Singlehanded passage making, Best Practices

[john61ct]

Originally Posted by grantmc

I disagree.
Being single handed does not qualify under the ColRegs as suggested

Originally Posted by conachair

Crewed boat does not necessarily mean proper watch keeping.

as **very** clearly stated in my OP.

No discussion of legality or morality here.

I clearly linked to the threads created for those "angles".

Only discuss what you suggest we do to keep safe and sane,

**not** how the regs should be changed, or enforcement issues, etc.

As if we lived in an ocean without regulation at all please.

And of course, topic is single-handing, nothing to do with crewed passage-making.

If you feel everything's been covered on that one topic, then just refrain from posting.

Please.

[john61ct]

Jokes are fine, but please flag as such so as not to confuse the noobs.

Personally I feel all singlehanded sex should take place in the cockpit, while scanning the horizon.

8-D

[TeddyDiver]

Alex Thomson talks about mental prepareness for Vendee Globe: https://www.inc.com/video/hes-sailed...toughness.html

[TeddyDiver]

Originally Posted by conachair

Yes, inshore and coastal absolutely no excuse.

Offshore with technology nearly all the time where we go you can get to close to the same result. IMHO a well set up single handed boat will actually be keeping a better watch then many crewed boats running with no radar and a sleepy crew on watch at night 2 weeks into a passage. Crewed boat does not necessarily mean proper watch keeping.

Concur, actually I claim most of the short handed crews do worse than single handers. Their mentality for the task is flawed.
And I bet they don't do it in the cockpit anyway when there's other traffic around

Teddy

[boatman61]

Single handing is a 90% state of mind occupation..
I remember way back when MarkJ first split with his gf and was worried as hell about soloing the rest of the way out of the Med and on across to the Caribe.
He dropped me a line expressing his particular concerns about it and I passed on my opinions, veiws and experiences..
How much this allayed his fears and how much of my style he took on board I dont know..
What I do know is he went solo and loved it..
The hardest part is mastering yourself and accepting full responsability instead of relying on the illusion that extra hands equal extra safety.. you will never master the ocean.. merely learn how to roll with the punches.

[John A]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Single handing is a 90% state of mind occupation..
I remember way back when MarkJ first split with his gf and was worried as hell about soloing the rest of the way out of the Med and on across to the Caribe.
He dropped me a line expressing his particular concerns about it and I passed on my opinions, veiws and experiences..
How much this allayed his fears and how much of my style he took on board I dont know..
What I do know is he went solo and loved it..
The hardest part is mastering yourself and accepting full responsability instead of relying on the illusion that extra hands equal extra safety.. you will never master the ocean.. merely learn how to roll with the punches.

You're absolutely correct.

I lived on our family farm until I was 29, and learned, very early, that I was totally responsible for everything that happened to me and our loverhood.

Lets not forget that a single handler has no insurance. Insurance Companies generally refuse to cover claims due to a lack of proper crew, I've heard that they won't cover cruising couples when the go offshore..

Budget cruisers, as a general rule, don't even have medical insurance.

It's called self insured.

[Jim Cate]

I've heard that they won't cover cruising couples when the go offshore..

Simply not true. May be expensive,but most certainly available and utilized by many of our cruising couple friends. And even singlehanders manage, although not all underwriters will offer the coverage and the cost and experience requirements may be very high.

Jim

[John A]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Simply not true. May be expensive,but most certainly available and utilized by many of our cruising couple friends. And even singlehanders manage, although not all underwriters will offer the coverage and the cost and experience requirements may be very high.

Jim

Yes you can get insurance if you want to pay an extremely high deductible. I based my remarks on conversations with the fellow cruisers I associated with. I had insurance on my boat for the 12 years I lived aboard in the SF Bay and what my agent told me when I went cruising, also a dozen or so west coast crosiers who went to the south pacific, and beyond.

2 had Bank enforced insurance and claims rejected due to "improper crew".

I also heard that US insurance companies require a dry survey in the US. Is this true?

