The trip... Securite.. as opposed to Pan Pan or Mayday.. blah blah blah

[bcn]

Originally Posted by martinworswick

Thanks....that was a great suggestion

I was thinking more of personal recommendations that people have found useful,i googled "weather forecasting at sea" and got 1110000000 results.I'm sure searching will find what i need but google can't yet give personal opinions

Two recommendations for reading:

The Dashew's are offering now their books
"Mariner’s Weather Handbook" and "Surviving the Storm"
for free as download in pdf format.Have a look here:
http://setsail.com/weather-forecasti...ng/#more-31380

[sabray]

Originally Posted by Stu Jackson

11) Please ask Donald Crowhurst how to help me get to Europe.

Really if you had 10 messages to be preprogrammed you want us to Call a dead guy with a unlisted number. I find it hard to come up with 10 programmed messages that would cover me ahead of a trip. Probably someone can create a new thread for this problem. Boatie had this ability and was rescued because he had a spot and a Securitate message was sent. Very pertinent and not answered. Will he use the spot? If yes will he change the message setting. Will he notify us or the call list of his intentions. As usual I am serious and not having any intent to humor.


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[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by martinworswick

I was thinking more of personal recommendations that people have found useful,

'Reading the Weather' by Alan Watts Reading the Weather: Modern Techniques for Yachtsmen: Alan Watts: 9780396091943: Amazon.com: Books
is a favourite of mine.
Seems it is still available.

[jtsailjt]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Normally I chuck some bleach in the tanks then fill up to the brim.. leave over night then drain and refill.. ...
Did not do it this time as did not want dead fish floating down New River...

Adding bleach to the water tanks to kill bacteria is a very common technique but it's not necessary to add amounts http://www.community.gov.yk.ca/pdf/c...lding_tank.pdf that will kill fish (unless they've moved aboard and into your water tanks), especially when you consider that the diluted bleach/water will only be going overboard at the rate you select when you turn on the tap. Even if you're all the way up by Summerfields, by the time you finish draining the tanks, the water from when you first turned on the tap will be down by Pier 66, virtually unnoticed by even the most discerning of fish.

The fact that officials in Horta were out looking for you may have had more to do with your request to the ship to come to your aid. We all seem to be unanimous in our understanding that a securite call alone is not a request for aid and is not grounds for sending out any search parties. But if the ship that gave you water also reported that you asked for assistance from them and they altered course to render aid to you, that information makes it a little more than just a routine securite call and be the reason why you got so much more attention than you expected from them.

Of course once you asked, the ship was obligated to render aid to you as they properly did, but I wonder if the ships owners will send a bill to the cats owner for the time, inconvenience, and additional fuel spent coming to your aid and providing you with water? I've helped out a few mariners (one with a failed engine that I towed in and one that was about sunk when I managed to find the offending thru-hull and close it) in trouble over the years but only along the coast and I never considered charging them anything, but I wonder if the owners of a commercial ship at sea might have a different policy?

[boatman61]

My experience with Commercial shipping has always in the main been a positive one.. true there are the odd ships that will ignore your call.. but not sure if that's a deliberate thing or if its coz they happen to be communicating on another channel at the time..
However.. as the skipper of 'Praia' said.. we are men of the sea and it behoves us to lend assistance if at all possible.. in time it cost him 1-2hrs.. in fuel maybe 10 miles total to circle back round slowing all the time to stop at a position where we could sail alongside..
No.. despite my occasional grumbles the Merchant Marine are great folk in the main.. as are the deep sea fishermen.. I remember one occasion when crossing in my Hunter37 I'd been below for around 36hrs with just a hankie of jib out waiting for some heavy weather to pass when I was roused by a horn blasting away... stuck my head outa the hatch and there was a Spanish fishing boat circling me.. big cheers and thumbs up as I emerged.. they asked if I needed anything.. I said all was well and they went on their way.
Horta I think is a bit extra cautious at the moment considering the amount of boats that vanished in this area last year.. tho' they do take the sea very seriously by tradition.. this was once a great whaling community and just about every family has lost members to the sea at some time.
To those of you passing through I'd recommend you allow more time to explore.. they are each unique and quite spectacular..
I love these islands..

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by sabray

Really if you had 10 messages to be preprogrammed you want us to Call a dead guy with a unlisted number. I find it hard to come up with 10 programmed messages that would cover me ahead of a trip. Probably someone can create a new thread for this problem. Boatie had this ability and was rescued because he had a spot and a Securitate message was sent. Very pertinent and not answered. Will he use the spot? If yes will he change the message setting. Will he notify us or the call list of his intentions. As usual I am serious and not having any intent to humor.


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Will be leaving the Spot as is for now.. contacts are the owner.. crews family member and a good friend who has sailed with me in the past.. more is OTT I feel..
Would more contacts have prevented what happened.. I doubt it.. would keeping my mouth shut about Spot have.. definitely..
What I'm basically saying is.. I got Spot so owners could track the progress of their boat.. not for any other reason.. though now I have it the 'Red Button' will be pressed if all else fails
The rest was for your amusement

[HappyMdRSailor]

The Islands are turning you into a softie Nancy...

