Atlantic 57 Catamaran Capsized

[catsketcher]

It is nice that everyone likes their own boats but we do have to look through lenses other than our own to learn more about how other boats work.

A performance cruiser is a vague term - Bob Perry thinks he may be the first to use it - for the Valiant 40 - a rather old fashioned mono designed in 1973. Compared to that most of the catamarans floating around could fit into the same club. I guess most people think a performance cruiser is a catamaran with centreboards, custom built or built lightweight with a lower profile than normal.

Where I think the problem lies is in looking at one or a group of events - the capsize of Ana and the more recent capsize and using this to say categorically that one type of cat is unsafe. We shouldn't use small sample sizes to make a point. Until we get more heavy cats going the wrong way across the Pacific at the wrong time of year then we don't have any comparison. If you want a sense of deja-vu type in Lagoon catamaran capsize into Google. Top of the list is the cruisers forum with lots of people talking about the fatalities caused by sailing these French style boats. We have been here before.

Rather than yelling at each other for our choices a better plan would be to learn as much as we can from each event. Multihulls can be sailed over by their crews, this is a given. Lighter multihulls can be sailed over more easily. What I don't agree with is that this means that those sailing around with lighter cats are either motoring, sailing reefed or hanging onto the sheet tails with white knuckled anxiety.

My car has a top speed of probably 160-180kph. I don't have to drive it this fast - in fact I never do. What I can do is drive it quite fast when the conditions warrant. This is what a performance cat can do - it can get it on. We have done 160 miles in 16 hours, never getting below 14 for 45 minutes at one stretch - a great sail but we did it just after a weak front passed through and we followed the flat water up the coast. I have averaged 10 knots for coastal trips a few times - but only a few. Most of the time we average 8, yet our boat can go faster almost all of the time. Just like when we drive our cars a performance boat allows you to set the amount of throttle you want. You aren't always searching for more.

I will probably go a little faster than the production cats in tradewind conditions but not that much. Where the performance cat will go better is during light winds and to windward. We are sometimes the only cat sailing in a group bubbling along under diesel, or again we slip to windward when others are having to motor. It's fun to sail my boat, that is a big reason I go out there.

It is probably prudent to reef at night in any boat. It also important to learn to sail a beach cat or skiff and get some quick reflexes. It is also important to understand that all of our boats may capsize and to have a look through our boats and detail how we would live in or on our boats after inversion. For me that detail has been thoroughly dealt with. I grew up in a world where lots of people I knew had flipped their boats. It can happen to you. Lagoons have flipped, lighter cats have flipped - they all can flip. So go down to the boat and work out how you are going to deal with the issue in the event of something very unlikely happening. Then go sailing and have fun.

BTW - That pic is from the 1997 Queen's Birthday "Bomb" storm. The cat is Ramtha a 40ft Roger Simpson design. After she lost her parachute in a previous blow and then lost her steering in the huge blow she was abandoned by her owners and left to drift alone and unaided during one of the worst storms in living memory. She was found after the storm, towed into Fiji or Vanuatu, and eventually returned to her owners. I saw her in Mooloolaba later.

cheers

Phil

[smj]

Good post Phil[emoji106]🏻

[Training Wheels]

What Phil said! If you want performance, it means having a big SA/D number, which means the boat could be capsized in less wind. It also means better light air performance. Of course, like Phil said, you can always reef down if you want to relax.

[SVNeko]

Originally Posted by Polux

Not all Atlantic 57 capsized, only about 20% of them and we don't know if the others were sailed fast with short crews frequently. If an Atlantic 55 is always sailed conservatively I am quite sure it is a very safe boat, but that kind of denies the performance character of the boat. Performance sailors don't like to sail conservatively.

There doesn't seem to anything inherently aggressive about the Atlantic 57. When first designed it was kind of rare but now there are many cats with similar performance ratios. Even an outremer 5x has a taller rig and higher SA/D than an A57 yet no 5X's have flipped. Maybe it's just bad luck or maybe CW owners push a little harder - they are sailor's boats and definitely not fitted out for luxury.

[belizesailor]

Originally Posted by Seaslug Caravan

Not sure if this is permissible mods?

