Lagoon Catamaran Smashed To Bits

[dannc]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

... But I'm guessing there was precious little time, and the crew was in shock and possibly deafened and perhaps even blinded by the lightning strike. I think I would give the guy a break.

Yes.

I have seen quite a few lightning strikes around me. NOT fun.

One time I was driving on I75 south of Tampa and lighting was hitting all around the interstate. The flash and bangs were instantaneous. You could see the strike hit the ground, and for some reason, all of the strikes were hitting the ground and not trees. Very odd. After the strike you would see smoke rising from where the bolt had hit. It is not fun, even in a car which is supposed to be able to protect the occupants from lightning, when you are seeing and hearing dozens of strikes all around you. Being targeted by Zeus is not fun.

On two occasions, I have been in elevated buildings watching a thunder storm approach and seeing lightning hitting power poles as the storm marched every closer. Again not fun. If the building is hit, will one be protected? On one occasion there were two roofers nailing down shingles who stayed on the roof the entire time working. Absolutely NUTS they were. Lightning was hitting power poles a block away, a mere hundred feet or so, skipped over the street they/we were own, and hit power poles on the next street. Stupid is as stupid does.

One day I was going to go work out in the yard under a tree. There was a front approaching, and checking radar it was 20-30 miles away. I decided to make a phone call instead of working since I would not able to work too long before the rain arrived. I was on the phone, looking in the direction of the front and could see nothing but blue sky. Then every thing went WHITE. Followed by the biggest boom I have ever heard. Deafening is a word used too often, but this was deafening. The phone call ended. Power dropped but came right back. No damage to house, people or electronics. The lightning had hit the tree I would have been working under if I had gone outside to do chores. The tree is a bit over 100 feet from the house and bark was blown almost to said house.

That strike came out of a clear blue sky, and for some reason, hit a specific tree in a forest. The front ended up creating some tornadoes south and east of us doing wide spread damage and killing a coworkers relative amount others.

A lightning strike is deafening and can be blinding and disorientating. Looks like the crew of the Lagoon did not have much time or distance to figure out what had happened, what equipment had been taken out, what they could do about the damage, if the boat was flooding, and decide on a course of action.

Nobody died which could easily have happened. There was a young man whose sail boat was hit by lightning in the Keys years back. He was killed and the boat sank.

Later,
Dan

[malbert73]

Scary stuff- on the latter I actually thought I read somewhere there had never been fatalities on sailboats struck by lightning. I guess never is a strong word…

[IoannisD]

Originally Posted by Saleen411

There are a couple videos showing this. Supposedly after a lightning strike the captain decided to make for a marina with no engines. It didn't work out so well.

Gladly everyone survived.

Not exactly... the engines died out after a lighting strike exactly as the captain was manoeuvring to enter the marina in gale force winds and very large waves. He did not have time to use the sails as the cat crashed against the marina wall. Passers-by and coastguard managed to get everyone out without any injury... but the charter boat was unfortunately completely destroyed...

[CaptJimFrei]

Could have used the dinghy as a tow boat. I doubt its motor was affected by the lightning strike.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by CaptJimFrei

Could have used the dinghy as a tow boat. I doubt its motor was affected by the lightning strike.

That still depends on having enough time to launch it and rig the tow. In close quarters, there may not be time for that (especially if there wasn't time to get the sails up).

[IoannisD]

The entire electrical system was out along with the two new Yanmars... no time for doing anything, just bad luck - it happens...

[qwerme]

Maybe the captain had a lot of options but he was paralyzed not knowing which one would get the experts on this forum to not insinuate he is incompetent.

[moseriw]

IoannisD if you look at my pic... I would enter the marina with 90° to the breakwater to quickly turn and hide beyond. The crash position is off this position to the west.



Therefore only two possible suggestions:
1 the captain motored cowardly close to the shore-wall an a longer leg to the entrance or
2 he must have had enough time to react but was tunneled in his fear. (could not blame him as well)

Conclusion:

Do not enter a harbour when it is not safe to do so! Stay outside and do not lease out a boat that costs more than half a million to not really professional skippers!

