Heavy weather, can we be honest?

[JPA Cate]

This thread is perking along quite nicely. Special thanks to Snow Petrel, and also, ka4wja.

The people with lotsa miles seem to agree with the OP that the really strong winds are generally short lived, with some exceptions (zeehag). However, it was only ka4wja who mentioned his ratio of light air sailing to "normal". I think this deserves another look, possibly in its own thread, 'cause its form of "exciting" is different from heavier weather sailing, but nevertheless is worth mentioning. It is one of the reasons to have good light wind sails for circumnavigating boats. Truly, much of the time the breezes are less than 15. And as mentioned earlier, one can sail even in slight zephyrs, and, if you're game for it, you can sail in whichever direction puts the breeze (such as it is--on our anemometer, with worn bearings, nothing below 6 arbitrary wind units [maybe knots, maybe, not!])...that slight breath of air at 60 deg apparent. Almost nothing, will move the boat. In a direction, but you're in the open ocean, so does it really matter? Up to you to decide.

Soon enough a real sailing breeze will come up, but in the mean time, ka4wja's assy, it kept him moving. Good onya, John. I personally think people who set off on the long voyage should carry, not light air sails, for those condx, but also heavy wx sails, for those, and of course, for in between, as well. I might have been scared in our 30 footer had we not had the tiny storm jib. Just sayin'

Ann

[Dockhead]

Great subject.

Very few of us have any good reason to be out in anything stronger than what we choose to be in. Really serious ocean weather doesn't appear out of nowhere -- you'll know at least three days ahead, and usually more. If we're not crossing oceans, we should be close enough to a safe port to get out of the way of such weather. Even if we're crossing oceans, 90% of those crossings are done in the trade winds out of tropical rotating storm season, where big ocean weather is practically impossible.

Where I sail, we have quite a bit of weather at F8 and above, and you sometimes have to choose between waiting or going out, in weather you think you can handle. My go/no go threshold, for when I don't want to wait, has always been F8, provided decent sea room, absence of wind against tide, and wind behind the beam; otherwise F7. Or less in special cases like hard on the wind, close to land, etc.

This did really bite me in the behind once when I made a "go" decision to cross the North Sea in a forecast F8 (with consensus of the crew). It was a three day crossing, and in the course of it the forecast F8 turned into F9, which was just a little too much. The shallow North Sea produces some gnarly sea states and we got knocked down when the crest of a large breaking wave fell on us. Won't make that mistake again.

So to answer your question -- I sail a fair amount in conditions up to and including F8. I've never been in a F10, and I've been out in F9 only a couple of times. F8 is no big deal for us in sheltered waters like the Solent; exciting but not scary in the Channel. Just yesterday I did 45 miles single handed between the Estonian islands, on a close reach in F8. F7 was forecast. Average wind speed was in the low 30's, but there were periods in the 40's and gusts in the 50's. A nasty, cold, North wind. Because I was in the lee of a long island the whole way, the sea state was fairly benign, so this was generally not any big deal.

I was sailing with my blade jib alone, with main sail put away. The blade trimmed quite flat (slightly overtrimmed leech by putting the twing all the way down) is brilliant for this -- remarkably little drag and lots of power. I was sailing 9 and 10 knots with very little heel -- mostly about 10 or 15 degrees. The last hour we lost the lee and it blew in the 40's and we got a little overpowered, so I switched to the staysail alone and turned on the engine.


I have become more cautious with age and experience and make "no go" decisions more often than I used to. I don't think there's any reason to be in dangerous weather unless you're crossing oceans out of the trade winds latitudes.


One problem with "reporting" of weather by sailors is that they don't really understand the Beaufort scale. They see a brief gust in the 50's and think they've been in a F10. But even an hour in the 50's does not a F10 make -- the Beaufort scale is about average wind speeds over longer periods of time, sufficient to create certain sea states. It is not a measure of short-term wind speed.

Likewise with land-type weather phenomena like t-storms and katabatic winds. As nasty as these can be, these are not ocean weather. They do not produce the sea states which we fear.

[Paul L]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Great subject.

Very few of us have any good reason to be out in anything stronger than what we choose to be in. Really serious ocean weather doesn't appear out of nowhere -- you'll know at least three days ahead, and usually more. If we're not crossing oceans, we should be close enough to a safe port to get out of the way of such weather. Even if we're crossing oceans, 90% of those crossings are done in the trade winds out of tropical rotating storm season, where big ocean weather is practically impossible.
...........

One problem with "reporting" of weather by sailors is that they don't really understand the Beaufort scale. They see a brief gust in the 50's and think they've been in a F10. But even an hour in the 50's does not a F10 make -- the Beaufort scale is about average wind speeds over longer periods of time, sufficient to create certain sea states. It is not a measure of short-term wind speed.

Likewise with land-type weather phenomena like t-storms and katabatic winds. As nasty as these can be, these are not ocean weather. They do not produce the sea states which we fear.

