Crossed an Ocean? What was worst weather?

[JPA Cate]

We're all familiar with the expression you don't know what you don't know, and both these took place long before current weather prediction. It used to be pretty much, pick your weather to leave on, accept what you get. One time, on the Hawaii to Calif route, in October (too late, but never mind), we had 19 1/2 days of gale force or better, on a 21 day passage. That was when I learned 50 knots is nothing, just like Boatie says, until the seas get up. If it comes up fast, like it did, it's real easy to get your reefs in! Had we heeded the advice of our friend, Skip Allen, and been willing to give up northing, we could have gone about 100 n. mi. south, to where he was, and got out of it. He had better understanding of weather patterns than we did.

The second story is different, and it was trusting a weather forecast that got us into trouble. The late season cyclone was predicted to go to Tonga (our destination, we had left from Bay of Islands), and we stopped along the Tonga trench at Raoul is. in the Kermadec group, invited ashore by the folks at the met station. Instead, the cyclone tracked more south. We went and anchored on the west side (sheltered), and at anchor, frequently saw the anenometer pegged at 60. Estimate gusts to 80 kn. [There was a bunch of other stuff happening, which i have written about elsewhere on CF and won't go into right now.] The eye came over, and we had to leave. The wind coming into the anchorage was so strong that we could not motor out against it unaided: we had to put up the storm jib and motor-sail tacking to get clear of the land. The extra power provided by the tiny sail made the difference. The cyclone was fast moving, and the seas were never commensurate with the wind force. We hove to for the night, then proceeded to Tonga.

Mr. Bogardus' story was chilling. Those times aloft in big winds and seas are very scary, and very, very hard on your body. You get thrown around and all bruised. And you have to "trust" a mast that is damaged. No wonder he was put off. Must be a sane fellow. Good on ya mate, you did it!

Ann

On edit:
These are not the times I have been most frightened at sea, that is a different question, with a different answer. But what I'd like to add, is that even then, with no GPS, doing sextant navigation, and with only having the weather one was leaving on to choose, those two above, and a couple of other events for over 150,000 sea miles, are pretty rare events.

[Hasbeen]

I have sailed through some pretty big weather, but my roughest trips were not in particularly strong winds. The roughest was from Honiara Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands to Cairns Australia, across the Coral sea.


It was only stiff trades, steady 30 knots with patches of 40, at about 70 degrees apparent. It was the sea angle that was bad. The swell was huge, so big & long that you couldn't see it until you pulled out the sextant. Then you could see you only had a horizon for a few seconds in the minute, the rest you were deep in a trough. It was about beam on, so not effecting me much. It was the 8 to 10 Ft chop that was the problem, & my speed. With the seaway not slowing the boat, I averaged 7.6 knots for 1100 nautical miles, under just a triple reefed main sheeted as flat as possible, or at other times, just a 165Sq Ft storm jib, also sheeted flat.


Regularly, perhaps when a chop & swell crest combined the boat would launch way out of the water, crashing back very hard. I really doubted my timber boat could handle it for much longer. in retrospect I think it was me having much more trouble than my boat.


Following is a post from 2017 about a young cyclone I sailed through in the sheltered waters of the Whitsunday islands. It can get nasty in semi sheltered waters.




I had returned to Oz from 8 years cruising my Morgan Giles 40 Footer, Alyth through the Pacific Islands. I was living on her & running a little fleet of boats out of Shute Harbor, in the Whitsunday Islands. The skippers looked after the smaller boats, leaving me with the larger one. It was a WW11 Fairmile, a UK navy gun/torpedo type boat, 112Ft by 19'10" converted for daytrip passenger use.

The props on these things were lower than the boat, & very exposed. You could never take them into shallow water as just touching a mud bank would bend a prop or prop shaft. No going up creaks here. I loved this boat. With twin 8 92 GM diesels of about 550 BHP each she did a bit over 20 knots, & had such sweet handling that you had stuffed up your approach if you could feel when you came alongside a jetty.

Cyclones generate south easterly winds as they approach the Oz east coast, so I layed out our 2 large anchors on their 3/4" stud link chain, one to the south of our mooring, & one to the east, with the V joining over the mooring. The boat thus lay to all three. This was it for her, I then went to look after my yacht.

It was too late to get into a creek, as the tide was falling, so I headed for Gulnare inlet on Whitsunday Island, near Hamilton Island, yet to become a major resort.

