Ship Hits Catamaran

[twisty]

Originally Posted by sabray

There is an open hole in the boat. you cant steer. You are disabled can not steer and a low presure system is approaching. What would you do? So yeah I would like to think that I would glass up a bulkhead or 2. Its gotta suck to kiss that boat good bye. It sucks even more when people qualify themselves second guessing the decission to ditch who haven't seen what the ocean can present.Do you have offshore sailing experience?

What your getting is I am not questioning what they did, I am questioning what I would do. They did what they felt was right in the situation and I commend them for it. Would I have done the same thing I can't say without actually having been in that situation, but I know I would have considered staying with it.

I can't find rudder config specs on that particular model but assuming it had twin spades theoretically that shaft could have been cut, broken, some how disabled and given no damage to its twin some steering would be possible. I say theoretically only because I am not familiar with the set up and every plan without knowledge is bound to have flaws. If someone is familiar with it and I am wrong please correct me.

[cat man do]

With darkness falling, the captain decided he had one last chance, or Fred and Jacques would be in mortal danger.

No they weren't, the boat was fine

So without them fully understanding what he was going to do, the captain slowly and carefully T-boned the small cat with his big ship.

Perfectly safe maneuver WTF

It enabled the two men to get off the cat safely.

No, they were still on board the cat a few boat lengths form the ship.

[BadFish]

Haha, I'd be pissed if it were me, but what a boat.

Whale Attack + 600ft Cargo Ship Attack = Boat Still floating - Mast/Rudders/Engines

WHAT A BOAT!!!

Cheers

Bill

[bene505]

No way that cat is taking on water. She's floating so high. Any cat owners out there that can add anything here? I'm skeptical.

[Wrenna]

I am French and new on this forum. On my own forum, we have also had a lot of talk lately about the video published by Latitude 38, and the rescue of the two French sailors by a Turkish cargo carrier.
The problem is, nobody really understands what "to T-bone a ship" exactly means.
Can you help me ?
Thanks.

[donradcliffe]

"T-bone" means to hit someone squarely on the side, like the shape of the letter "T".

[Ram]

ok I know this Cat enough to say the steering shaft for the rudder is about 3 feet above the water line and could be cut with a hack saw in about 2 min. if needed- seems the cat would be listing to one side if it went down deep enough for it to fill one of the hulls with water- and its plain to see this has not happened- one more thing why not just get in the digie and row or motor to the ship- why ram it -what was the crew going to do- climb the anchor chain?
There seems to be more to this story than what were being told

[Boomp]

That was fascinating...I would never show my wife the first part. All she has to do is 'think' that we could be hit by a ship and I'm not allowed to ever leave the helm. [tough on the eyelids and bladder] And we're just doing regular coastal sailing. So we are all glad they didn't get a haircut from the 20' props... Yay!

[twisty]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

"T-bone" means to hit someone squarely on the side, like the shape of the letter "T".

Another good way to describe it would be being hit perpendicular to the direction of travel.

[Tropic Cat]

If Maryland is like Florida, you can't buy insurance until the threat of hurricanes is over.

The whale smashed a rudder up through the hull along with the sail drive in that hull. That level of damage is certainly devastating and not possible to deal with at sea.

I wonder what the odds are of a whale surfacing under a boat in mid ocean? 1000000 to 1? Probably 10 times that. This has me wondering. Then again, we may be talking about the World's unluckiest guy.

[Pblais]

All she has to do is 'think' that we could be hit by a ship and I'm not allowed to ever leave the helm.

We have sworn all forum members to secrecy. Ratting out a fellow swabby to the Admiral is not considered good seamanship. Not hitting things is the general standing order. This would include whales, ships, or aids to navigation. The probability of hitting a navigation aid is far greater than you think given you are often aiming at them.

[Palarran]

I'm happy these guys survived and for sure if in threatening danger, my life and/or my passengers is surely worth more that $200k.

But

This has got to be the dumbest rescue story I've read. Others have already pointed out the obvious so no need to, but I'd like to add that in all the stories of cats being in danger, I've yet to read where one sank. Right side up or otherwise, it seems safest to be teathered to the ship. There was more danger to these guys in being rescued then in staying with the boat.
I've never sailed further then across Lake Michigan which is an overnighter so I can't speak from expearence but if you leave for bluewater, you need to be mentally ready. These guys may have known how to sail, but they surely where not mentally ready for bluewater. From the resuce stories posted here the last few months, many are not as they are rescued and their boat survives without much damage.

[Palarran]

Maxingout just started a thread which perfectly summarizes this rescue
http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...hts-23064.html

[BobJ]

I still don't get it. How does running into the cat help them get aboard the ship? It was highly risky to the two guys on the cat and it didn't work - in the second video the guys are still aboard the now-rigless cat and drifting away from the ship. We need to see the third video (if there is one).

When Skip Allan got rescued last Summer (in gale alley off the Pacific coast), he got in the wind/wave "shadow" of the ship and maneuvered alongside. They lowered a rope ladder and he was able to scramble up. Most ships don't have a safe/reliable way to recover a small boat, even if they had one to launch.

The cat probably could not maneuver (no steering and lots of water inside) but before the ship took out their rig at least a bit of sail could get them drifting forward, closer to reaching the ship.

etc. - I just don't get this one.

[David M]

Originally Posted by BobJ

I still don't get it. How does running into the cat help them get aboard the ship? It was highly risky to the two guys on the cat and it didn't work - in the second video the guys are still aboard the now-rigless cat and drifting away from the ship. We need to see the third video (if there is one).

When Skip Allan got rescued last Summer (in gale alley off the Pacific coast), he got in the wind/wave "shadow" of the ship and maneuvered alongside. They lowered a rope ladder and he was able to scramble up. Most ships don't have a safe/reliable way to recover a small boat, even if they had one to launch.

The cat probably could not maneuver (no steering and lots of water inside) but before the ship took out their rig at least a bit of sail could get them drifting forward, closer to reaching the ship.

etc. - I just don't get this one.

Ships don't stop on a dime nor do they turn on a dime especially when they are making very little way through the water. My guess is the cat drifted in front of the ship and it was never the masters intention to hit the cat. The ship was making a tiny bit of forward way...enough to get to the catamaran. The master probably had the EOT put 1/3 astern when he saw that he was almost there in order to stop all way on. How was the master supposed to predict the drift of the sailboat from a distance before he got there? Maneuvers to ships must be done well in advance and predicting exactly where you are going to be in a minute or two and knowing your speed then are both very difficult things to predict. You really have to spend some time conning a ship or at least standing in the bridge of a ship to understand how slowly things happen.

Predicting exactly where the boat that is drifting out control would be in a few minutes would have also been a very difficult thing to do.

Also, to put a boat in the lee of a ship and to have no way on is not a simple thing to get exactly right. Ships when they pick up pilots still have some way on..mostly to keep some steerage in order to maintain course. I used to put a 214 foot OSV alongside oil rigs off off Pt Conception...it was not easy even with twin screws and a bow thruster. The ship in the video was probably a single screw with no BT. Give the captain a break. I thought he did a good job of getting close to a small boat that was drifting out of control.

BTW all ships have Jacob's ladders (rope ladders with rigid treads) used for MOB's and for picking up pilots. Some ships have a cage lowered by a cable but they still have a backup Jacobs ladder.

Launching a lifeboat in rough seas is difficult at best. Recovering it in rough seas is impossible.