Picking up a mooring in bad weather

[JPA Cate]

^^^^^

Boy, zee, you got that right!

[Uncle Bob]

Ben I use a stand up mooring pole attached to my mooring pennant, basicly a length of conduit, a float approx 1/3 of the way up and a lead weight on the bottom with a length of 14 mm three strand down the middle. A large eye splice on the top stops the line disappearing down the conduit, makes quick hookups easy and you can then pull up the mooring when the boat has settled. A longer line allows the boat to move back as the line moves through the conduit without the weight of the boat on it and when done store the pickup pole on deck.
This has made mooring easier for me in winds of 20 to 30 knots, haven't had to try in up to 40 yet.
Boat located in the Georges river, Sydney.

[SailFastTri]

I'm with you Zee.

Been keeping my boat on moorings since '80.

[capt jgw]

I single hand often but when the wife is on board she picks up the lines while I drive the boat. Either way, when the wind is up I "cross the T" on the mooring. I approach the bouy with the wind abeam slightly to windward of the bouy. When the bouy is about ten feet abaft the bow I stop the boat and let the wind blow us down to the bouy. The mooring lines stay within boathook range for two or three minutes, plenty of time to pick up and drop the eyes over the cleats.

[Snowpetrel]

Originally Posted by zeehag

noooooooo.. anchor out until wind dies then pickitup. inj 40 kts you are endangering self and others... i had moorings for many years with winds to more than 40 kts in storms... anchor then go to mooring after winds are down.

I am with you Zee, I learnt this the hard way once. Should have done what you suggested. It was my fall back position, but stubbornness ruled.

It was blowing 40 and gusting much higher in viscous squalls one dark night at 2am in the morning. When the hard dinghy astern flipped and the one of the oars got away.

I really needed it to get to work the next day and didn't have a spare set aboard. So I thought about it for a second or two and decided to treat it as a MOB practise.. Fortunately my mooring was pretty much in open water, so not really any cance of hitting another boat.

I got the oar back Ok, but then had to pick up my mooring again. I was on my own, and every time I went fwd to pickup the mooring the bow would blow off very fast. I tried many times. I had picked up that mooring in all sorts of conditions under sail and engine on my own with no problems in the past, but not this time!

In the end what worked (sort of) was drifting down over it, I hooked it and got a long line through it, but unfortunatly another big squall came through and spun her around downwind before the line took up and pushed the line under the boat where it caught between the keel and the rudder, and inevitably the bouy then fouled on the prop( fortunately stopped)

So now the boat was moored by the stern and the cockpit was getting wind driven spray and waves slamming into it. Not much fun, and I was worried about the prop, shaft and rudder..

I managed to swim out to the bouy and attach another line led clear to the bow, then I cut the tangled line clear. Letting the boat swing around head to wind. It wasn't much fun, and was pretty dangerous in retrospect. No damage was done, except to my pride. I should have just anchored in the bay next door until morning, and I really should have stored the oars onboard or lashed them into the dinghy, preventing the problem in the first place. It was a useful lesson!

[TheThunderbird]

In strong winds, any boat drifts away in few seconds! And no human can keep her unless promptly secured on cleat. That which takes, from grabbing the floating line, more than 10sec, too much in strong winds

Best approach is from amidship, as bow moves more quickly.
Or from stern, if solo.


The grapnel is good advice

[bvisailing32]

I also like the idea of using a stern mooring line as a solution.

You could use this method single handing in calm conditions as well. Pretty smart.

Actually, with the mast up forward, and a double stern bridle, the vessel may lie a bit more steady downwind and not have as much tendancy to sail on her mooring to and fro if you were pointed bow into the wind.

Might be also appreciated by the wife in normal conditions as well.

We would approach down wind, slow ahead....and use the same method with a stern bridle, instead of a bow bridle. Pick the mooring line up from along side the hull.

Hopefully, you will not be encountering 40 plus winds as a steady practice.

But the weather guessers can be surprised as to what mother ocean can toss at you.

One surprise was a 64 mph blow in gustavia harbor , St Barts. The tropical depression formed in our area...no one had a clue until a black wall of mean energy descended on us. Erica and I stood anchor watch for 12 hours.