I was a bit late for this too, as I was crossing Whitsunday passage the wind got up & gusting over 40 knots, with squalls reducing the visibility from a mile or so, to a hundred yards at times. There were too many outlying reefs to get in there with that visibility.

The wind was against about a 3 knot tide so sea was getting nasty too. Only a bit over 4 or 5 Ft, the waves were very steep, almost square, & were braking over the foredeck continually. I got very wet putting an extra lashing over the dingy, lashed down upside down on the foredeck. Even in the big nasty open ocean, I don't think I'd had as much water over the foredeck.

My yacht, Alyth was great in these conditions. With just the triple reefed main up, she balanced beautifully, & was scooting across the passage at about 8 knots. Still I was running out of options. I could reverse course & get back into Shute harbour easily enough, it had a safe entry but it was open to the south east, & with a 150 boats moored in there, I expected some chaos. In the event quite a few boats were damaged or sunk by others that broke free.

Then out of a break in the squalls Cid Island appeared to the north, our left. The area between Cid Island & Whitsunday is a moderately sheltered area known as Cid Harbor. It was the anchorage where the US & Oz fleets combined before going out to meet the Jap fleet in the battle of the Coral Sea, the first ever major aircraft carrier battle, before Midway.

It is a better aircraft carrier anchorage than yacht anchorage, but I was running out of choices, & the approach was steep too, with no reefs to have to avoid. It was our best option.

We sailed into the most sheltered part of the bay, just 10-0 yards of the windward shore, & dropped our big 45Lb CQR anchor, in about 60Ft of water & about 50 fathoms, [300 Ft] of chain, dropped sail, & lashed everything down. Damn we were dragging anchor out of the bay. This was strange as this part of the bay was known good holding ground.

I Started the little 6 HP Petter diesel which struggled to push us back in. The wind even in here was now a steady 25/30 gusting in the bullets to about 55 knots. My wife steered us in as I hauled the anchor up. As it cleared water I saw the point of the anchor had gone through the centre of a large, 8" diameter shell. No wonder we'd dragged.

The rain was really pouring down now, & the wind was now above 40 knots, with gusts to about 60. These came in anywhere from south to east, catching the boat, with its tall mast at anything up to beam on, as she sailed around the end of the long chain. She was getting healed to about 20 degrees in the stronger ones.

I was worried about windage, as the wind increased, so decided to get the dingy off the fore deck, & launched it on a long doubled painter. It sheared around wildly in the wind gusts, but in 15 minutes the rain had filled it, with only the buoyancy keeping it semi afloat.

After night fall the wind really got up, but I can only guess what it was blowing. The yachts rigging was shrieking, much louder than it did in 70 knots in the Solomons. There was a constant roar of wind through the trees & constant sound of rain water cascading through the deck scuppers into the sea. South Mole Island, the nearest resort about 8 miles away, received 26 inches of rain between 4.00 PM, & midnight, & it rained until about 4.30 AM.

It was hard to hear the radio, to get any weather information so we went to bed to at least doze.

Next morning at first light, about 5.00 AM or so, we could still hear the roaring, but realised the sun was coming in through the skylight, the boat was not rolling to 20 degrees in the gusts, as it had all night, & then we realised it was not raining. Yes we were pretty punch drunk.

On deck we found a beautiful clear sunny day, with not a breath of wind, it had all gone. The roaring was still there, but now it was water, about 3Ft deep, cascading down the side of the island, & this continued for another hour or so.

We had no interest in doing anything. I emptied the dingy & we just sat in the cockpit with a coffee, watching the water rush off the island, & marveling at how clean everything was after such a washing. We noted that the trees still had leaves, so the wind had not got to 90 knots, where most trees are stripped.

The area is totally wild, no human habitation, but we had seen flashes of a light during the night when we were on deck checking things. Now we saw another yacht about a mile along the bay. The couple came rowing down to compare notes on our experience. Their anchorage had been a bit rougher than ours.

Suddenly we saw their boat dragging out into the bay. They were anchored off a creek, & the huge run coming down it had washed the sand away from their anchor. The thing had sat through a huge gale, but was drifting away in total calm, with the flow of water.

I threw the outboard on our dingy, & we went & fetched their boat. We were somehow totally washed out. The 4 of us did nothing all day, not even turning on a radio.

