Two sailboats on the beach Outer Banks

[donradcliffe]

If you invested in the old fashioned paper sailing guides, I remember one Intercoastal Waterway guide which ranked the inlets as "all weather" or not. There are no all weather inlets on the outer banks.

[svfinlandia]

Originally Posted by thomm225

Those are dangerous inlets (Ocracoke Inlet and Oregon Inlet) which is why most sailors up this way avoid them.

Reading the article, I don’t see anywhere where it said that either boat was trying to go in either Ocracoke or Oregon Inlet. It only said they washed ashore near Ocracoke, Inlet and Oregon inlet.
There were some squalls offshore during the time they washed ashore but again, I don’t think either we’re trying to enter an inlet.
I have been in and out both Okracoke and Oregon with a 6 foot draft and it is not at all dangerous if done at the right time in good weather.

Al, S/V Finlandia

[svfinlandia]

Originally Posted by SailingHarmonie

Having delivered TWO boats in just the last three weeks south down this stretch of coast, I can with 100% certainty assure you there is NO excuse for this.

Bad sailors, putting their boats in the wrong place, at the wrong time and not knowing what they are doing. I know there will be the soft hearted people who will object to me putting it that way, but it is the truth.

This is not the "graveyard of the Atlantic" this is the graveyard of stupidity. Darwin Rules!

I agree about 98%. I’m not sure I would go so far as calling them absolutely stupid, but I will say that I feel like they must have not had much experience or had been sailing for 24 hours and were totally not capable of navigating at that point.

Al, S/V Finlandia

[svfinlandia]

Originally Posted by Kettlewell

I don't know enough about why these boats went where they did, but this summer I noticed quite a few big, beautiful boats venturing into waters where they shouldn't be. Nothing too dangerous mind you, but stupid stuff like trying to anchor in a spot that is charted as a couple of feet deep at low tide or entering a channel at low tide that is charted as shoaling to 5 feet or less. Entering one popular harbor I noticed the boat ahead of me slow right up and wait for me to pass so that I could lead him in the easy entrance. Are people cruising without the proper charts, not understanding their chart plotters, not reading the cruising guides, not looking at tide tables?

I think you may have hit the nail Squarely on the head!
I have been seeing a lot of stupid stuff like that myself on the water in the last couple of years. I think maybe a lot of new “sailors” bought boats during the pandemic and never bothered to learn how to use them.

Al, S/V Finlandia

[svfinlandia]

Originally Posted by Peeew

I was sailing past okracoke when the last episode was occurring. Listening to the boat and the coast guard communications it was obvious that something more than simply running aground was going on. Unable to describe their position, eventually we saw the flare that the coast guard requested. The Ch was closer than we were and they located the boat as the flare was burning. Lots of confusion for sure.

Thanks for that report! That confirms to me that the captain of the boat was not competent to be sailing. If you can’t even give the Coast Guard your current location, you should not be on the boat, even as a crewmember. I am sure that even if they had an electrical problem which took out all their electronics, they should have had at least a handheld GPS or maybe even a cell phone for a back up to give the Coast Guard their coordinates.
I don’t like government regulations or the government telling us what we have to do and don’t have to do, but maybe I’m starting to think that there should be some sort of mandatory training to operate a boat.

S/V Finlandia

[Kettlewell]

Reading the article, I don’t see anywhere where it said that either boat was trying to go in either Ocracoke or Oregon Inlet. It only said they washed ashore near Ocracoke, Inlet and Oregon inlet.

I was just speculating they must have been trying the inlets, but no real knowledge. Otherwise, what were they doing there?

[Bucket]

My wife and I literally just went through Oregon Inlet a few days ago on the way from Hampton, VA to Ocracoke Island. We are *just* under ICW height, so the ICW in NC is not a great option as many of the bridges are below 65’ and the tide is wind based, so impossible to predict with certainty. We wanted to visit Oriental & New Bern to visit friends in the Raleigh area(where we used to live)

Our steps:
- Check and download the latest soundings for the inlet from US Army Corps of Engineers.
- Create a route in Google maps for the supposed best route in, then upload to chartplotter
- time the arrival to be just before high tide during day light
- call local Tow Boat US for local knowledge
- have a backup plan in case the tide, wind, current give us pause.

