4 die on Portuguese coast..

[Franziska]

Maybe for whatever reason the life vests where stored inaccessible. Still impossible to comprehend why they did not done them in port, knowing the conditions...

Originally Posted by solana707

Agree, while it is sad the loss of life, that not one victim was wearing/donned a pfd is shocking - speaks to inexperience of crew and captain. God rest their souls and may their families find peace .

[catsketcher]

I don't know about this situation but common lifejackets and huge waves don't mix. The guys who ride the big waves in Nazare use very different lifejackets from sailing ones, more like water skiing jackets. Even so, the guys in Nazare and big wave surfing spend an awful amount of time in the foam. Having a sailing lifejacket on and being in massive waves would be little different to having none on at all. It would be ripped off in the first massive dump.

I think the video shows a situation that can occur in large waves. A surfer, sailor, or kayaker thinks they are safe "out the back" and then a massive set comes in. You don't know about it and then you see it stack up and all of a sudden there is a panic to get out further. But the bows of a boat do not like pointing into the foam and so the boats gets knocked sideways. The moral of the story is to always have plenty of sea room, much more than you think you need.

We have had a couple of boats come to grief in Stockton near Newcastle. They were racing north and trying to get out of the south running current. The racers tack into the beach until they get amongst the surfers. But then a set of big waves came in and the boats on the inshore tack could not tack in the breaking waves and ended up on the beach (with no one hurt at least). It is very hard to tack into the foam.

Lifejackets are not the be all and end all of safety. The closest I came to drowning on a sailboat was because a lifejacket pinned me under a capsized dinghy. But my Dad died because he didn't have one. They are useful but they are not a measure of your competence or your situational awareness.

[Franziska]

Still, looking at the conditions under which they left port it seems weird that they didn't put them on when leaving.

They might not help in the surf, but they were not in the surf at the beginning.



Wonder though, did they perhaps get ripped off them in the surf, I could see that happening if the crotch strap was not put on..

[solana707]

Originally Posted by Franziska

Still, looking at the conditions under which they left port it seems weird that they didn't put them on when leaving.

They might not help in the surf, but they were not in the surf at the beginning.



Wonder though, did they perhaps get ripped off them in the surf, I could see that happening if the crotch strap was not put on..

Indeed, perhaps the wave action ripped off the PFD. I did not consider this. RIP

[TrentePieds]

Update to #26:

Dansk Radio - Denmark's answer to the BBC - published this:

https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/udland/nic...lle-sejlere-vi

The clips are in English.

The interviewee is a French Canadian and the boat wears a Maple Leaf so we may expect that he had at least crossed the Atlantic, but the text also sez that he's sailed since the age of seven. He appears to me to be an old, rather than a bold, sailor!

In the text, the man, who is the man who in personal conversation with the lost skipper warned him against putting out, gives expression to his first opinion of the crew of the lost vessel, viz that that crew did not consist of "experienced sailors, either generally or in regard to the specific vessel."

The vessel stated the FC was a Bavaria 38:

https://sailboatdata.com/sailboat/bavaria-cruiser-38/

One might venture an opinion that the B38 in difficult circumstances would, due to its fundamental design features, be far too cantankerous a vessel for novices to handle.

TP

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by BAD ORCA

WTF? Wow!

I really want to be careful not to be an armchair critic, maybe there was some reason to be that close to BIG breaking waves beam on, like something broke or there was an onboard emergency that was taking their attention, but that seems almost suicidal to sail like that. That or they had almost zero experience.

I am surprised there was no emergency call if that was the case as they lost ground towards the coast..
In the other clip it shows 2 or 3 people on the side decks almost as if they were sitting on the coach roof looking at the pretty towns along the coast.. overconfidence in both skill and vessel.???

[BAD ORCA]

Originally Posted by boatman61

I am surprised there was no emergency call if that was the case as they lost ground towards the coast..
In the other clip it shows 2 or 3 people on the side decks almost as if they were sitting on the coach roof looking at the pretty towns along the coast.. overconfidence in both skill and vessel.???

Yeah good points. Such a shame. I think what another poster said has merit. The surfer analogy where you think you are far outside where the waves begin and then all of a sudden a big set appears behind you.

Interestingly, Portugal is so well know by sailors and non-sailors alike for probably being the #1 dangerous spot in the world for gigantic waves on the coast. Even in calm weather i would give Portugal's coast a very wide berth.

[TrentePieds]

Here is another thought - pure speculation, of course, and we are most unlikely to ever learn the "truth" of what really happened here. The vessel was a pleasure vessel and the crew was "foreign nationals" as far as Portugal is concerned, and of no known political significance either to the nation where the sinking took place or to their native land. Hence, there will be no enquiry.