[Jim Cate]

I also heard that US insurance companies require a dry survey in the US. Is this true?

If that was directed at me, I dunno. We left SF in 1986, uninsured because at that time only LLoyds were writing offshore insurance and they did indeed want three crew minimum. But that was a long time ago, and for some years now, lots of couples cruising have had both hull and liability insurance offshore... and yes, it is expensive, and that's why we only have 3d party coverage.

I do believe that Pantaneous (sp?) offer the sort of cover that you are talking about, and they may require a survey at first and perhaps now and again as you cruise. No one said it would be easy or cheap!

Jim

[poiu]

Originally Posted by Foolish

The Jessica Watson ATSB report should be required reading for every singlehander: https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/1539485/mo-2009-008.pdf) I've experienced the 3am effect myself on several occasions and nearly been run down by a ship in just these circumstances. So read up on this and understand it before you set off on your passage.

What a clusterfudge! There are lots of lessons there and not all are mentioned in the report. I find it cautiously written. Thanks for the link.

The ship's AIS registered the yacht on its AIS, but the crew did not get alarmed or maybe didn't look at the screen. The OOW wasn't properly trained to use the equipment. Dangerous crew at large. As an aside, the report says that an Australian survey found that 17% of class A AIS ships were not able to see class B AIS. That was in 2008. Is the situation better now?

The ship didn't see the yacht on radar, although it had good equipment and conditions were good. It might have been because the OOW wasn't looking, but the yacht didn't help as it didn't have a radar reflector and turned off the active radar transponder, possibly to save power. Triple/quadruple oops.

The OOW on the ship saw the lights from the yacht in time and misjudged it as having a constant bearing and assumed also that it was a buoy. Well doh and doh again. It is worrying that such errors can be made and a lesson in not relying on the other guy.

The yacht skipper was tired and saw the ship on her radar only 6nm away, but misjudged it as not dangerous and went to sleep - a lesson in the dangers of fatigue and maybe in relying on what was maybe incorrectly understood to be accurate radar vector information. I don't think she should have slept at all anyway with a ship in front of her and clearly passing near.

The yacht skipper might have set incorrectly or might have failed to understand the functioning of the radar. It was on, but didn't detect the ship because the ship was already in the guard zone and the set will only alarm when entering a guard zone. A lesson in RTFM and/or to know the limits of your radar.

The ship sailed off without stopping thinking the yacht was OK, but seemingly not really giving a damn and couldn't really understand enough English to establish the situation. An interesting snippet of information from the report: In 20 out of 38 collisions or near misses in Australian waters in the previous 18 years the ship failed to offer assistance and in 15 of those 38 events the ship sailed off and failed to respond to VHF. You are on your own for sure.

[John A]

Leaving Simpson Bay in St Martin on a clear calm day. I noticed a 120ft motor yacht cross 50 yards off my stern.

The Captain admitted that he was alone on the bridge setting his GPS course on his autopilot when he looked up and saw my spreaders racking down his deck rail.

He repaired my boat from his own pocket on the condition that I never reveled his name.


Also on this forum there is a thread I started.

Bahamas Boat Ramming
2 examples of a single handler (me) involved in boat collisions

[home_maarten]

Single-handed around the world. My lessons-learned:
- Good wind-vane
- Active radar reflector: gives good signal to other vessels and has alarm in case struck by radar. Radar often goes much farther than AIS, so much earlier warning. Also warns against fishing vessels, who do have radar, but often switch off their AIS (assuming they have one)

- AIS transponder, set with alarm in case of collision course.
- Getting close to coast (<50-100nm, make sure you do visual check very regularly, as you run the risk of crossing paths with very small local craft, who tend to sail around without any equipment, and even without (navigation) lights, depending on where you are in the world)


Last one, which may be more provocative to some: make sure you sleep long enough. My experience is that when I am not overly tired, I hear or feel any change in the circumstances, be it changing wind, waves, things falling on the deck etc. and wake up automatically. I also never sleep through an alarm. Talking to other single-handers, who for whatever reason (like not having above equipment) chose to maintain a schedule of waking up every 10-20 minutes, got so exhausted that all of them missed alarms.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by home_maarten

- Active radar reflector: gives good signal to other vessels and has alarm in case struck by radar. Radar often goes much farther than AIS, so much earlier warning.

