Life Raft Discussion.... Yes or No?

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by estarzinger

Like several other people reading that post, you missed the key point; which was that his raft was not usable the day after it was serviced (because of a QA failure).

A risk factor which cannot be eliminated, but can be significantly mitigated. I think:

1. Choose a quality raft, not a cheap one. Double tubes, butyl rubber, quality construction (failure mode is seams come unglued).

2. Have it serviced regularly by a competent workshop, and WITNESS the servicing yourself. A good workshop will allow you to do this.

3. Carry TWO of them. Not just for redundancy, but also a lift raft is useless in rough weather if it is not loaded correctly -- at least 50% of capacity. So an 8 man life raft with two people in it, for example, will not have any stability at all and will not keep you out of the water in rough weather. I carry TWO four-man rafts.


I really most highly recommend getting hands on with your raft and participating in the service. You will understand how it works and feel more confident that it WILL work if you have actually seen it inflated and seen everything tested. I don't actually have all that much confidence in a raft until I've seen it serviced at least once. Even new ones fail occasionally.

[Doug Brown]

I use to run 300-ft container ship from Norfolk to Iceland and when that contract was up tramped it all over Europe, the Med and out into the Pacific Northwest.

In the big Atlantic storms I always wondered how I was going to get the crew safely off if it all went really bad. We had two 15-man liferafts - for a crew of 10.

What I ended up with was toss the rafts over, activated them and then have the crew jump in the water and get in. All of the theoretical steps you should take to get everyone dryly into a raft was just so much BS when you are in 30-35 foot swells and 60+ knots of wind. And these conditions were good - having 40 foot swells and winds 90 to 100 knots were not uncommon....

I finally made up my mind that I would most likely "go down with the ship" to keep communications going with the rescue people and from my personal decision that I did not want to be in a liferaft in those sea conditions, wet and in 30 F temperatures. I'd rather die warm and on the bridge of my ship while trying to get help to my crew.

When I ran a research ship with a lot of civilians (males & females) scientists on board and did the "safety speech" to everyone before we left the dock, I always told the smallest female that we had on board that she was going to be the first person to get into a raft and to expect to have hands shoved half way up her ass to get her into the raft. We were not looking for a date, we wanted someone to help pull us into the liferaft!

But, if I had a choice, I would rather get into a liferaft than a open dinghy which is in no way made to operate in really bad conditions. Since a liferaft is a "throw and go" operation vs a "launch" operation, you stand the chance of being able to have a secondary platform to keep you alive in a few seconds vs a few minutes.

[KD8NPB]

Don't quote my figures, but if memory serves, 70%+ cases of abandoning ship are due to electrical fires. Most rescues occur in less than 24 hours, with the grand majority of rescues in less than 2 hours.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by estarzinger

...... Originally Posted by daletournier
Hi Evans, I don't dispute the psychological response your talking about but you can't say it applies to all, .. . . circumstances vary as well as the individual, such things as fatigue levels play apart as well, many variables come into play that dictate how one responds, , that's my point.

We agree, I do not know much about the distribution of this effect. I know enough about myself to have have been satisfied we made the right decision about ourselves. I have never suggested it was necessarily correct for everyone (or anyone specifically) else. However, looking at incident reports, it does seem to me that I am not totally unique and that it does clearly apply to some other people/situations.


Also sometimes you just don't have the time, yachts can go down fast as my mate Matt of the New Zealand coast experienced. Do you just die?

Yes, we would just have died. However, we were probably better prepared and more committed to avoid/prevent that sort of outcome than many (arguably precisely because we knew we would have died).

This sort of 'commitment' has been explored in the military (and other leadership situations), typically shorthanded by 'burn the boats on the beach' if you are interested . . . .
http://travisrobertson.com/leadershi...s-succeed-die/
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/you-w...alok-tamhankar

Sometimes you are just going to die. Sometimes you might have been able to carry gear to prevent that but choose not to. Physically you can't carry it all, and you can instead focus on preventing/risk reduction for many risks. We accepted that, and accepted that we had made the best trade-offs for ourselves.


How do you argue that the dinghy dosent give you the same escape option as the life raft thus instigating the non fight but abandon response?

We never sailed on (long/serious) passage with the dinghy inflated on deck. I considered that poor seamanship (a greater risk of causing problems at sea than the risks it might possibly reduce by being inflated on deck). On Hawk, it was deflated and stowed below in the workshop. note: we did often coastal cruise with it inflated on deck, but for pretty much anything longer than an overnight we deflated it and properly stowed it.........

Just two comments about all of this:

It is absolutely right that "sometimes you just die". And this is true no matter what kind of precautions you've made, training you've done, and gear you have. Something all of us should understand when we do something with inherent risks like going into remote places whether by boat or otherwise.

I am not, however, comfortable with the "burn the boats on the beaches" approach -- supposedly to force yourself to be more careful and take more precautions so that you don't need the raft in the first place.

Why? Because you are the only person I have ever known who actually took far more precautions than most, with your multiple watertight compartments etc etc, but consciously did without a raft. It's theoretically possible, and I'm sure there are a few others, but in reality, at least in my experience, those people who sail without a raft in blue water as a rule do without that just like they do without many other precautions. It's not a cost-benefit question of raft versus dewatering pump -- for example. It's a cost-benefit question of do I even worry about stuff which is unlikely to happen, or do I just wing it. Or else it's the Rebel Heart approach which is I am such an awesomely gifted and skillful sailor that nothing bad can happen to me -- I'll surely find that leak and stop it; I unlike others will be super active and get the fire out; therefore no need to think about how do I abandon. Or else the budget just got exhausted before I got to the raft (a perfectly legitimate reason by the way) so I'm not going to worry about it.