As Boatie pointed out (and he should know), the water is skinny where the sinking occurred. In videos, breakers can be seen further from the shore than the yacht was, which gives rise to the thought that there, where the breakers were to seaward from the yacht's position at the moment of capsize, the sea was "feeling bottom", and that the yacht was in RELATIVELY deeper water, between two "bars", at the time it was lost.

In seas such as these the depth of water from the bottom of a wavetrough to the sea bottom would be less than it is when the sea is "flat", and this depth is continually changing. It is possible - pure speculation - that a sea, higher than most, came rolling along followed by a trough deeper than most, and deep enough to make the Bavaria's keel touch bottom as she was in the bottom of that trough, and cause it to be torn off. As the next wave came, it rolled the boat which had lost her righting moment. The loss of righting moment would have happened so quickly that the crew would have been taken entirely by surprise, and would have had no time at all to take any remedial action either for the boat or for themselves.

In videos of the salvage work on the beach one can see that a part of the boat's bottom has been torn away - a panel perhaps about 4' x 6' feet. Looking at the profile view given in SailboatData, I don't think it is farfetched to think that the keel-to-hull interface is of minimal integrity on those boats. We see also in the video of the upturned hull lying on the beech, that the keel is gone, but the spade rudder is still there.

That IMO lends credence to my "theory" that the capsize was a result of the keel being torn off PRIOR to the capsize so the boat stabilized in the inverted position accounting for the rudder not being torn off by touching bottom.

As I say - speculation. But not without credence for those of us who were warned with some emphasis, and early in life, against the skinny waters on the west costs of Europe

TP

[s/v Jedi]

It’s all difficult to see on these videos but I think they are reefed down too much and steering weird. What is sure is that they are miles too close inshore.

I have been involved in a similar situation where a boat with 3 guys had engine trouble and asked me to tow them out so they could sail. It was Beaufort 7 and I refused, warning them not to go, but they found someone else to tow them out.

Next day we passed them with only 10’ of their mast sticking up from the water and all three had drowned.

Still difficult when I remember it and so glad I didn’t tow them out.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

It’s all difficult to see on these videos but I think they are reefed down too much and steering weird. What is sure is that they are miles too close inshore.

I have been involved in a similar situation where a boat with 3 guys had engine trouble and asked me to tow them out so they could sail. It was Beaufort 7 and I refused, warning them not to go, but they found someone else to tow them out.

Next day we passed them with only 10’ of their mast sticking up from the water and all three had drowned.

Still difficult when I remember it and so glad I didn’t tow them out.

this is what I noticed as well. The sailplan is either not balanced properly, or something is wrong with the steering system. You can see the bow frequently point 90+ from the wind. They are losing distance between the boat and the shore all the way up to the capsize.

[EricJOverseas]

I sincerely apologize for the loss of these fellow sailors and the grief their friends and family must be facing right now!

That said, I might as well start a new thread with a fictive scenario, but I hope it’s ok to raise a thought here.

Accidents happen, that’s a fact. I was thinking if I was to end up in the same situation, what do you think about the idea of using diving equipment if you have it onboard? Obviously a lot of what if’s here, but if you have “given up” for a multitude of reasons. Imagine an easily accessible BCD with tanks and regulator, and a place to anchor yourself onto the interior.

I got this idea since the hull looks ok, and it was a sand break. If we neglect the water temperature and skipping putting on a wetsuite since that might too much time and be too stressful, then unless you get hit by something (probably not so violent anyway if water has already entered), and the hull doesn’t crack in pieces, the opposing force of which the hull poses on these breaking waves is quite considerable, leading to a reduced momentum of motion. So you might not loose it from a perspective of the forces involved in reaching the shore. Exiting is of course another aspect, but what do you think of this measure of last resort?

[Mrkva]

15l tank @ 200bar means 3m^3 at 1bar. At 25l/min, that's 2 hours (and 25l/min is probably way too optimistic for being in a washing machine cold water). The waves will last way longer than 2h. What are you going to do then?

[EricJOverseas]

I was of course assuming that to be quicker. Do you think it took more than 2 hours to reach the shore from where it capsized?

[EricJOverseas]

Also, even if the hull allows water to pass, you are still contained within a slightly different body of water, so it’s the hull that will take most impact and the objects inside will kind of have lower inertia I think.

[landsend]

I think the tanks would bash you to pieces as the boat is hammered on shore. Safer to dive overboard and swim to the beach?