Beaufort is a measure of wind speed. The sea states are an outcome of the wind speed over time. 50kts for an hour is F9, almost F10 no matter what the sea state. UK Meet Service states

. Anemometers measure a ten-minute
average at a height 10m above ground level
in an open space.

The 90% of ocean crossing are done in tradewind luxury is just marketing hype. All those boats that leave Europe on a nice tradewind passage to the Caribbean certainly aren't on a tradewind passage back to Europe. The West coast boats that do the tradewind slide to French Polynesia mostly end up going to New Zealand. The 1,000 mile passage to and from NZ is no tradewind romp.
I agree that weather forecasts are pretty good out to 3 days, but that is only 450 or 500 miles - not that long a passage.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

We used pocket gribs for for years, switched to Weather4D pro for most of 2016 and now using PredictWind and paying for the $20 or so per year subscription to get more accurate Adriatic weather. So far it's been excellent.

But don't tell any of the armchair experts here on CF you're using it, even though we enjoy it's accuracy, we've been repeatedly ridiculed for it's use here on the forum.

Good luck.

Ken

Sorry for the thread drift, but what's the criticism of Predict Wind? I don't understand.

We use GFS model gribs from Passage Weather. This is raw model output from, I believe, NOAA, and once you have some experience interpreting them, they are excellent, giving you a very good picture of the wind (subject to those things you know to interpret about them) up to three days out, and a decent idea of the general flow for a few more days out than that. It seems to me that the model keeps improving, as the data seems to be better than it was 10 years ago or whenever we first started using it.

As good as they are, I would never use raw gribs alone if I have access to human weather forecasts. So I always get an official maritime weather forecast when it's available, or weatherfax for the big picture.

But I believe Predict Wind gives the same GFS gribs as everyone else -- what is wrong with them?

[conachair]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

But I believe Predict Wind gives the same GFS gribs as everyone else -- what is wrong with them?

I pay for predictwind but mainly as the display either on android app or web is excellent. They have gfs,ecmwf and 2 of their own models based on ecmwf & gfs. I find their own models useless, too sensitive and windspeeds consistently higher than real. This is atlantic europe so far. Still a great product and well worth the subscription fee though imho.

Determining the accuracy of forecasts is way beyond us mortals imho, even actuals is hard enough assess with access to local calibrated wind speed data - "my favourite forecast is the best" is normally based on bias rather than the mass of data required to do a decent assessment.

And as the wonderful Frank Singleton says - the wind itself doesn't even know what it's doing within a Beaufort number up or down

Frank Singleton's Weather and Sailing Pages - Franks-Weather - The Weather Window

I've found gfs to be best of the bunch here in europe & once on a 6 month outdoor event in Azerbaijan with extensive logging of data into evernote - load of work trying to get a handle on a weeks worth of forecasts against what really happened

As for real heavy weather - never been in any, doesn't sound very nice. Becalmed often enough way out to sea though, only time the 3rd reef in the main has been used - to try to cut down on the main slatting .

Also , opencpn weatherfax plugin can be very useful as you can overlay sat pics over synoptics over gribs. Sometime useful to get a better idea of where the front really is.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Paul L

Beaufort is a measure of wind speed. The sea states are an outcome of the wind speed over time. 50kts for an hour is F9, almost F10 no matter what the sea state. UK Meet Service states
. . .

I can't argue it dogmatically, but I can't agree with you here. And the Met Service quote does not support the proposition.

Beaufort force is what the day or afternoon or night is like, not what happens during one hour. It's not a measure of sea state per se, but it's a measure of wind conditions which persist long enough to determine sea state. It was invented before anemometers existed -- as a way to read the sea state as a sign of the strength of the weather. There is no concept of short-term wind strength in it.

Just like you would never call a squall blowing in the 30's for 20 or 30 minutes, a "gale". It's not a gale -- a gale is a longer term weather event, lasting at least several hours. Beaufort forces correspond to these longer term concepts -- "gale", "whole gale", "storm", etc. Beaufort Force 10 is a "storm", but an hour of 55 knots is not a "storm".

[Kenomac]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Sorry for the thread drift, but what's the criticism of Predict Wind? I don't understand.

We use GFS model gribs from Passage Weather. This is raw model output from, I believe, NOAA, and once you have some experience interpreting them, they are excellent, giving you a very good picture of the wind (subject to those things you know to interpret about them) up to three days out, and a decent idea of the general flow for a few more days out than that. It seems to me that the model keeps improving, as the data seems to be better than it was 10 years ago or whenever we first started using it.

As good as they are, I would never use raw gribs alone if I have access to human weather forecasts. So I always get an official maritime weather forecast when it's available, or weatherfax for the big picture.

But I believe Predict Wind gives the same GFS gribs as everyone else -- what is wrong with them?

Nothing, I like it. First heard about it last summer from a friend.

It's the sail-by-desktop crowd that wants a human to tell them what to do. You know... "small craft advisory from.... to ..... from 12 noon." Better to stay home, it's too windy today crowd.

You might as well wait around for the announcement, "It's OK to go out and play now boys and girls."

