Visit our Popular Forums

Rakuflames · 07-09-2013, 20:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wrong

Next to actually being caught out in a 'furricane' the worst place for you and your boat to be is in a marina. Other boats, docks and pilings become battering rams. Next worse is at anchor, because few anchoring schemes will prevent your boat from dragging in 'furricane' conditions. Best place for your boat is in a location where you can secure multiple lines, doubled or tripled up - some more slack than others - to strong points (trees) on opposite banks. Heavy foilage/trees that help to reduce wind strength is a big plus.

Do the best you can to secure the boat, and then LEAVE for a place safe from the storm.

I just don't have those options. I'm well aware of them; my dad used them all the time with the company tugboats. Forecasting wasn't as good then and sometimes they really had to scramble.

But I don't have a way/place to do it, so my plan has to be the most sheltered marina possible, and I have found it. I also have insurance. that's the best I can do.

I know it's quite possible that if we have a full hurricane here, and are hit by the brunt of it, I will probably lose my boat, and would never stay on my boat through either a hurricane or even a very strong TS. I already have backup plans for that -- two, in fact -- one where I am now and one in St. Pete.

its' the best I can do. I have a sailboat, and I know Mother Nature has the power to take her from me.

Rakuflames · 07-09-2013, 20:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by deckofficer

This is where Rebel heart is holed up. IMHO, about the best place in the region.

Woah -- that's some pretty serious natural protection! I think luck will be on your side, Rebel.

bobconnie · 07-09-2013, 21:23

Personaly I would rather be at sea for a storm, rather then at anchor! At anchor you are strickly at the mercy of the storm, ya have to be ready, really ready!! Marinas, well I don't really have much info on that cus we don't use them much! I have ridden out a couple of good storms at anchor, not my favorite thing to do !! I never leave my boat! it's all we have ! Ive tryed to get Connie to leave, like Katrina, but she is a hard head, and stayed with me! Last year we had one come right over us, and she worked the whole time in the in the hospital! I r

rebel heart · 07-09-2013, 21:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wrong

With all due respect, this is why you can't know with certainty staying with your boat, which can be replaced, is a prudent choice. Is putting your life at risk worth the gamble?

It's a judgement call, but in these parts the boats that survive tend to have someone onboard and the ones that don't are usually left to fend for themselves. It's usually chafe management or something that can be dealt with but if left alone is a real issue.

A tropical storm, or even a cat 2 or 3 hurricane would probably have me on the boat. Something like a 4 or 5, direct hit... It really depends on what I had to work with.

In the place I'm at Puerto Escondido (in deckofficer's pictures there) there is almost zero storm surge so it's just a wind thing.

Rakuflames · 07-09-2013, 21:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by rebel heart

It's a judgement call, but in these parts the boats that survive tend to have someone onboard and the ones that don't are usually left to fend for themselves. It's usually chafe management or something that can be dealt with but if left alone is a real issue.

A tropical storm, or even a cat 2 or 3 hurricane would probably have me on the boat. Something like a 4 or 5, direct hit... It really depends on what I had to work with.

In the place I'm at Puerto Escondido (in deckofficer's pictures there) there is almost zero storm surge so it's just a wind thing.

The problem with saying that you'll leave if it's a Cat 4 is that storms can change intensity quite rapidly. Andrew went from Cat 1 to Cat 5 in 24 hours. It came in as a Cat 5 -- they often weaken a ittle approaching land, but not Andrew -- but one of the reasons the devastation from Andrew was so complete was that no one was expecting such a strong storm (builders skirting building codes were also a major factor. We built a house in Fort Lauderdale in 1956. It was required to be cinderblock, and it had rods embedded with an L foot in the cement slab, running through the cinderblock and anchoring the roof on. Somehow they got around a lot of that when they built Homestead.)

What I'm saying is that IMO deciding to stay on the boat based on our hurricane category system is quite dangerous. Just because one has gotten away with it in the past doesn't mean that will continue. it's like the football players who went out in a shallow water boat and then handled it badly -- they'd done it all multiple times before, but this time it blew up on them.

zeehag · 07-09-2013, 22:07

location location location
makes all the difference.
so does how you are affixed to whatever you are affixed to and whether you have lovely mangroves in which to snuggle your boat.

rebel heart · 07-09-2013, 22:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rakuflames

The problem with saying that you'll leave if it's a Cat 4 is that storms can change intensity quite rapidly. Andrew went from Cat 1 to Cat 5 in 24 hours. It came in as a Cat 5 -- they often weaken a ittle approaching land, but not Andrew -- but one of the reasons the devastation from Andrew was so complete was that no one was expecting such a strong storm (builders skirting building codes were also a major factor. We built a house in Fort Lauderdale in 1956. It was required to be cinderblock, and it had rods embedded with an L foot in the cement slab, running through the cinderblock and anchoring the roof on. Somehow they got around a lot of that when they built Homestead.)

