things know there are new production boats whose keels fall off from time to time. I know of one hull that split right down the middle at sea. I read about one whose engine fell off its mounts when the boat turned turtle in a storm. And we know that there are certain boats with well-known reputations for susceptibility to hull blisters.

In my book called Twenty Small Sailboats to Take You Anywhere, I list all the faults I could find out about each boat. These faults were mostly to do with sagging cabin tops under deck-stepped masts, rotting plywood or balsa cores in decks, or weak-kneed rudder fittings. But they were all old boats, well used boats, cheap boats, not models straight off the showroom floor. And the reaction from sailors who already owned those boats was interesting.

There were big headlines on the Internet when I aroused the wrath of owners of 20-foot Flickas. "Vigor is an Idiot," they said. It wasn’t because I criticized the boat in my book. In fact, the Flicka got a very favorable review. It was, after all, one of the favored 20 out of the many hundreds of boats I had to choose from. No, they objected because I mentioned that she was tubby and boxy, and because I characterized her as pug-ugly. Love is blind, of course. All boats are sleek and beautiful to their owners, and those who think otherwise are patently idiots.

My wife now suggests I write a book to help newcomers to sailing. She has the title already. Twenty Small Sailboats to Avoid at All Costs. I’m not biting, though. It’s still my opinion that there are Yugo yachts out there, but — and I’m actually ashamed to admit this — it will take a braver man than I am to point them out in print.

Today’s Thought
I have never found, in a long experience of politics, that criticism is ever inhibited by ignorance.
— Harold Macmillan

Boaters’ Rules of Thumb, #144
When is your boat overloaded? The average displacement sailboat may safely be allowed to rise above, or sink below, its designed waterline by an amount equal to 1 percent of its waterline length. Thus, a boat with a 30-foot waterline can sink 3.6 inches.

Tailpiece
“What happened to that horse you bought?”
“It died.”
“Did you sue the guy you bought it from?”
“Nah, too much fuss and bother. I raffled it.”
“But didn’t people complain when they learned it was dead?”
“Only the winner, and I gave him his money back.”

Ignore the experts

(Every Monday, Wednesday, Friday. How many times do I have to tell you?)

NOW AND THEN a sentence in a boating magazine grabs my attention. This one was in an article by Annie Westlund, in the latest issue of Small Craft Advisor. It said: “In flat conditions, keeping the mainsail up helps with economy by about 5 percent when motoring, according to Tom Cunliff.”

Well, my brain cells sat up straight and started paying attention when I read that. I don’t know how much Annie Westlund knows about Tom Cunliffe, apart from the fact that she can’t spell his name, and I don’t know how much Tom Cunliffe knows about the law of conservation of energy, but I have to wonder if he’s ever heard of it.

Cunliffe, in case you’re wondering, is a British sailor and writer who operates from a cottage in the New Forest. Westlund operates from a 17-foot Slipper sailboat in Lake Huron in Ontario. Between the two of them, they have some explaining to do.

Lots of sailboats around here go from island to island under power in summer, when the winds are light or non-existent, and many of them raise the mainsail while they motor. I have done it myself countless times.

But I’ve never kidded myself that it was helping the boat move forward in any way. Let’s face facts: if you motor at 5 knots in a calm, the apparent wind will be from dead ahead at 5 knots. The mainsail will lie back along the centerline and flap uselessly.

You can sheet it in as tight as you like, but it will still billow and empty without providing any forward drive. To keep the mainsail quiet, many of us will move the mainsheet track over to one side or the other, and pin the main down there. In this position it is filled on one side and lies quietly, but anyone with the sense of a fried oyster will know that a parallelogram of forces shows that the force it is creating is directed aft and to the side. There is no forward component at all. In other words, it is making the work of the engine harder, not easier, as the Westlund/Cunliffe combination claims.

What this proves, I have to tell you, is that you can’t believe any darned thing the experts tell you. I’m sorry that this is not good news, but it’s the only subject I could think to write about on a Sunday evening and as soon as I finish this I can go and have another beer. So you’ll have to be brave and figure things out for yourself, as I do, and ignore the experts. Sadly, it’s the only way. Cheers for now.

Today’s Thought
Science is wonderfully equipped to answer the question “How?” but it gets terribly confused when you ask the question “Why?”
— Erwin Chargaff, Professor of Biological Chemistry, Columbia U

Boaters’ Rules of Thumb #80
Floating junk. The rule is that flotsam is what remains floating after a vessel has accidentally sunk. Jetsam is cargo or gear deliberately thrown overboard to help save a stranded vessel or one in heavy seas. There is no linguistic requirement that jetsam should float. Furthermore, if you attach a buoy to your sunken jetsam it might better be described as lagan. Yes, lagan. It’s in the dictionary, honest.