From another forum (not as nice as this one[emoji3]) we have our first "first hand" information.

Quote" After a conversation with the crew of Leopard I am convinced the inversion was caused by a microburst or extreme squall. There was no acceleration just before the boat flipped and it inverted almost instantly. They had eased the sails and decided to forego a sail increase until after dinner. The crew described a "roar" and we're immediately inverted. If it can happen to these guys, it can happen to anyone. They don't get more experienced or cautious than this crew. " Unquote


So it appears as though the boys were a little busy inside the cabin with din dins to sail the boat safely.

They had warning, a roar, (over the sound of the Hi Fi?) but possibly weren't anywhere near the sheets, and possibly not outside to feel the first subtle signs of an approaching microburst in their nostrils and on their skin.

I'm going to call this one early. Sounds awfully like the previous 3 Chris White capsizes.

That inside steering wheelhouse arrangement is DANGEROUS.

Now wheres my fire retardant suit.[emoji3]

So, sounds like a micro burst event. IF, they had been outside, they MAY have had time to react...or maybe not. IF they were in obviously unstable weather they at least one crew member probably shoud have been on a more attentive watch.

Would be interesting to know more about local conditions at the moment.

Years ago when I lived in the DFW area, microbursts dropped a few commercial jets out of the sky. Now airports have doppler RADAR. Wonder what it would cost to equip a CW with doppler...or a least doppler feed? [emoji6]

[Jim Cate]

I may have missed this, but was the incident in daylight? If so, someone on deck could quite possibly have seen the approaching gust in time to dump the main. Huge gusts are quite visible due to water surface changes, at least in my experience, but since they travel pretty fast, you gotta be looking and react quickly.

Jim

[Training Wheels]

We flew a hull once in our Gemini. We were loafing along with full sail in 5 knots of wind behind an island. BAM, we got hit with a 30-40 knot gust. Blew the main and jib sheets, I'd guess we got to a 30 to 35 degree angle. I'm always on my toes when we're downwind of a land mass!

[mikereed100]

Originally Posted by Seaslug Caravan

They had warning, a roar, (over the sound of the Hi Fi?) but possibly weren't anywhere near the sheets, and possibly not outside to feel the first subtle signs of an approaching microburst in their nostrils and on their skin.

I'm going to call this one early. Sounds awfully like the previous 3 Chris White capsizes.

That inside steering wheelhouse arrangement is DANGEROUS.

Where do I begin?

First, I would point out that the Atlantics all have a steering station in the forward cockpit with all sail controls immediately at hand. There would be no better place to be to respond quickly to a rapid change in the weather. This is in addition to the inside steering station.

Second, I would guess that most, if not all, cruising catamarans are sailed from inside the cabin with the autopilot doing the hard work. This is particularly true of short handed crew. To be sure, most people will move to the wheel when a squall approaches. Whether that wheel is in a pilot house, on the transom or behind a bulkhead is irrelevant. On our boat we don't rely on "feeling the first subtle signs of an approaching microburst in our nostrils and on our skin" to react to approaching squalls. By then it's too late. We are watching these things coming from miles away, visually and on radar, and the boat is made ready in advance.

Third, The higher you go in latitude, the more pilot houses you will see. People don't choose this arrangement because it is "DANGEROUS", but rather with the idea that a warm and comfortable crew is a more responsive and effective, to say nothing of happier, crew.

I can't say why 3 Atlantics have capsized, but I would speculate it is because they are on the performance end of the spectrum of cruising cats and tend to be sailed accordingly. I don't think it is due to any flaw in the design, and certainly not due to the forward cockpit/pilot house arrangement.

[TJ D]

I don't think that these cat capsizes that we've seen really reflect that the design isn't suitable for offshore sailing, nor is operator error always a factor, either.

But, they do reveal what is, at least in my view, the Achilles heel of these boats.

While a drastically overpowered mono will round up and lay on it's side, generally without any real consequences, in a huge, unexpected gust, the cat can just load up and flip. The mono will tell you unequivocally that it's way overpowered, even without a single instrument. A cat's clues are certainly more subtle, and the consequences of this condition's worst case conclusion much more drastic.