And I'm not even saying that just winging it is per se wrong, either. Our sport is very safe compared to others and extremely few people die doing it, even people who don't think about safety at all. I think everyone should decide for themselves, how much attention and money to devote to safety. Obviously how much money everyone has to spend on this stuff varies hugely. But for sure what I would recommend to everyone is to START with structural and watertight integrity of the boat and especially, the steering gear, and don't do anything, maybe not even a life jacket, before you're sure about that. I do think it's ridiculous when people spend thousands or tens of thousands on safety gear, when they haven't even checked their keel bolts.

And the corollary of that is -- I would much rather sail on the boat of a guy who doesn't have a penny and doesn't have a raft and maybe not even an EPIRB, but knows every detail of his boat intimately, and has crawled all over it and checked every last bolt and cable before setting off on a long passage, than the boat of a guy who's never been in his own bilges, doesn't even understand how his steering system works, and has bought the most expensive raft in the world, and has left it at that. First things first!

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by daletournier

I don't see the life raft as an easy out if your a thousand miles from land. Leaving the mother ship with all its food and shelter to board a little life raft is not a preferred option imo.

Obviously true! And if anyone thinks that having a life raft gives anyone an easy way out of something unpleasant on the mother ship, should think again.

A life raft is no kind of "get out of jail free" card. It's a horrible place to be. It's hard to get into, and could be impossible to get into in bad enough conditions. It has the most horrible motion in bad conditions -- everyone vomits -- a serious hazard to life (why all life rafts have stashes of seasick pills). A liferaft (at least properly loaded) is far more stable than a dinghy, but can still be rolled by breaking waves, in which case you are likely dead in cold water. It might not work at all (as others have written about). A life raft is really only a last ditch way to keep out of the water, when everything else has failed, and it is far from a guaranty of anything.

OBVIOUSLY, if the mother ship is still even somewhat habitable, you stay there. It's one reason why I think pumping ability is so important. A lot of boats are abandoned because of flooding which could have been controlled with enough pumping capacity. It would be awful to have to abandon an otherwise sound boat because of a leak.

Just day before yesterday on passage we listened to the radio traffic on the VHF about a sinking boat, which was saved by a lifeboat which brought a dewatering pump out. Bilge pumps couldn't cope, crew couldn't find the leak, but once the lifeboat arrived and got the water down, they did find the leak and managed to stop it. What if this happens offshore out of range of the SAR services?

[Kenomac]

I've decided to purchase a life raft if for no other reason than to set the minds of the crew at ease. All four of us have a do everything possible to keep the mothership afloat approach, but I'm concerned about the stability issue regarding the dinghy. So owning a four person, water ballasted, canopy dinghy, with a boarding ladder is in our future.

Thanks everyone for your responses.

Here’s Greg trying on his survival suit and stretching the label’s claim that “one size fits all.”

[goat]

Doesn't anyone make water ballast bags that can be attached to a dinghy? Empty, they wouldn't take up a lot of room.

[Kenomac]

My concern is that the issue is more about the shape of the dinghy and placement of the four individuals inside the dinghy. Long and narrow vs square or round.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

My concern is that the issue is more about the shape of the dinghy and placement of the four individuals inside the dinghy. Long and narrow vs square or round.

Bingo. Life raft is specifically designed for lying ahull.

Dinghy is most definitely not.

[Sojourner]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Just not sure it’s absolutely necessary given all the other safety stuff we already have onboard and the routing precautions being taken.

We will have a pre-inflated dinghy lashed down absent of the outboard while enroute. The life raft isn’t a no-go at this point... I’m still undecided. Do you wear a drsuit on your boat in bad weather? I do.

So far, I’m leaning towards Pete’s idea of buying one, then selling it upon arrival. Does Italy do craigslist?

Yes. Subito

https://www.subito.it/

[Exile]

Someone mentioned early on about vendors in the UK who will ship a liferaft to the states at far less cost than what one has to pay here in the US.

Any links to or names of these vendors?

[Pete7]

Originally Posted by Exile

Someone mentioned early on about vendors in the UK who will ship a liferaft to the states at far less cost than what one has to pay here in the US.

Any links to or names of these vendors?

Probably have to go sea freight due to flares and CO2 bottle in the raft.

However, you could try Ocean Safety, they probably have the experience to ship overseas.

https://www.oceansafety.com/sectors/...gory/liferafts

Or possibly: https://www.marinesuperstore.com/delivery-costs

[KRMS]

Ha ha I like the survival suit pic. I thought you’d buy the liferaft. Good decision. If neither money nor space are an issue then it’s simply a question of whether you’d board the dinghy of the liferaft if the ship was going down.

I guess if it was super calm you could take the uninflated liferaft in the dinghy and so still have a back up :-)

[kmacdonald]

The dinghy is all you need. Life rafts are dinosaurs. They went away when good weather reporting became available. The dinghy will work fine in any situation you might reasonable encounter. I'm sure there are some that will tell you that you need a life jacket in a hot tub but I'm sure you're more rational than that.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by KRMS

Ha ha I like the survival suit pic. I thought you’d buy the liferaft. Good decision. If neither money nor space are an issue then it’s simply a question of whether you’d board the dinghy of the liferaft if the ship was going down.

I guess if it was super calm you could take the uninflated liferaft in the dinghy and so still have a back up :-)

The operative phrase being "super calm"

Yes, but that's what I would do, in fact, if it were calm enough (< F4) and there was time to get the dinghy launched. I think the more space and more different options you have, the better. But I would inflate the raft and lash it to the dink probably, rather than carrying it uninflated (and therefore subject to being lost if we got turned over by a wave).