Tailpiece
“I notice that Bert’s business seems to be perking up.”
“Yeah, he started taking the pins out of the map and sticking them in the salesmen instead.”

My purpose on Earth

(See this space every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for another Mainly about Boats column by John Vigor)

BEING OF A HUMBLE NATURE I don’t mention this often, but some people think I’m perfect.

Yes, they do. Perfect. Some. I didn’t say all. Ivor Tungin-Cheaque is one for a start. He’s chairman of Vigor’s Silent Fan Club and he’s my biggest fan.

But sad to say, I’m not perfect. Sorry Ivor. There is one minor flaw in my character that I recognize as an imperfection. I confess that I like to sail rings around other yachts. And “like” might be a small understatement. Take a great delight in, actually.

I did it again yesterday. Took the little Mirror for a singlehanded spin, the first time in years. Beautiful warm 10-knot breeze, cloudless sky, snow-capped Mt. Baker hovering in the background.

Bellingham Bay is six miles across and crossing it in a small dinghy can get boring, so the kayaks and speed rowers and small centerboard sailboats mostly stick reasonably close to shore where they can shout rude things at landlubbers but still be out of range of thrown stones. But I felt the need to get away from everything so I headed offshore, perched on the gunwale and bashing along beautifully.

And then, when I was about two miles out, I spied a sailboat of about 26 feet sailing under full main and a 150 genoa. And something came over me. The old thing. The bad thing.

I watched him for a minute or two and it seemed I was gaining on him. That’s very important. I’m not in this for fun. I have to be faster, or it’s no contest. I’m not stupid, thank you very much.

So I trimmed the jib for a best beat and started concentrating on the telltales. The bottom two were fine, alternately lifting and lying flat in unison like a well disciplined pair of twins. But the top one was a little off. The head wasn’t twisting enough. Well, we know what to do. We have to move the jib fairlead aft to cure that. But you can’t do that on a Mirror. The fairlead is fixed. On a Mirror you cure that by moving the whole jib up or down the forestay. But it’s so long since I raced a Mirror I couldn’t remember whether I should move it up or down, and in any case I could only move it up because it was already down as far as it could get, and changing it would mean heaving to and losing time so I thought to myself “Bugger it,” I thought, “Bugger it, I will still sail rings around him even though I am handicapped.”

Now all this thinking took some time and when I looked up again I could see that we were much closer to the quarry, and not only closer but pointing higher, to boot. I don’t know what kind of boat it was, but it was a plastic sloop, with a big V on the mainsail with one man in the cockpit, looking back at me with what I imagined to be a mild form of alarm on his face.

I ignored him of course. I always do that. It’s not nice to jeer. Not out loud, anyway. I zipped past him well to windward and then gradually fell off onto a broad reach, making lots of foam. I crossed his bow, jibed, and headed back the way I’d come. Then I hardened up and crossed his wake. It’s always hard not to look at the victim at this stage. I always imagine he’s jumping up and down and shaking his fist and mouthing obscenities. But I was brave and didn’t look. I bit my lip and stared straight ahead at the jib telltales.

“Aha!” I thought to myself. “Another notch in my belt. And with a bad jib, too.”

And total peace descended over me. A great contentment flooded my soul. “How often,” I thought, “do we humans question why we were put on Earth? I don’t question. I know. I was put on Earth to sail rings around other boats. It doesn’t make me perfect. But believe me, it’s wonderful, just wonderful.

Today’s Thought
So who’s perfect? ... Washington had false teeth. Franklin was nearsighted. Mussolini had syphilis. Unpleasant things have been said about Walt Whitman and Oscar Wilde. Tchaikovsky had his problems, too. And Lincoln was constipated.
— John O’Hara, Carte Blanche, Fall 65

Boaters’ Rules of Thumb #74
Figureheads. The old rule of thumb was that a real human head should be placed on the bowsprit of a vessel starting her first voyage. Often, the head was that of a beautiful maiden. Hence, the term maiden voyage. The head was supposed to provide the ship with a soul.

Today, in the age of female emancipation, mariners no longer dare use live maidens for figureheads, which may explain the glut of soulless look-alike vessels that fill our marinas today.

Tailpiece
“Do you really believe kissing is unhealthy?”
“Definitely. Your husband is watching.”

Motors be damned

(NOW HEAR THIS: They’re letting John Vigor out of his cage for three whole weeks. This is his last column until Monday July 5. Meanwhile, this is your chance to browse through 259 past columns listed over there on the right. Good stuff, believe me. Ration yourself to 10 a day.)