What I'm saying is that IMO deciding to stay on the boat based on our hurricane category system is quite dangerous. Just because one has gotten away with it in the past doesn't mean that will continue. it's like the football players who went out in a shallow water boat and then handled it badly -- they'd done it all multiple times before, but this time it blew up on them.

I can only talk about where I am in particular, and at least here although the forecasting is far from dead-on it's certainly enough that I can tell what's going on every few hours. It's not going to jump from a 1 to a 5 from the time it gets from Cabo to Puerto Escondido up here. And if it did, the numerous sensors between Cabo and here would alert to the change. The VHF channels are alive before, during, and after the storm, relaying updates people get from the Internet and SSB.

Our boat has been our home for seven years. We've raised two children on it in two different countries, and we have plans to do a lot more. She's taken care of us, and we take care of her. I would have to honestly feel that my life was in real danger to abandon her. How that manifests in storm tracks and the such is too varied to state specifically.

The difference between a tropical storm and a hurricane is 1 knot, so it's not like it's something magical happens between those two levels. It's a judgement call but with every storm I've been through, and knowing other (attended) boats in my same bay have survived direct hits from cat 3's, I feel comfortable with what we're doing.

**Dockhead** · 07-09-2013, 23:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by rebel heart

Our boat has been our home for seven years. We've raised two children on it in two different countries, and we have plans to do a lot more. She's taken care of us, and we take care of her. I would have to honestly feel that my life was in real danger to abandon her.

I would stay with my boat, too, even though I have really good insurance. I completely understand and agree with your position.

It would seem to me like a betrayal to leave her, in her time of need. She wouldn't do that to me.

Ocean Girl · 07-09-2013, 23:28

Few people who ride out a hurricane aboard a boat say they would do it again. I rode one out because I listened to the weatherman when he said it would turn south of us. By the time I realized it was not only going to hit us, but will get the bad northeast side, it was too late to find better shelter. Thankfully I was at least smart enough to of gotten the boats ready in the off chance it would hit us. It takes me at least 18-20 hours to get a boat ready for that kind if storm, i had three to get ready. I think it was a cat 1 or even lower by the time it went over us. At the time I was in one of the best hurricane holes on clear lake.

I would never do it again. It's not just wind, rain and storm surge. It's other boats breaking loose. It's tornados, lightning, flying and floating debris, hour after hour.

Brian, my hubby, has a really smart approach in the way he designed our life financially. The boat we have, if we lost it, it would hurt, but would not devastate us. It would only set us back financially about a year. This living way below our means, allows us to make the decision on whether to stay aboard or evacuate less about finance and more about safety. I hope this does not come off as judging others for staying aboard, just telling my story.

Hope all is well down there.

**JPA Cate** · 08-09-2013, 09:26

On the 15th of May in 1991, we were at anchor on the north side of Raoul Island when the Met Service there got word that Cyclone Lisa was on its way, forecasted to pass between Raoul and Tonga. We moved to the west side of the island, which would have offered protection had the storm followed its predicted track. We anchored pretty far off the shore, in a depth of around 40 ft. of water. We had long periods when the anemometer was pegged at 60.

When the wind started to drop off, we decided to get out of our foulies and have a hot lunch. While we were below, the motion started to change, and we found ourselves pitching. Sure enough, the wind was blowing into the bay, and we were on a lee shore. The cyclone had come right over us, the calm was the eye, and we had to leave right now. Foolishly, we put on dry foulies (spares).

We had a manual windlass at the time, and the pitching was such that Jim had to hold onto the bow pulpit to keep from being swept off the boat, so it was back and forth, hold on, more back and forth, till we got up 175 ft. of chain (IIRC). We hoisted the storm jib, and motor-sailed out of the bay, tacking to get upwind. Scary, till we could clear the island. Fortunately for us, it was a fast moving cyclone, and the seas were never terrible. We went out and hove to for the night, proceeding the next day for Tonga.

As for Puerto Escondido, where Eric & family are, in 1989, the greatest dangers when Jim was there for a cyclone came from two sources: unattended vessels, and from other cruisers, who refused to move when told they were too close, who put out a spider web using all their anchors, leaving none in reserve--and no room for Jim to swing. Most of the vessels on the moorings were unattended, and Jim felt so unsafe that he went alone (I was in the States) out to Isla Catalina, with the plan to shift sides of the island when/if the wind shift hit there. He preferred the dangers out there to the traps in the harbor, and the alternative tactics that he could use to confront the situation on his own hook, so to speak. Fortunately the plan didn't get really tested--it could have been really difficult to move after the wind shift--and all was well.

xeon_tsd · 08-09-2013, 09:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by atoll

...having a dive mask handy will allow you to see if it gets really wet and windy, when checking your ground tackel at the bow

I like that idea! Now that I have laser eyes and don't wear glasses this could be really useful.