On the sail there, we stayed about 10 miles off shore, got there early, then took a slow trip in, perpendicular to the shore to arrive just after dawn.

The markers were accurate for the channel, but still different from the USACE soundings done three weeks earlier. Having the track in the charplotter gave us a lot of confidence that we were reading the buoys correctly even if they were not all where expected.

Now, Ocracoke Inlet is another story. That changes constantly, and with our shoal 3’9” draft, there is no way I would attempt that right now (based on current soundings).

We have found that the AquaMaps app is great for hyper recent data as it pulls in USACE soundings for the entire east coast. This is actually our go to mapping app for planning, finding anchorages, etc. highly recommend it for cruisers. Map prices are reasonable too.

Now that we are full-time liveaboards, “discretion is the better part of valor” is our new mantra. We’ve covered 11,000 NM since January so we try to reduce or eliminate risks whenever possible.

Mike Pail
SV Mira
44’ Vision 444 Catamaran

[jipcho]

I have passed Cape Hatteras on several deliveries of cruising yachts. Hatteras isn't to be taken lightly, and sailing from the Northeast to Florida and other points south should only be attempted in fair weather. Usually, I would make Beaufort, with it's well charted approaches, my first anchorage. However, I did stop in at Ocracoke one time, as crew for another delivery skipper. He was simply too exhausted to go on. It was a difficult entry, but in settled weather, we made it to a dock without any issues. It was a different story upon departure. After some rest, the captain decided to head back out in the early morning hours, before the sun came up. Retracing our route into the inlet, we ran aground. The vessel had a shoal draft keel which could be lifted up, and once we freed ourselves from the sand, we saw that we couldn't put the dagger board down. We were still in the calm waters of the bay, so I went overboard with my scuba gear and a wood saw to dislodge the sand that had become embedded in between the dagger board and it's entry into the keel. It worked, but I convinced the skipper to turn back to the dock, and get some rest before trying again during daylight hours. What a fiasco thanks to a careless decision.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by svfinlandia

I agree about 98%. I’m not sure I would go so far as calling them absolutely stupid, but I will say that I feel like they must have not had much experience or had been sailing for 24 hours and were totally not capable of navigating at that point.

Al, S/V Finlandia

Right and it helps that you live nearby where you can get all the information you need.

It's called local knowledge.

Squalls in the area are no excuse these days with the outstanding chart plotters, phones, etc. we have now to aid us in navigation.

Not like back in the day when many of us simply used the Sun and eye sight since we had no compass and for me no radio.

As a 21 year old, my 17 year old wife and I had been 10 miles offshore near Morehead City in my beat up 17' runabout with a 1968 4 stroke 55 HP Bearcat Outboard Engine that was missing a bit. This was 1976/77.

I couldn't figure out where the inlet (Beaufort Inlet) was and we were getting low on gas.

Luckily, I finally saw a boat that was coming out......

Another time we circled Emerald Island and came in Bogue inlet near Swansboro. That was a bit hairy as well as I had no knowledge of that Inlet.

I just remember coming in through/with the breakers.

This is the way we used to enter the Inlets like Metompkin Inlet off the Eastern Shore where I am from, but this time we were alone not with 3-4 other boats also driven at the time by 16 and 17 year old Skippers.

Metompkin Inlet:

https://www.google.com/maps/search/m....33z?entry=ttu

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3Pwm_L4-yE

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by Kettlewell

I was just speculating they must have been trying the inlets, but no real knowledge. Otherwise, what were they doing there?

Of course they were trying for the Inlets.

Why else would they have been in so close.

[Kettlewell]

New information.

“It’s a never ending nightmare,” said Szabo, who has been staying at local hotels the last few days. “It is a big boat and people believe it’s a luxury problem. But I have nothing else in this life, this is my home, I have nowhere else to go.”

https://www.pilotonline.com/2023/11/...re-else-to-go/

[Franziska]

Originally Posted by thomm225

The "Graveyard of the Atlantic" saying was based on vessels that got beached on the Outer Banks before modern navigation was available.