I understand that Catana, at least once upon a time, sized their rigs so that they would fail before the heeling loads exceeded the boat's stability. This seems to be a pretty sensible design approach to me. I don't know if they still do this, and I don't know if this offers any protection in a surfing/pitchpoling scenario.

Anyway, no offense to anybody, particularly cat enthusiasts. We are considering one as sort of a 'last' boat for our golden years, so I do like them, but I wonder just how obvious it really is when sailing the faster designs when one's getting close to the edge of what the boat can handle prior to capsize.

Any insights from you cat folks?


PS- Neko--We haven't seen you guys since the Haha, we've since sailed to Europe. Baxter still asks about your dog from time to time.

Good sailing, TJ

[seaskip]

Originally Posted by catsketcher

It is nice that everyone likes their own boats but we do have to look through lenses other than our own to learn more about how other boats work.

A performance cruiser is a vague term - Bob Perry thinks he may be the first to use it - for the Valiant 40 - a rather old fashioned mono designed in 1973. Compared to that most of the catamarans floating around could fit into the same club. I guess most people think a performance cruiser is a catamaran with centreboards, custom built or built lightweight with a lower profile than normal.

Where I think the problem lies is in looking at one or a group of events - the capsize of Ana and the more recent capsize and using this to say categorically that one type of cat is unsafe. We shouldn't use small sample sizes to make a point. Until we get more heavy cats going the wrong way across the Pacific at the wrong time of year then we don't have any comparison. If you want a sense of deja-vu type in Lagoon catamaran capsize into Google. Top of the list is the cruisers forum with lots of people talking about the fatalities caused by sailing these French style boats. We have been here before.

Rather than yelling at each other for our choices a better plan would be to learn as much as we can from each event. Multihulls can be sailed over by their crews, this is a given. Lighter multihulls can be sailed over more easily. What I don't agree with is that this means that those sailing around with lighter cats are either motoring, sailing reefed or hanging onto the sheet tails with white knuckled anxiety.

My car has a top speed of probably 160-180kph. I don't have to drive it this fast - in fact I never do. What I can do is drive it quite fast when the conditions warrant. This is what a performance cat can do - it can get it on. We have done 160 miles in 16 hours, never getting below 14 for 45 minutes at one stretch - a great sail but we did it just after a weak front passed through and we followed the flat water up the coast. I have averaged 10 knots for coastal trips a few times - but only a few. Most of the time we average 8, yet our boat can go faster almost all of the time. Just like when we drive our cars a performance boat allows you to set the amount of throttle you want. You aren't always searching for more.

I will probably go a little faster than the production cats in tradewind conditions but not that much. Where the performance cat will go better is during light winds and to windward. We are sometimes the only cat sailing in a group bubbling along under diesel, or again we slip to windward when others are having to motor. It's fun to sail my boat, that is a big reason I go out there.

It is probably prudent to reef at night in any boat. It also important to learn to sail a beach cat or skiff and get some quick reflexes. It is also important to understand that all of our boats may capsize and to have a look through our boats and detail how we would live in or on our boats after inversion. For me that detail has been thoroughly dealt with. I grew up in a world where lots of people I knew had flipped their boats. It can happen to you. Lagoons have flipped, lighter cats have flipped - they all can flip. So go down to the boat and work out how you are going to deal with the issue in the event of something very unlikely happening. Then go sailing and have fun.

BTW - That pic is from the 1997 Queen's Birthday "Bomb" storm. The cat is Ramtha a 40ft Roger Simpson design. After she lost her parachute in a previous blow and then lost her steering in the huge blow she was abandoned by her owners and left to drift alone and unaided during one of the worst storms in living memory. She was found after the storm, towed into Fiji or Vanuatu, and eventually returned to her owners. I saw her in Mooloolaba later.

cheers

Phil

Great post and thanks. This is the knowledge/attitude I'm chasing. You guys are teaching me not where the line is, but how to see it for myself.
Also, thought I recognised that photo. Kind of hilarious to use it to illustrate the exact opposite of its intention.

[Polux]

Originally Posted by catsketcher

If you want a sense of deja-vu type in Lagoon catamaran capsize into Google. Top of the list is the cruisers forum with lots of people talking about the fatalities caused by sailing these French style boats. We have been here before.