Get back on the boat!

[westwinds]

Originally Posted by SmartMove

Very nice summary Boatie, thanks for taking the time to write it.

Going off topic here, reading the other thread as things unfolded reminded me of sitting in a seminar at the Miami Boat show a few years back. The speaker was a delivery captain and author that has become somewhat known, he was speaking to storm tactics. Anyway, in the course of the talk it came up that people now pay him to take them out in heavy weather. After the last thread and your summary here I bet there a more than a few who here would pay just to sail with you ... something to think about -- could keep you in beer and baccy between deliveries!

The best to you and have a great time for the rest of the delivery.

Robyn

That's got to be John Kretschmer. He has a new book out in 2014, Sailing a Serious Ocean. This book tells some stories mixed with how to sail. He has also written Flirting with Mermaids: The Unpredictable Life of a Sailboat Delivery Skipper and several other books.

[boatman61]

Oh.. an aside for Lagoon owners who have this type of reefing.. a roller held in place by 3 bits of webbing.. look at ways to re-enforce it or switch to the old steel ring type..
This happened in a 40kt blow hove to... not the best thing to deal with on a ridiculously high boom standing on a roof near 3 metres above sea level handballing flogging sail..
A Doyles main less than 18mths old..

[goboatingnow]

I said it before, this side of the pond , irrespective of what PROWords you use, A call suggesting you have some form of trouble, however benign, MAY get the authorities to react. People will access the content of the call, not the words at the start.

And we,re the better for having such an attentive service

Dave


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[Prairie Chicken]

Boatmann wrote:
"... Another thing that’s bothered me about this episode is the fact that in spite of the experience on this forum.. and the concern and speculation.. no one contacted the Azores/Horta authorities (who knew the true situation) to provide them with my latest Spot position and how to track my progress in case the SHTF sometime down the road. ..."

That para bothered me too. It never occurred to me & I think it should have. Had this been an overdue or missing aircraft, the first thing I would have done would be to contact Flight Services or RCC. I think most of us accepted the problem was not life threatening--yet (given approaching wx concerns); and were reluctant to call for 'rescue' unnecessarily. Still, given all the clarity of hindsight, a chat with the Azores/Horta authorities would likely have been the best course of action.

[Wotname]

Boatie, I guess you already know that many who followed your last thread have nothing better to do than sit at a keyboard and wait for your next SPOT position . These idle hands can cause mischief!

More seriously, I believe part of the problem was trying to make sense of the available data. With only two SPOT positions a day, it seemed you were doing some seriously slow sailing sailing. The 24 hour average was bludi sad. This added to the contents of the securite message gave some cause for concern. The reassuring part was that you did not request assistance however we tend always to fear the worst and knowing that conditions can and do change and given that the message indicated nil coms, electrics and engine, any change was more likely to negative rather than positive.

Of course now we know you did indeed have good boat speed during the day and while we might have guessed that, we had no data to support it. It just seemed more likely that you had some type of rig trouble or such that prevented any decent boat speed.

Anyway, all's well that ends well and next time we notice you sailing slowly, we will know that you have just slacked off and are drifting around smiling at the mischief you will be creating on CF and us armchair sailors .

Another option is to give us more SPOT updates when you are sailing fast

Off topic - shocked the local marina yesterday by taking the boat for a delightful sail on the Huon.

[jtsailjt]

Originally Posted by westwinds

That's got to be John Kretschmer. He has a new book out in 2014, Sailing a Serious Ocean. This book tells some stories mixed with how to sail. He has also written Flirting with Mermaids: The Unpredictable Life of a Sailboat Delivery Skipper and several other books.

Kretschmer's logged some very serious miles, mostly as a delivery skipper but more recently also instructing sailors who are learning to sail offshore, and has had more than his share of interesting situations. That's an understatement! I found both books quite entertaining, but IMHO if you're just going to read one, Sailing a Serious Ocean is better and also has a lot of good information mixed in on how to cross oceans in addition to some great sea stories. One of the best sailing books I've read.

[atoll]

Originally Posted by Prairie Chicken

That para bothered me too. It never occurred to me & I think it should have. Had this been an overdue or missing aircraft, the first thing I would have done would be to contact Flight Services or RCC. I think most of us accepted the problem was not life threatening--yet (given approaching wx concerns); and were reluctant to call for 'rescue' unnecessarily. Still, given all the clarity of hindsight, a chat with the Azores/Horta authorities would likely have been the best course of action.

just to clarify things

when i initially contacted the owner by pm .
i sent the securite message,which had all the relevant contact details for MRCC in the azores.

i later gave him JP's phone number as a contact in the azores.

the owner chose to call JP instead of alerting the rescue services,with the current spot position.

had i not been able to contact the owner and alert him ,my next option would have been to contact MRCC delgada as they had clearly instructed in the securite message.
at the time i felt that alerting the owner had a higher priority.

once contacted i had no further communication with the owner, or a role in subsequent events.

[Prairie Chicken]

That makes sense Atoll. It was the owners call to make. Still, I'm annoyed I didn't think of it and mention it on the thread, & surprised no one else did either.