Rakuflames · 08-09-2013, 10:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by zeehag

location location location
makes all the difference.
so does how you are affixed to whatever you are affixed to and whether you have lovely mangroves in which to snuggle your boat.

One option we haven't talked about that I might have would be pulling the boat out into the fairway, away from the docks and pilings, and spiderwebbing it to a number of pilings. It would work extremely well here in theory because the fairways are so very wide. However, if a storm comes up the east coast of Florida, the wind will be out of the north, and the marina is not protected from the north.

If it comes up the west side, the risk of a major storm surge is very real because the marina is on a river. I don't have *any* experience tying my boat up for extreme tides. Where I am I'm not on a floating dock, but the marina does have floating docks at the end of each pier, and if they let loose, yowsa ...

The other marinas I have in mind are markedly sheltered. I have a video on my blog of what Boca Ciega Bay was like compared to what the marina on the other side of the mangroves (and sheltered on all sides) was like. But the fairways are much more narrow and I don't think spiderwebbing would work there.

I would love to have the opinion of more experienced people on here. Here is a link to one of the blog entries with that video: Boldly Go Sailing: Saving a Boat from the Rocks

Eventually that video pans 360º and shows the club marina. If anyone has an opinion on whether spiderwebbing is a possibility in that marina I would love to hear it.

thanks in advance ...

Rakuflames · 08-09-2013, 10:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by rebel heart

I can only talk about where I am in particular, and at least here although the forecasting is far from dead-on it's certainly enough that I can tell what's going on every few hours. It's not going to jump from a 1 to a 5 from the time it gets from Cabo to Puerto Escondido up here. And if it did, the numerous sensors between Cabo and here would alert to the change. The VHF channels are alive before, during, and after the storm, relaying updates people get from the Internet and SSB.

Our boat has been our home for seven years. We've raised two children on it in two different countries, and we have plans to do a lot more. She's taken care of us, and we take care of her. I would have to honestly feel that my life was in real danger to abandon her. How that manifests in storm tracks and the such is too varied to state specifically.

The difference between a tropical storm and a hurricane is 1 knot, so it's not like it's something magical happens between those two levels. It's a judgement call but with every storm I've been through, and knowing other (attended) boats in my same bay have survived direct hits from cat 3's, I feel comfortable with what we're doing.

I don't mean to be questioning your judgment. You know you, your boat, your anchorage, etc., etc., etc. And I completely understand that it's your HOME that is at risk.

I just came to living aboard differently than you, I suspect -- as in, not knowing nearly as much and realizing that. I moved on as a calculated risk, knowing that I did not have the skills to be assured of saving her in a hurricane, and I still don't feel I have those skills. But I was 62 and it was "now or never."

We've been extremely lucky here in the Tampa Bay area. Charley was aimed right at the mouth of Tampa Bay and would have been a disaster probably worse than Katrina if it had not turned, but it did.

They never expected Debby or Isaac to get terribly strong. They were on the low end for TS's. So I haven't experienced anything like what might happen.

I'll do everything I can to save her, but my "everything" isn't nearly as complete a list as others' "everything here.

Ocean Girl · 08-09-2013, 11:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rakuflames

One option we haven't talked about that I might have would be pulling the boat out into the fairway, away from the docks and pilings, and spiderwebbing it to a number of pilings. It would work extremely well here in theory because the fairways are so very wide. However, if a storm comes up the east coast of Florida, the wind will be out of the north, and the marina is not protected from the north.

If it comes up the west side, the risk of a major storm surge is very real because the marina is on a river. I don't have *any* experience tying my boat up for extreme tides. Where I am I'm not on a floating dock, but the marina does have floating docks at the end of each pier, and if they let loose, yowsa ...

The other marinas I have in mind are markedly sheltered. I have a video on my blog of what Boca Ciega Bay was like compared to what the marina on the other side of the mangroves (and sheltered on all sides) was like. But the fairways are much more narrow and I don't think spiderwebbing would work there.

I would love to have the opinion of more experienced people on here. Here is a link to one of the blog entries with that video: Boldly Go Sailing: Saving a Boat from the Rocks

Eventually that video pans 360º and shows the club marina. If anyone has an opinion on whether spiderwebbing is a possibility in that marina I would love to hear it.

thanks in advance ...

Maybe start a new thread about this, it seems worth exploring. One of the issues with marinas is you cannot block fairways, there are folks coming in at last minute for shelter. But again, I'd start new thread, and be sure to check the old threads, lots information already posted.