Loss of the RedSky

[Jim Cate]

I don't think this sad event has been posted here yet...

Latitude 38 - 'Lectronic Latitude

What a bummer... and IIRC, this is a sister ship to Dockhead's vessel.

Jim

[Jim Cate]

No responses at all??? I'm a bit surprised by this... here we have a high end cruising yacht, apparently a sister ship to one of our most prolific poster's prized vessel, hitting a floating object at night, tearing off the rudder and then being abandoned at sea under heavy weather conditions... and no one has a comment??

IIRC, Dockhead posted some photos of his rudder structure in the thread about rudder losses, and it looked damn strong to the casual observer. He felt quite confident about its integrity, and now this!

I would sure like to know more about the issue.

Jim

[colemj]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

No responses at all???

Check your calendar (and adjust to average US time zone) Jim

I'm sure the dogs will be back into the fray soon…

Happy whatever day it is now down there!

Mark

[JPA Cate]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

No responses at all??? I'm a bit surprised by this... here we have a high end cruising yacht, apparently a sister ship to one of our most prolific poster's prized vessel, hitting a floating object at night, tearing off the rudder and then being abandoned at sea under heavy weather conditions... and no one has a comment??

IIRC, Dockhead posted some photos of his rudder structure in the thread about rudder losses, and it looked damn strong to the casual observer. He felt quite confident about its integrity, and now this!

I would sure like to know more about the issue.

Jim

Well, since no one else has taken up this issue, I'm thinking that the rudder damage may have occurred during the grounding, since the owner was able to bring Red Sky alongside the rescue ship before the engine quit.

Too bad the boat was looted, too, but that does seem to be what happens.

Ann

[weavis]

Originally Posted by Ann T. Cate

Well, since no one else has taken up this issue, I'm thinking that the rudder damage may have occurred during the grounding, since the owner was able to bring Red Sky alongside the rescue ship before the engine quit.

Too bad the boat was looted, too, but that does seem to be what happens.

Ann

Guys.
In Europe and USA its Christmas day..
Jes sayin'

[a64pilot]

What exactly is a "fish attractor" If it was a large semi floating thing with huge surface area and considerable mass, I assume it could tear the rudder off of anything if it got tangled up with the rudder?

Absolutely a pure guess as I don't even know what they struck, or if it got tangled with the rudder or not?

[44'cruisingcat]

Wonder how successful they'll be refloating it. There was another big boat (tall rig, triple spreaders) on a beach just south of Mourilyan when we passed heading north this year. Was still there on the way south. (We were told it was one of the Apollo's, maybe Appollo 3.)


You'd think someone would have tried to get that boat afloat in the months in between.

[Jim Cate]

Well, I had heard of FADs and had even seen one recently off the NSW coast, but didn't know what they really were. Mr Google revealed this:
Fish Aggregating Devices - FADs | NSW Department of Primary Industries

It appears that these FADs are simply tethered buoys. Wonder how that could rip off a rudder?

Jim

[JPA Cate]

The article does quote the owner as saying he thought striking what he spoke of as the fish aggregation device tore off the rudder. I was thinking that he might have been misquoted, or misunderstood the event. There is (was?) a yellow nun buoy off Evans head, 29deg 6.3 m. S/ 153d 36.1 E, which delineates the Evans Head Bombing range area, depths nearby range from 49-53 meters, according to my Cmaps chart in OpenCPN.

In the cases of the boats washed up (like the Apollo or the Beneteau by Pancake Ck.), I'm wondering if it is prohibitively expensive to remove them? I do know of one case, years ago, when a singlehander on a boat called Maxwell's Demon went aground in Coff's Hbr. The owner had made landfall after an arduous trip from Fiji, and was boiling water for a cuppa, but was so exhausted he fell asleep, and woke up to the thumping. He was required by the local council [similar to county authorities in the US] to remove it from the beach, and it got cut up an hauled away. A sad end to his dreams.

[a64pilot]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Well, I had heard of FADs and had even seen one recently off the NSW coast, but didn't know what they really were. Mr Google revealed this:
Fish Aggregating Devices - FADs | NSW Department of Primary Industries

It appears that these FADs are simply tethered buoys. Wonder how that could rip off a rudder?

Jim

Assuming it could weigh tons and have a real high drag coefficient, having a cable that hooked to that thing snagged on a rudder in high winds and seas could I think easily have enough force to rip the rudder off, even the entire back end of the boat.
Again, just a pure guess.

Interesting to note that despite it all, she didn't sink.

[JPA Cate]

Yeah, really bad luck.

Ann

[RTB]

It's always sad to see a beached boat. We ran across this one on our return trip from Florida. It was on the Gulf side at Dog Island. I never got a story on it.



Ralph

[a64pilot]

I was anchored behind Dog Island this Summer, I didn't see that boat. Guess this was recent?

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

Assuming it could weigh tons and have a real high drag coefficient, having a cable that hooked to that thing snagged on a rudder in high winds and seas could I think easily have enough force to rip the rudder off, even the entire back end of the boat.
Again, just a pure guess.

Interesting to note that despite it all, she didn't sink.

If you have a look at the link I posted, you will see that the devices currently deployed are small (like maybe 1.5 m tall x 1 m diameter) plastic bouys tethered by some length of chain and then likely neutral density line to the anchor. Not tons of mass by any means, and a cable hanging straight down, thus being hard to engage with a passing rudder. I hope that more info appears... seems that there are quite a few of these things littering the coastal areas of Oz, and they are unlit!

Jim

[Paul L]

The prior owner of Red Sky put the boat on the market about 3 years ago while in El Salvador. Sounds like it took a long time to finally offload it to someone else.