[GBR134]

Originally Posted by Tetepare

Choice 6: read the thread and realize that spinning around and going to sea was not an option.

Amazing the number of people who don’t bother to read but just gotta have something to say.

Help me out please / I still can’t find a bit in the thread that definitely states what in the location or weather definitely rules out any possibility of heading out to sea under sail?

[capn_billl]

Originally Posted by sailormed

The original information I read on the internet when this happened (so it must be true ) was that the captain received the offer to be towed into the harbour. He turned down this offer because he could just use the sails to get safe into the harbour.
Just another information to enrich this CF thread.

I think the bottom line here is the Captain's top priority was getting home, not saving a charter boat.

An objective he accomplished.

After the lightning strike, (understandably scary), I'm sure the crew was "GET US OFF THE BOAT RIGHT NOW", which he did.

If it was MY boat, saving the boat would be my first priority.

But it wasn't MY boat, it wasn't even HIS boat, just a rental with adequate insurance.

[GBR134]

Interesting point re engine electronics that I’d never considered before. We recently replaced our damaged Vetus M3.28 with a like for like short engine replacement. The only difference between the engines was that the original had a mechanical fuel pump and the replacement has a small electric lift pump. I thought to buy a spare lift pump but never considered the possibility of frying the alternator and batteries. I now don’t know whether the electric pump is just a lift pump for starting or whether it needs to keep running to keep the donk turning. Investigation required!

[capn_billl]

Last note.

I'm not sure being towed in during gale conditions would have gone any better.

[GBR134]

This poor Skipper is getting a lot of armchair quarterbacks advice. Does anyone know if he was hired with the charter boat or a ‘bareboat’ skipper?

[redneckrob]

Originally Posted by moseriw

IoannisD if you look at my pic... I would enter the marina with 90° to the breakwater to quickly turn and hide beyond. The crash position is off this position to the west.



Therefore only two possible suggestions:
1 the captain motored cowardly close to the shore-wall an a longer leg to the entrance or
2 he must have had enough time to react but was tunneled in his fear. (could not blame him as well)

Conclusion:

Do not enter a harbour when it is not safe to do so! Stay outside and do not lease out a boat that costs more than half a million to not really professional skippers!

I don't think "cowardly" was quite the word you were looking for, that implies a strong moral judgement on the captain that I don't think anyone is in a position to make.

[OneBoatman]

It's amazing how many experts there are after trouble arrives. Let's say we are motoring into a harbor to escape a building sea and gale force winds when suddenly lightening takes out our Nav system, both engines, and perhaps a few other things we haven't checked yet. I wouldn't think trying to tow a forty plus ft cat with dinghy in gale force winds would be on anyone's list. Anchoring may be possible but maybe not because most charter boats have but one anchor rigged and it generally not of storm duty size much like the winches they commission on charter boats. Somehow you recall the charts showed somewhere between 10-15M of water in front of Alimos when you were last able to check, likely days before, and so you decide against attempting to drop anchor because of scope needed and size limitations and the danger to you or one of your crew to drop it free fall as the boat is moving closer and closer into danger and of course randomly pitching in gale force winds and a build sea. Then you consider that maybe you could unfurl part of the jib and reach away from the entrance if she'll come about and you can wait until the storm passes but you know you have no nav system and don't know yet exactly what else doesn't work. News flash you're running out of sea room. Does that leave you to try and get her in behind the lee of the breakwater or tell the guy you will let him know in a minute or so whether he should send a rescue vessel out into the gale as your crew is trying to unfurl the magic amount of jib that she needs to give you enough way and steerage for you to head back out to sea with your paper chart. There's no time to celebrate you paid for the lowest deductible. Perhaps it's too late to recall what you did the last time this happened or maybe you still have time to wait for them to put an expert the on the phone.
Sometimes mother nature wins.