At the risk of it being called an urban legend, I know this person and this
boat personally. So I am in fact reciting first hand - well ok, second hand knowledge cause I didn't
see the
boat fall off the
trailer, but did see the dent. My friend Kenneth built a boat (ken, if your out there say Hi!!) Anyways, Ken built a sweet 25 ft hard chinned
steel hull sailboat named Sea Mark. While trucking it to the
water Sea Mark fell off the
trailer at 55 MPH. When she finally stopped the only thing wrong was a dent and a scratched up
paint job. She is a real tough gal and I'd take on a container with her anytime! well, hopefully that will not happen, but you get my drift. BTW - Ken, his wife Liz, and their son andrew, lived on the 25 footer for several years.
Go steel! says the girl with a
fiberglass boat
.
I think striking a container is very likely nowadays. I had a near miss out in the
Gulf of Mexico a few years ago. The large container in the
classic "pointy side up" position passed off my stbd about 50 yards. I took a pic and will try to find it. I have two friends that were sunk by containers within three months of each other. We believe the containers fell off the same ship (but different containers) around
Belize, then was carried by currents into the Gulf. One of the boats that sank was a older model
Hunter, she sank in only three or four minutes . The other boat was a newer
Catalina 40 -42, she took about 8 hours to go down. It was a slower leak but behind a
water tank so he just couldn't get to it from the inside. I think the key for
fiberglass boats in dealing with containers is to have a good plan if holed. My boat, with its pesky liner, makes that task harder because of the limited access to the
hull from the inside. I will have a
emergency kit especially designed for going over the side to
repair a hole. Lets hope I'll never have to use it.
Lots of debris out there, be careful.
Erika