Next day it was back to port, to help in the clean up. Within a few days the tourists were appearing again, & it was back to carrying them around gods own country.

I've been through a few cyclones. This was not the strongest, biggest or most dangerous, but somehow it was the most exhausting I've experienced.

[Don C L]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Sustained 60kts average for 5 days W of the Azores with breaking seas up to 7metres..fortunately long periods so only bad when picked up and thrown by the odd breaker that caught me.. hove to for 5 days with bad visibility much of the time due to torrential rain.
Damn climate change..

When you say hove to in that, do you mean with a trysail and storm jib?

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by barnakiel

Wind 45-50 knots sustained, gusting 64+. Max waves seemed 12 meters. Most waves seemed 6+ meters. The storm lasted +18 hours but the highest wind was only about 12 hours. Few waves broke (maybe 5%). But when they did ... eh.



I do not know how much the wind gusted then - as our instrument is only scaled to 64 knots.


Lessons learned:


1) our boat is very small and the sea is very big,
2) stormy ocean is immensely beautiful,
3) do have a passive plan (better two plans) for a situation when your boat can no longer be actively sailed. The plan we had (warps) was NOT enough.



BTW the above was not the most dangerous time. This came when we sailed in 6-7 meter waves where maybe a third of all waves were breaking. Ended up with the mast under water story. The wind was only 30-35 knots though!

Originally Posted by Don C L

When you say hove to in that, do you mean with a trysail and storm jib?

No.. fully reefed main and handkerchief furled genny.. its all I had..

[NormanMartin]

MVWEEBLES:

My two cents.

Calm.
You aren't moving and you are using resources such as food, water and fuel.

As for rough weather? You and your boat are either set up for it or you are not.

Resources:
I follow some you tube channels that involvs ocean sailing. Right now, Wind Hippie is my favorite. You and the Mrs should watch some for guidance. Two recently read books are instructive: Sail of Two Idiots and How Not to Buy a Boat.

I took my sailing/racing navigator wife on an ocean delivery from Boston to San Juan. We still sail but she's never going offshore again.

Have fun and stay in touch

[chouliha]

Queens Birthday storm NZ - Tonga

[Larry69]

I was bringing a newly purchased Catana cat to the Chesapeake Bay in 1999 and dismasted in 40' seas and 70mph winds! A real experience, but learned A lot about the new boat.

[nofacey]

Worst wind condition on circumnavigation was 50 odd knots in a sustained squall mid pacific......heavily flavoured by furling drum picking that moment in time to go into racing mode, releasing end of furling line & letting 130% full out. 🥴

But its not wind that gets you - it’s waves, and in particular wind over waves.

Was coming down inside Madagascar riding the Mozambique current when I was advised of a current flowing front coming thru - but at only 20kt for a few hours, thought we’d just punch thru. Wellllll, 20 became 35, and 2 hours turned into 8, tacking into square waves. At 50ft, DreamCatcher handed it well, but I remember working at the mast, on top of the trunk house, standing in water to my knees. Only time that ever happened.
Definitely taught me get out of the way for other northerly fronts rounding Cape Agulhas.

[sailingabe41ds]

To me the worst weather is when you are running out of fuel..food...water..and there is no wind to get you there.

abe

[barryglewis]

Tonga to Sydney 1969, as crew on 39ft gaff ketch Isbjorn , most remarkable seas I've ever seen; the wind has been E for days and the gale was E, the seas were very regular. We ran dead down the seas steering by hand and surfing. . You could look along a wave crest or trough from horizon to horizon!

1974-75; 32ft steel yacht Cape town to Sydney (my first single handed voyage, very slow, 83 days, dropped down to around 41°30S to get Westerlies till S of Cape Otway), 3 fronts with NW then SW gales. Ran under bare poles, with Aries wind vane. Courses adjusted to the wave directions minimise broaching.
My father had previously capsized her 3 times in Southern Ocean and I was 6 months in Cape Town refitting her, including making a new wooden mast. Interestingly his first capsize he described as boat being thrown, or hurled, and this was when the lee side of the cabin was bent in a couple of inches! The acrylic windows,partially protected with steel plates, bent but stayed intact. His other two capsizes were "roll overs", although still enough to dismast her.

1978 Coral Sea on passage Torres Strait to Sydney.57ft steel yawl Solo, (former Hobart winner and triple circumnavigations under her owner builder Vic Myers). Hove to under trysail in f9. No worries, but saw one wave about 1/2 mile off which reared up above the other seas like a giant fist, like a cartoon! Gave me a lot to think about.

