Chris White Atlantic 57 Capsize

[Boatguy30]

Actually i guess it turtled. Anyway, I've find it interesting how everyone has taken for granted the safety of the new big cats just because nothing like this has happened RECENTLY. Good work NZ!!!!
Men rescued in heavy seas near Niue - Maritime New Zealand

[cagney]

Wrong place to be at.
Nasty compression zone S - SW of the Low.
Don't underestimate the SW Pacific!!

[FSMike]

Boatguy30 -
I think the safety factor of most multihulls lies in the fact that they rarely sink. The two sailors in this case were rescued from a craft that was still afloat.

[Joli]

First of all, it's good news that everyone is OK.

Not to be argumentative but the grib file shows 30 knots. That is hardly a major storm. Maybe the sea state affected the outcome but certainly the wind speed can't be the culprit.

That is a BIG platform to have floating upside down. Has anyone heard of a cruising cat this size flipping? It will be interesting to hear what happened.

Originally Posted by cagney

Wrong place to be at.
Nasty compression zone S - SW of the Low.
Don't underestimate the SW Pacific!!

[cagney]

Look at the isobar spacing where a meteorologist(Nandi) says 25 kts. Then look at the isobar spacing in the compression zone, once again put there by a human. Machine produced gribs are known to be unreliable at times, specially near tropical features, and gribs don't include squalls...

[wanderingscotty]

I agree with cagney regarding they were in the wrong spot.

I've sailed that route a few time and pretty much every sailor who sail to/from NZ checks out Bob Mcdavitt's weekly weathergram which can be found here.

WEATHERGRAM: July 2010

On the 25th of July Bob McDavid posted the following
"TROPICS
South Pacific Convergence zone SPCZ is mainly along 8 to 11 South from
Solomons to Tuvalu/Tokelau. It occasionally peels away to the southeast
and makes a trough-an example of this should occur over Tonga Niue on
Sat 31 July, and this may develop into a LOW to south of Southern Cooks
early next week."

In a well written lat 38 artical titled "Nightmare Off New Zealand" which looked into the death of four sailors and 4 lost/destoryed boats during a 20 day period contained this telling quote

"The one condition we knew we had to avoid was getting caught between a high and an approaching low — especially a low coming down from the north."

The artical can be found here.

Latitude 38 - Nightmare Off New Zealand

IMO the main catalst was the weather pattern, rather than the any design flaws in the catamaran.
I suspect a monomaran which was flying a similar amout of canvas would have encountered major problems aswell.

[FSMike]

Originally Posted by Joli

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Not to be argumentative but the grib file shows 30 knots. That is hardly a major storm. Maybe the sea state affected the outcome but certainly the wind speed can't be the culprit.

I believe grib files only predict average wind strengths, not peak. As it turns out, the vessel in question experienced at least 62 mph during one gust according to the captain.

[donradcliffe]

They were sailing upwind in 15-20 with full jib and one reef in the main. Waves were about 3 meters. Saw a squall coming, but didn't reduce sail. Boat started to tip, man on watch tried to get to mainsheet, but fell.

Sorry, should have just directed people to the extensive discussion under http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...iue-44538.html