I OFTEN THINK of the late Hal Roth as a kindred spirit. Like me, he was always content to dawdle along at a couple of knots if the wind went light. He wasn’t one to start the engine when his speed dropped below 5 knots, as so many sailors do today. When he was sailing around the wine-dark seas of the Mediterranean in the wake of Ulysses, he once took 6 hours to cover 15 miles in Greece — an average of 2 1/2 knots.

Like him, I grew up in an era when sailors actually sailed. The grumpy old salts I learned from frowned upon anybody who switched on an auxiliary engine just because there was no wind. I was actually quite shocked when an American yacht came past me once on a passage around the bottom of Africa. He was actually motor-sailing, and he didn’t look at all guilty about it. We were making a knot-and-a-half and he was making six. Such bad taste, I thought.

On another occasion I was sailing from the British Virgin Islands to Fort Lauderdale when two American sailboats, Pendragon and Escudo, came motoring past our 30-footer in mid-ocean. They were talking about us on VHF. They couldn’t understand why we weren’t motoring in the very light air. There was a lot of discussion about how much ice their freezers were making, with their engines running all the time.

When the wind hauled aft we were able to raise our twin running jibs. “Well, whaddya know?” said the radio. “The guy’s got his spinnaker up at last.”

“Yeah, slow thinker,” came the reply.

We thought they were very rude. I contemplated hitting back at them on the VHF with some powerful invective or some scornful, withering sarcasm, but in the end we held our tongues and slid over the calm waters leading to the Bahamas in stately silence, as all decent sailors should. Motors be damned.

Today’s Thought
One of the greatest sounds of them all—and to me it is a sound—is utter, complete silence.
— André Kostelanetz

Boaters’ Rules of Thumb #63
Electrical wiring. In general, electrical wiring for boats should be tinned and should have at least 20 strands in each wire to absorb flexing and vibration. The insulation should contain no paper or fabric.

Tailpiece
“What’s Monica’s last name?”
“Monica who?”

The motor-sailing conundrum

Check back here every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for new columns by John Vigor, one of America’s best-known boating writers and editors. He’s the author of 12 books ranging from a children’s novel to a full-blown boating encyclopedia. He is a nationally recognized sailing and navigation instructor, certified by the American Sailing Association. His column is Mainly About Boats, but after a working lifetime as a newspaper humor columnist, it’s Occasionally About Anything That Comes Into His Mind – and always worth reading.

WHENEVER THE WIND DIES on Puget Sound you’ll find cruising sailboats puttering along under power with their mainsails set and their foresails stowed. It’s called motor-sailing.

The question is: does the mainsail actually help? Is it contributing to forward motion, or is it a parasitic drag?

It’s a question that must have occurred to many a sailor trying to reach an anchorage before the dark stillness of night hides all the unmarked rocks in his way.

At first glance the answer seems quite simple: as long as the sail is filled with air, bulging with a business-like curve, it must be sucking the boat forward and adding to the engine’s speed. This must certainly be the case if there is a faint breeze blowing at 45 degrees or more from dead ahead. But what about a dead calm?

When there is no wind at all, the apparent wind caused by the boat’s motion through the water will come from dead ahead. This will make the mainsail flutter uselessly as the boom swings in to the centerline. There will definitely be no advantage in that case, and perhaps a slight disadvantage caused by the drag of the sail.

What then, if you pull the mainsheet traveler to one side or the other and pin the mainsail at an angle so that it fills with the air coming from ahead? This is what many sailors do, including me, to keep the mainsail quiet and, perhaps more importantly, to help cut down on rolling; but it has always worried me.

The sail might well be curved in a bulge that looks purposeful, but most of the power that it generates in this position is directed aft, not forward. It’s acting in the same way that a backed squaresail acts, and it’s robbing the boat of forward speed. The faster the motor pushes the boat, the greater the counter-effort.

So what we really should do in a dead calm is drop the mainsail altogether. We don’t, of course, not only because of the extra rolling, and not only because it involves work, but also because a little breeze could spring up at any time, and that would change the situation drastically. Even five knots of wind would change the mainsail from being a big bag of drag to a helpful contributor to forward motion, and we want to be ready to take advantage of it the second it happens.

And so we continue to motor-sail in the age-old way, our brows furrowed with the effort of trying to figure out whether the effort of dropping the mainsail is worth the slight gain in speed that might result. Mostly, I believe, it isn’t. But maybe that’s just wishful thinking.

Today’s Thought
Expecting something for nothing is the most popular form of hope.
—Arnold H. Glasow

Tailpiece
“Dad, if a girl kisses me, should I kiss her back?”
“Hell no, son. Kiss her lips.”