I'm either in an anchorage or sailing in transit for five continuous months, I need to make up my own mind as to what needs to be done. If I listened and planned my summer around those marine forecasts, our boat would probably just sit in a marina all summer just like the fair weather sailor crowd.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Nothing, I like it. First heard about it last summer from a friend.

It's the sail-by-desktop crowd that wants a human to tell them what to do. You know... "small craft advisory from.... to ..... from 12 noon."

Better stay home, it too windy today crowd.

I'm either in an anchorage or sailing in transit for five continuous months, I need to make up my own mind as to what needs to be done.

Oh, I see. It's a criticism of models in general.

Well, you have to interpret model data, and you have to take them with a grain of salt. You have to understand that they poorly account for geographic effects and don't account at all for any land-based weather phenomena. But if you understand their limits, they are exceptionally valuable and useful. They are extremely good at giving you an picture of gradient wind and general flow out to three days or so. I can hardly imagine doing any kind of long distance cruising without weather model gribs.

But the human professional weatherman information is also really good to have, especially for sailing near coasts where there will be geographic effects human weathermen can sometimes predict.

[sailorboy1]

I'm never been out sailing in sustained 30 knot winds. I seen some gusts of that, but not sustained. I worry more about the sea in these conditions than I do about the wind.

Unlike people who are proud of having been out in big wind, I'm proud to have been smart enough not to have been!

[estarzinger]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Sorry for the thread drift, but what's the criticism of Predict Wind?

Years ago, they were trying to charge for stuff you could easily get for free and better elsewhere (gfs, plus a pretty poor GUI). That developed a poor 'reputation' among the 'in weather crowd'. It was viewed as the place people went who did not know any better, which has persisted . . . . however they have improved a lot since those days, including the euro model which is somewhat hard to get elsewhere and a much better GUI.

[Kenomac]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

I'm never been out sailing in sustained 30 knot winds. I seen some gusts of that, but not sustained. I worry more about the sea in these conditions than I do about the wind.

Unlike people who are proud of having been out in big wind, I'm proud to have been smart enough not to have been!

You're saying that you've never ever sailed in what what my wife and I now consider to be relatively benign conditions like in this video, yet you persist in your opinion that all boats are basically the same except for the quality of the seat cushions in your other posts.

We're making 8 knots in 28-32 knots of wind with just the staysail.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=s0HgonCDFxI

[AiniA]

When we crossed the Indian Ocean from Cocos-Keeling to Mauritius we traversed several lat/lon 'squares' on the pilot chart that showed that the most common winds were SE at 30 knots, which would suggest a range of 25 to 35 and that was pretty much what we got for close to two weeks (more the 35 than the 25, which brings me to my point, we were broad reaching with apparent winds 7 to 8 knots less that the true, say 23 to 30. If we had been heading east, an appalling thought, the apparent winds would have been more like 35 to 40 and a totally different kettle of fish.

[barnakiel]

Yes. There still are some unresolved questions. They will remain unresolved I am afraid.

Like with any product though, you must judge it by how well it serves your purpose.

If more keen users get same or similar data from other sources, this is all the beauty of the era of information. We are always better off with more options than with fewer ones.

And it is no crime to take anything publicly funded and otherwise available, chop it & wrap it in your own package, and sell it to the crowds. As long as the source data is still free and available to anyone, there is no conflict.

b.

[DougR]

Jim Cate, your comments about Mexican hurricanes pulling the pacific high south made a light bulb go on in my head....

Back in 1979 we sailed our Tartan 30 from Dana Point,CA to Hilo and spent a number of weeks sailing the Hawaiian islands before departing from Kauai heading back to Southern CA. There was a hurricane reported to be brewing in the southern Baja area and we cleared out to the north to get way ahead of that. The hurricane fizzled out, but about 7 or 8 days after leaving we ran into a gale blowing down out of the gulf of Alaska.

The only piece of electronic gear we had on the boat was a knot meter and a SW receiver, so it's anyone's guess what the winds were doing, but according to WWVA the gale had 45-50 Kt winds out 500 miles from its center and we were definitely in that circle. Lucky for us we were heading mostly east by then and the wind was generally on the port quarter. We ran with this for a day and a half.
During that time the wave height was between 20 and 25 feet....the mast spreaders were 22 feet off the water and most of the waves were right up there. These waves stretched from horizion to horizion and were about 1/8 to 1/4 mile apart with a 4 or 5 foot chop riding on them. They would roll up from behind and the boat would take off surfing down the face of the swell with the knot meter needle slamming over to the pin at 10 knots. Then the wave would roll under us and we would settle back and round up 20 degrees before heading back on course. Believe it or not but the Aries vane steered the whole time. We were down to just a 90% jib, and the boat liked that better than a smaller storm jib.

We made that trip in 22 days, and figured that wasn't bad for a 24 foot waterline 30 footer. Needless to say it's a good thing we were running with that weather because we wouldn't have been able to do anything else.

DougR

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Someday your luck and "smarts" will run out,

unlike some my smarts will always be with me, now troll along