Man Overboard off Puerto Rico -- 7-Hour Swim to Shore

[Lizzy Belle]

I'm just gonna duct tape myself to the boat ...

[Juho]

Originally Posted by Lizzy Belle

I'm just gonna duct tape myself to the boat ...

I'm going to stay inside. Maybe I should lead the furling lines to the saloon instead of to the cockpit.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Juho

I'm going to stay inside. Maybe I should lead the furling lines to the saloon instead of to the cockpit.

Buy a keel stepper, fit some cleats then just run the lines down the hole..

[Brewgyver]

Originally Posted by TraderJoe

I like the idea of dragging 50 ft of line (snip)

A couple of posters have mentioned this. But you'll need more than fifty feet of line. If you had the full fifty feet trailing, and your boat is doing six knots, you've got a bit under five seconds from the instant the stern of the boat passes your position to get to that line.

Not really a great example, but check out this video, start at 5:30 in: (sorry, you'll have to skip to 5:30, kept getting errors using embedded code).
https://www.youtube.com/embed/MiUYSG-1-G4

These are very young, very fit people, deliberately jumping off a small sailboat. The boat is under power, on glass-smooth interior waters, and they're probably doing 4-5 knots. They've also got their dink on the end of the line, making it easy to see.
Shaun Sailing, if you're on this forum, home you don't mind me linking your vid!

So, maybe a LOT longer line, with a rescue float on the end...

[a64pilot]

OK then 100 ft of polypropylene ski rope then, Idea would be as soon as you grab the rope it pulls the tiller to one side, or you could rig it to the rudder maybe, my IP's rudder has a hole in the upper corner, run the line from that to a stanchion, then let it trail the boat, pull the line, and it pulls the rudder to the side.
But in this electronic day and age, I'm a little surprised there is not a Bluetooth remote or similar that the Autopilot requires the remote to be paired or it goes hard over, fall in, boat travels 10m, Bluetooth signal lost, Autopilot goes hard over until manually reset.

Boatie, you remind me of a friend that ferries small aircraft across the North Atlantic, he refuses to carry the required survival suit. His opinion is that all it would do is turn 5 min of Hell into a few hours of Hell.


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[NorthCoastJoe]

I have never tried it from a sail boat.

But two prusik hoops on a line can be used to pull yourself up. We use them in swift water rescue, whitewater rafting. I wear two around my waist joined by a carabiner when rafting, always with me easy to deploy.

I will be testing this idea this summer.

[uncle stinkybob]

Originally Posted by sailormed

YES. I read about a product test in a French sailing magazine doing exactly that. It was designed so the single hander falling overboard can get back on-board. The tether can be unscratched to reveal 2 (or 3?) tissue loops to put your feet in to climb back up the boat. It was rather cumbersome and you needed really good knowledge how to handle the equipment.

Interesting, I tried searching that and don't find anything, If you remember anything else that would help, that would be great. I'm really surprised there aren't more option's for something like this. Thanks for responding Sailormed.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by uncle stinkybob

Interesting, I tried searching that and don't find anything, If you remember anything else that would help, that would be great. I'm really surprised there aren't more option's for something like this. Thanks for responding Sailormed.

Has no one told you yet.
Its illegal to sail solo...

[Lizzy Belle]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Its illegal to sail solo...

Nah, they just forgot about us, and now we only have regulations for ships with a crew of 2 or more

[uncle stinkybob]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Has no one told you yet.
Its illegal to sail solo...

If it's fun and illegal ....that usually means it's really fun. It's not so much the idea of falling over board and drowning. for some reason, it's the idea of hanging on the end of that line.....like a rotting hunk of fish bait. HA HA.

[a64pilot]

I've heard the Aussies call it trolling for white pointers, wonder what they meant by that?


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[JPA Cate]

^^^^^
white pointers is great white sharks

:-0

Ann

[ryon]

Been there. DIDN'T do that. (I have witnesses!)

Let me guess what he was doing when this all happened. . . Also, let me guess that it wasn't swimming, but just dumb luck that washed him up on a beach.

In sunny Southern California, he would have been dead from exposure long before his seven hours were up.

[cwyckham]

Originally Posted by NorthCoastJoe

I have never tried it from a sail boat.

But two prusik hoops on a line can be used to pull yourself up. We use them in swift water rescue, whitewater rafting. I wear two around my waist joined by a carabiner when rafting, always with me easy to deploy.

I will be testing this idea this summer.

Yes, you can certainly use prussiks to climb the rope in theory. Reality is likely to be different being towed at speed. The problem is breathing while getting a face full of water trying to set up the prussiks. Better to have a short tether/centerline jacklines.

[cwyckham]

Does anyone have leg loops that don't suck? I've tried a couple, and they were both terrible (very loose and caught on everything, and gave wedgies if you tried to tighten them). I've ended up tying my own from webbing, but that's awkward to get on and off.

A lightweight climbing harness would work (BD Alpinist maybe), but seems like overkill.