If possible , having a back up plan in a more protected anchorage might be a good idea..especially if a rental slip or dock is available.

Not always possible.

A happy wife is a happy life.

Fair winds and following seas,

[svGenesis]

hah! I had this same situation not too long ago, (25kn winds) very crowded/tight field, I ended up waiting for someone in there dinghy to help me. (paid him $20 for his 10 mins) So i leave a 1" poly rope about 6'looped on the pennant....so easy to grab!

[builder dan]

40 knots is a hell of a lot of wind usually the bow drops off and it takes a lot of time to get forward speed to gain control again,by then you could be 100 metres downwind. Im with Zee,Keep away from other boats untill wind calms down.

[JPA Cate]

Originally Posted by builder dan

40 knots is a hell of a lot of wind usually the bow drops off and it takes a lot of time to get forward speed to gain control again,by then you could be 100 metres downwind. Im with Zee,Keep away from other boats untill wind calms down.

That's good advice, actually.

My sense of this is that those of us who anchor all the time, just go do what we know. But the guys who have moorings, who usually go out when the wx isn't fierce, may come back "too late"--for whatever reason-- and then they're met with a real problem, because they have to go to work in the morning, the boat needs to be on its mooring, etc. The thought of going around trying to find a clear anchoring depth place to wait at may be quickly foiled by the knowledge that such a place is 10 mi away, upwind. So the guy's really between a rock and a hard place. For me, this scenario falls into the "it wouldn't be the first time I'd missed a night's sleep" category, and would have to be dealt with from that point of view. We have never picked up a mooring in 40 knots. Snow Petrel's report of his attempts chills my *soul*. But Jim and I have the luxury of time, to spend, going elsewhere, where those with serious commitments ashore do not.

However, for wind strengths less than 40, practice will still help a lot.

Ann

[Suijin]

I have to say I'm with Zee on this one. I pick up mooring pendants all the time while single handing...whether at bow, mid-ships, or stern it usually depends on the situation. But mooring fields are generally pretty closely packed and in 40 knots of wind managing a 40' boat with all it's windage in tight spaces is challenging to begin with. I'll make a pass or two to see if I get lucky, if circumstances are right, but then call it a day and go off and anchor.

[charliehows]

1; practice makes perfect - or at least, you get better at it...2; if conditions are really bad i dont even bother because i can anchor safely close by and wait for things to calm down ... 3; recently in bad weather i've had success with the following - I know my boat settles beam on to the wind and is quite steady once it's there so if the weather is up I come in to the mooring side on and let the boat slow to a settle as close as possible to the mooring. Once she's steady a little push from the engine brings her close enough to the buoy that i can nip forward and get her snagged. seems to work ok, the only down side is it does slightly increase the risk of over running the buoy and getting it caught under the hull - always fun. Luckily, in the couple of instances where this has happened, because i have a double bridle i've been able to attach the bridle that doesnt have the buoy on it so i can take my time releasing the buoy, have had to cut it off once but, wtf, 5 minutes to splice it back on...

[boden36]

Two things we do when picking up the mooring when it is blowing hard.
Firstly use a length (ours about 12 ft) of rope with an eye each end.
One eye over the bollard. the other you slip through the mooring eye and then bring it back to the bollard .
That gives you a margin of error and a 2:1 purchase on the thing. It can also go around the anchor winch and use that to haul the proper mooring eye inboard.
The other thing is not to be tentative. Come up on the mooring much faster than usual.Your inertia and steerage will make the boat less likely to be blown around. Once you hook up the boat will over run the mooring, but will soon blow back.
We are 12 tons and this works well for us.

Regards,
Richard.

[avant]

Trying to grab the eye of a mooring, or a training pennant from the bow of almost any boat is very hard, and almost impossible in the conditions you describe. Try the 'Lasso' method to secure to the buoy initially (see: Picking up a mooring buoy | Boat Handling - Sail | Cruising Tips | Knowledge & Advice | RYA ) and then grab the eye at your leisure.

[billgold]

Are those "hook and moor" poles useful?