No, I have no memory of a significant number of Lagoons capsizing. If they capsized at the same rate of the Atlantic 57 we would have many dozens of cases since they are many hundreds, not less than a dozen. And they are not the only performance cats that have capsized even if they are in much smaller number than condo cats.

I can only remember a small Lagoon 38 that went down on a huge storm, but off course a 38 does not really count since we are talking about an almost 60ft boat, that should have a much bigger stability. I know also about a Lagoon 440 that capsized after taking on water, but does not really count since the boat had not intact stability.

A searched google with your suggestion and did not find more. A very small number compared with the many hundreds (thousands?) of Lagoons out there. It reinforces my opinion that condo cats are a lot safer then performance cats.

That has nothing with liking more condo cats than performance cats, it has to do with facts. Actually I like more performance cats.

[Polux]

Originally Posted by SVNeko

There doesn't seem to anything inherently aggressive about the Atlantic 57. When first designed it was kind of rare but now there are many cats with similar performance ratios. Even an outremer 5x has a taller rig and higher SA/D than an A57 yet no 5X's have flipped. Maybe it's just bad luck or maybe CW owners push a little harder - they are sailor's boats and definitely not fitted out for luxury.

There is a big difference between the 5x and the atlantic 57:




Those fixed keels (in addition to daggerboards) are a bad idea on fast light performance cats, they help to trip the cat when subjected to a big gust, much more than a smaller daggerboard, preventing the boat from sliding and inducing a rolling movement that can finish on a capsize.

[Seaslug Caravan]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

I may have missed this, but was the incident in daylight? If so, someone on deck could quite possibly have seen the approaching gust in time to dump the main. Huge gusts are quite visible due to water surface changes, at least in my experience, but since they travel pretty fast, you gotta be looking and react quickly.

Jim

Good question, well asked.

The lads were having dinner. The reports say EPIRB received early evening. Aircrew on the scene 2;49 am.

I'm not sure what time dinner is served, and what time it gets dark. Either way sitting in the FORWARD cockpit, beating to weather, tending sheets and keeping out a weather eye, isn't going to be a lot of fun. Sounds wet, windy, cold and miserable to me. But I suppose thats what you sign up for with one of those forward cockpit CW thingys.

Obviously the crew didn't want a bar of that nasty forward cockpit. They were inside having dinner.

[Catopia]

A question: is it possible that the roaring sound the crew heard just before capsizing was from a rogue wave as opposed to a microburst?

[catsketcher]

Here is an interesting article that does include large and heavy cats in its talk about rig design. A fair way down is a section on cruising cats. Some of the basics are

- heavy and large cats have huge righting moment - the loads on flying a hull are so large designers can just assume the sails will be doused or blown out before you lift a hull.
- mast designers are not sure if this is a good idea

Info – AES

It would be interesting to do more research on the number of capsizes and the SA/D ratio (Bruce number). I can pretty much guess that the higher the SA/D ratio the more likely a capsize. It is basic physics. The question for me, and maybe others is, where is a cut off, over which you are unsafe.

It is a bit trickier than it sounds. Condo cats have a much higher centre of gravity than other cats. On top of this the loads and motion of a higher CG and heavy cat are much higher. High sheet loads may cause injuries and cause owners to be less likely to do things like reef or trim sails properly.

Multi designers have always wrangled with power and weight. For most of my time in multis we were always getting rid of weight - excess weight made the boats less safe - structurally and with the problems like bridgedeck clearance. The more modern cats handle weight so much better and yet it is hard for me to change my tune because I like the feel of a nice lightish cat.

John Shuttleworth designs performance cats and tris. He has a few good artiles on this. One here

Considerations for Seaworthiness

Interestingly when I use Shuttleworth's formula and plug Kankama's (my 38ft cruising cat) rough numbers in I get an answer that says I will fly a hull in 24 knots. That doesn't seem right. I will have to go out with a tape measure and have a check. I have never flown a hull in her yet (and hope never to get the chance). Is anyone else interested in plugging their numbers into the equation and getting some more answers?

cheers

Phil