Watching the few ships you see out there on AIS, usually they seem to do any avoidance dog-legs before even appearing over the horizon, finished more then 5 miles away. That's on a steel boat with a good return.

[passthetuna]

Thank you all for posting on this thread. The tips on safety, fatigue, and nutrition are much appreciated.

[traveller47]

I've done quite a few single handed offshore passages and would like to offer some observations:

1. AIS. You need it, and not just a receiver. My first single handed passage was 1000nm from the Azores to Falmouth, England. I didn't have AIS at the time, just radar. It was nerve wracking and exhausting due to all the shipping in the English Channel and the to and from from the Med. I always had a dozen or more ships on the radar even if I couldn't see them (visibility often sucks there) and frequently had to change course. I was soooo tired by the time I reached port and decided then and there to install AIS. Imagine my shock when, upon leaving England for the Med, I often had more than 200 ships on AIS! And a few called me on the radio because they could see me! More importantly, I never had to change course for shipping - fishing boats and other sailboats yes, but the big boys stayed away from me! In the 8 or 9 years since then, I've had to change course for shipping (in the open ocean) perhaps two times and have had NO close quarters situations. I would not voluntarily sail offshore without AIS - it makes a HUGE HUGE difference in overall safety with respect to shipping.

2. Radar. You need this too, it's not as important as AIS because in general fiberglass lboats just don't show up very well and commercial shipping has AIS. It does help to be sure, but what it's really good for at night is alerting you to incoming weather (squalls). I can set two guard zones on my system and I use them both - one all around zone for weather and one 90 degree one on the bow for shipping. I'm not saying that's the best way, just that this works for me. I will say that you should use guard zones if you have them.

3. Alarms. Most modern instrument systems have the capacity to set alarms for various events - wind shift, strong wind, boat speed, engine temp, etc. You should set ALL the alarms that make sense when under way. Alarms are your eyes and ears while you are sleeping or cooking or whatever.

4. REST. This is obviously one of the key issues of single handed (or even short handed) passage making. In an ocean passage, the most dangerous times are at the beginning and end so it's important that you are at your best during these times. Generally, you aren't going to be leaving port exhausted; however, arriving is a different matter entirely. My goal is to make sure that when I arrive, my head is clear so that I can properly assess whatever situations occur. To ensure this, I sleep. I sleep a lot. I sleep for long periods of time. I take naps when I can for as long as I can. I have read studies and, while in the Coast Guard, have had significant experience with what happens to your judgement without proper sleep and I strongly disagree with the whole notion of cat naps. You're going to fall asleep eventually, why not derive some benefit by getting a proper sleep? Waking up every half hour or 15 minutes as I've heard some single handers claim they do, simply guarantees that you will spend the entire trip in an exhausted daze. So... when in the deep ocean I plan on a full nights sleep - if it's quiet (no engine) I go to my cabin, if not, the salon or the cockpit if that's more comfortable. As I get closer to shore I tend to sleep in the cockpit (weather permitting) and I will doze as much as I can in the cockpit. This way, the alarms actually wake me up and I'm not so exhausted that it takes precious time trying to get my bearings. The last day or two of the passage generally finds me pretty well rested and ready to stay awake and alert during the most dangerous part of the passage. Sometimes, particularly in bad weather, I have a tendency to stay awake longer than advisable so I periodically test myself. For me, I use Sudoku puzzles - if I can't solve one, I need to sleep! So I might shorten sail and then get some sleep.

Lastly, in unsettled weather or if the radar goes down (as has happened to me more than once) I'll generally shorten sail a little before dark. My least favorite exercise (and probably most sailors) is putting in a reef in the middle of the night during a squall.

Hope all this makes sense.