[picklesandjesse]

Originally Posted by barryglewis

Tonga to Sydney 1969, as crew on 39ft gaff ketch Isbjorn , most remarkable seas I've ever seen; the wind has been E for days and the gale was E, the seas were very regular. We ran dead down the seas steering by hand and surfing. . You could look along a wave crest or trough from horizon to horizon!

1974-75; 32ft steel yacht Cape town to Sydney (my first single handed voyage, very slow, 83 days, dropped down to around 41°30S to get Westerlies till S of Cape Otway), 3 fronts with NW then SW gales. Ran under bare poles, with Aries wind vane. Courses adjusted to the wave directions minimise broaching.
My father had previously capsized her 3 times in Southern Ocean and I was 6 months in Cape Town refitting her, including making a new wooden mast. Interestingly his first capsize he described as boat being thrown, or hurled, and this was when the lee side of the cabin was bent in a couple of inches! The acrylic windows,partially protected with steel plates, bent but stayed intact. His other two capsizes were "roll overs", although still enough to dismast her.

1978 Coral Sea on passage Torres Strait to Sydney.57ft steel yawl Solo, (former Hobart winner and triple circumnavigations under her owner builder Vic Myers). Hove to under trysail in f9. No worries, but saw one wave about 1/2 mile off which reared up above the other seas like a giant fist, like a cartoon! Gave me a lot to think about.

Your father was a remarkable man. I still remember when he left Sydney in Ice Bird after just a few weeks preparing. We were cruising with another boat that was a sister ship to his. It was called Gallavanter and had rolled over near Port Stephens a year before. They were 1/8 plate and not enough ballast. I believe he was short of funds but couldn't be stopped.

[Uricanejack]

I came to the conclusion a long time ago.
The best way to cross an ocean. Is sitting in a business class window seat of a BA 747, with a nice lady bringing me free drinks.
That was a lucky upgrade. I usual make do with the rest of the crowd, in the cheapest seat in the back.

So I don’t cross oceans.
Friends and family rate,
I might contemplate it for say 1000 bucks a day. Plus expenses.
PS my engineer, same rate.

If the weather might be bad, I’ll pass.

Coastal depends what you mean by bad weather.
Fog, Fog sucks,

Many years ago, I went along with the idea, there no such thing as bad weather, just inappropriate clothing.
Part of my misspent youth, I learned how to sail with the Ocean Youth Club and spent a season as a Bosun on one of their vessels.
My clothing wasn’t great so some of the weather was definitely rather bad.
The skipper thought the weather was much better, he had a full Henri Lloyd outfit with a javelin fleece.

I was young and didn’t know any better.
The boat was a big, 72ft ketch. With a hefty rig.

Beating into a gale to round Lands End,

Changing a headsail. In the Irish Sea, With a couple of Glasgow hooligans, on probation. After we blew the clew out the No 2.

Wasn’t bad weather, It was awesome. Just Pure Majic.

I really enjoyed it at the beginning and and of the season, when the weather was rough and the kids were tough. Most of em, I wouldn’t want to meet on the street.

I’m kind of nuts, I still love turning into the wind. Getting the lee deck under, Rain, shine, who cares? I got wind.
Just so long as I can find a pub for the end of the day.

[barryglewis]

Picklesandjess,
Do you know where Gallavanter is now? Were you the couple that circumnavigated in her?
Yes, definitely tender,
After arriving back in Sydney, some friends added 1/2ton of steel to Icebirds' keel, a huge improvement!

[picklesandjesse]

Originally Posted by barryglewis

Picklesandjess,
Do you know where Gallavanter is now? Were you the couple that circumnavigated in her?
Yes, definitely tender,
After arriving back in Sydney, some friends added 1/2ton of steel to Icebirds' keel, a huge improvement!

Have no idea where she is. Alister Heron owned her back then and he had a really hot Swedish girlfriend, I remember that part well!! We swapped girlfriends/wives for a day in Sandy Strait. That was 3 wives ago for me. But close to 50 years ago. Enough of that, sorry.

[Taichungman]

Cape Town to Annapolis Md. August to Oct 2016 . It rained and thundered a few times in the Caribbean. Could have been worse as Hurricane Matthew was right behind us.