Another pan, or was it?

[Guest]

The Times today reports a yacht with two adults and two teenage children on board as having called for assistance in the Aegean. They were sailing Siros-Kea, had started in a force 6 which became a gale. The yacht got a rope round her screw. It was a new sailing yacht.

Now this is open sea. There is a circle surrounded by steep-to islands with good gaps between them. Nowhere in this circle is one more than about 20 miles from shelter, even if it only a lee. There was nothing else wrong with the boat.

Now, this article was written by a professional journalist, and I suggest that it typifies what is wrong with having professional journalists write yachting stories. If written by a yachtsman, it would have been informative. This one merely posed more questions than it gave information.

What else was wrong with that yacht? There must have been something; the report said that the owner was experienced.

 

[Guest]

The strength of journalists..

... is getting the first 60/70% of any story very fast, writing fluently and coherently to the word limits. Given the deadlines most journalists are constrained by, that is a very real talent. The weakness is that non-specialist journalists rarely bother with the remainder of the story. Who cares? They were an instant semi-expert on sailing last week; knitting, chess or semiotics is this week's big story!

 

[Guest]

Saw another report that said she had taken a lot of water on board as well. Somehow.

 

[Guest]

A reporter\'s job ...

...is to report, not analayse or (God help us) to speculate. I did not read this report in The Times but (having been there, done that) I'd say it's a fair certainty that the reporter was working to a deadline from a handful of wire reports, many of them conflicting. His job was to compile a report based on the available evidence. Speculation about what might or should have happened is rightly left to others such as regular columnists or various instant experts who are roped in when required. Even if the reporter had a knowledge of small-boat cruising, the important info might not have been available. Perhaps he/she did a great job under the circs.

 

[Guest]

Boats don\'t get ropes round their props......................

Silly skippers, get ropes round their boats props! or am I just being pedantic!

 

[Guest]

Re: Could\'ve been a busted P bracket..

This is starting to sound like one of Tom Cunliffe's quiz specials. You know, skipper knocked overboard by boom, mate bleeding coiously as he caught his fingers in the windlass trying to anchor on the spring ebb, rope round prop (own sheets), rising gale, lee shore and the dog's got foot and mouth.

What now skipper?

 

[Guest]

Could\'ve been a busted P bracket..

I believe that some boats have an inconsiderate tendency to leak copiously if you get a rope round the screw with sufficient force to wrench the P bracket out of the hull. If he'd dropped a sheet tail overboard and then caught it round the prop while hammering away to windward at full chat then that might've dropped him in it. Just a thought.

 

[Guest]

... or even P bucket? nm

nm