We are talking mostly the late 1500's to the early 1900's.

https://islandlifenc.com/the-graveya...the%20Atlantic.

Outer Banks Shipwrecks
Ever since ships began navigating the coast of North Carolina, the area has maintained a reputation for being dangerous. Today, the region that stretches from the Currituck Outer Banks south to Bogue Banks is referred to as the Graveyard of the Atlantic. From the 1585 grounding of the English ship Tiger off the Outer Banks to the 2012 loss of the Bounty, more than 2,000 shipwrecks have occurred in the Graveyard of the Atlantic. Weather, geography, war, piracy, and human error have all contributed to this dense shipwreck zone. The stories behind the shipwrecks illustrate the best and worst of mankind, showing courage and compassion as well as the atrocities of war. This history informs readers about commerce, technology, war, environment, maritime life, and the complexity of the human element.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graveyard_of_the_Atlantic

More than 5,000 ships have sunk in these waters since record-keeping began in 1526.[1] The Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum, located in Hatteras Village, focuses on the history of this area and features many artifacts recovered from area shipwrecks.

Wow, that's a crazy chart of shipwrecks...

[Turtle Blues]

Some earlier posts: Really?
It is so easy to deliver a withering condemnation totally ignorant of any specific situational fact.
There is an old photograph of a 50' Hatteras standing on it's stern coming out of one of the inlets. They used it in promotional brochures. I have turned around at the mouth of Ocracoke, couldn't see the swells until last minute. Most photos of beached boats are taken the next day in the sunlight after the storm. Those are the ones that are intact. Had a friend loose a rudder in a bad storm. Anchors dragging he took the dingy to the rocks, sat and watched the boat get battered to pieces. Bad things happen to competent people in that area. The wind and current changes during a quick storm are the most dangerous on the East Coast.

[Chotu]

I just read an article on that guy. One of these ones that went ashore

He was going for the inlet because he needed fuel but it was not passable I guess so he decided to anchor and wait it out. But the conditions picked up more than he estimated and he dragged into the shallows.

Like I said when I was going through there a couple months ago, it’s not really that big of a deal. You can just walk home. Lol. And that’s exactly what happened. He was able to get out of the boat and just walk ashore with some help from rescuers.

Ultimately the weather pushed the boat even farther up on the beach and it couldn’t be dragged back out

[Jim Woodall]

I grew up in eastern North Carolina and I have transited both inlets many times, but mostly on fishing boats. I’ve never entered Oregon Inlet with a sailboat, but I have been through Ocracoke Inlet twice on shoal-draft sailboats. Both entries at Ocracoke were in virtually perfect conditions. I have also rounded Hatteras and Lookout six times. I don’t claim local knowledge because my experience is spread out over 45 years.

What I can say is round both Hatteras and Lookout during benign conditions, it takes planning and patience. Round Hatteras in daylight if possible. Do not underestimate Lookout; although, less notorious Lookout can kick butt.

Do not attempt Ocracoke or Oregon on a sailboat without extensive preparation and obtaining the latest local knowledge. Very experienced skippers might be able to do it on the fly, but they in the minority. Ocracoke is, in my opinion, a little more challenging. Certainly doable, but only during very good conditions.

Only one year ago we left the Chesapeake bound for Beaufort, NC and another catamaran skipper (leaving at the same time) asked my advice about the passage. I recommended standing well off Hatteras unless very good conditions, which we had. Within a couple of hours things got sporty, but not bad. We did not have visual contact with the other cat and it was about 8nm astern. Later the skipper radioed that he intended to go in at Ocracoke. I was shocked, and warned him it would be untenable under existing conditions. His wife was terribly seasick and he had “studied” the inlet. I again told him I thought it was a very bad idea. He felt overall conditions were deteriorating quickly and it was the best option. He made it in; however, the boat sustained significant damage and is still being repaired. We moved farther offshore and had a bumpy passage to Beaufort, but made it without incident.

For the “average” recreational sailor: Carefully plan for Hatteras and Lookout. Do not attempt Oregon or Ocracoke Inlets.