BlueSkyNick
Well-Known Member
Just looking at gribs, which are showing 30kts in the southern Irish Sea from Monday evening into Tuesday.
Anybody here giving it a go?
Anybody here giving it a go?
Draughty for the Fastnet
- Thread starter BlueSkyNick
- Start date
Sans Bateau
Well-Known Member
30kts on the GRIB will be more like 40kts in practice
OGITD
Well-Known Member
Can I have a go.... PLEASE!
My old pal Smudge goes out in 50kts just for fun & training for the Fastnet…. but he is using MoD (aka RN) Sigma’s (I’m only jealous) & fully trained crew.
So what’s the problem?
My old pal Smudge goes out in 50kts just for fun & training for the Fastnet…. but he is using MoD (aka RN) Sigma’s (I’m only jealous) & fully trained crew.
So what’s the problem?
BlueSkyNick
Well-Known Member
So what’s the problem?
We're bleedin' paying for it, that's what !
OGITD
Well-Known Member
I know!
I know… but at least:
They aren’t hiding the fact… like an awful lot of others do.
They are raising the profile of the RN by getting out there and making a good-show.
And apparently we are desperately short of manpower (no!.... the few who sail do not have a negative impact on this issue, as they are a very small and select few), so hopefully this will entice others to join and help resolve this issue…(to a point).
PS… Dear Sir A…. if I promise not to take the mickey can I come sailing PLEASE!
I can also work as a PR man, cook, bilge scrubber and general crew.
Oh yeh…. I do a mean! “Channel Night”…. ask our Smudge...
I know… but at least:
They aren’t hiding the fact… like an awful lot of others do.
They are raising the profile of the RN by getting out there and making a good-show.
And apparently we are desperately short of manpower (no!.... the few who sail do not have a negative impact on this issue, as they are a very small and select few), so hopefully this will entice others to join and help resolve this issue…(to a point).
PS… Dear Sir A…. if I promise not to take the mickey can I come sailing PLEASE!
I can also work as a PR man, cook, bilge scrubber and general crew.
Oh yeh…. I do a mean! “Channel Night”…. ask our Smudge...
Last edited:
prv
Well-Known Member
Also, it's not all public money.
Some is, because the training in working as a team in testing and sometimes dangerous conditions is valuable to their role as soldiers, and the government is prepared to pay for that value. But a lot of the money for adventure training comes from non-public funds - during my brief stint in the Army ten years ago, I helped organise a couple of adventure training trips, and finding funding for what we wanted to do was a big part of that organisation. The limit on public money is both absolute (can't have more than £x per participant) and proportional (can't claim more than x% of the cost from public funds), so you can't get your trip wholly paid for just by doing something really cheap.
The balance comes partly from various official but non-public funds. That is, it's money owned by a military unit but which didn't come from the taxpayer. It might be from selling regimental T-shirts or stable belts, or it might be from a levy which members are encouraged to pay (if I remember rightly, REME officers sacrificed two days' pay per year, and soldiers one, to a regimental fund, although I don't know if that fund paid for adventure training) or various other sources. They're not exactly charities as such, but operate in a similar way. There was a big book in the admin office which purported to list all of these, and how you qualified to get money from them for your expedition (mostly you wouldn't!). Picking the brains of an experienced SNCO was the best way of finding odd little funding sources - no individual one would give you very much. I don't think we ever raised very much by this route, but that's because we weren't doing anything particularly exciting or novel or expensive.
Finally, the participants themselves do have to pay towards the costs, to remind them that this isn't just a free jolly. Again, there was a set of rules to work out how much this should be, with the aim of neither running free holidays nor disenfranchising young soldiers who would benefit most from the experience.
Pete
pteron
Well-Known Member
Yep. On a trimaran called Strontium Dog.
dt4134
Well-Known Member
If any of the Fastnet boats end up in the Southern Irish Sea they really ought to think about upgrading their naviguesser for the next race.
Did you mean the Celtic Sea?
BlueSkyNick
Well-Known Member
OGITD
Well-Known Member
I like it...THANKS!
A new one one me.... so THANKS!.....
I WILL have to use this one....
A new one one me.... so THANKS!.....
I WILL have to use this one....
dunedin
Well-Known Member
My old pal Smudge goes out in 50kts just for fun & training for the Fastnet…. but he is using MoD (aka RN) Sigma’s (I’m only jealous) & fully trained crew.
So what’s the problem?
Aye right! So how often do you really get 50 knots mean wind speed in southern UK waters. That's Force 10.
Having been storm hiding during the carnage that hit the north west earlier this year - and hit by a sustained 54 knot gust in flat waters the following day (completely wiped even downwind after past 48 knots), and been in one other such storm on a steel Challenge 72 (boat fine but crew struggling) these are not conditions to sail in Sigmas - survival conditions only with sea room.
OGITD
Well-Known Member
It was a post from his FB page last year.
It was a post from his FB page last year.
That was the forecast & they were all looking forward to a hard but enjoyable sail.
The last time I worked with Smudge he was off sailing & came back with reports of surfing down waves on the stops in whatever was one of the Navy’s largest Nic’s at the time… this back in 91.
It was a post from his FB page last year.
That was the forecast & they were all looking forward to a hard but enjoyable sail.
The last time I worked with Smudge he was off sailing & came back with reports of surfing down waves on the stops in whatever was one of the Navy’s largest Nic’s at the time… this back in 91.
Last edited:
Racecruiser
Well-Known Member
Done 2 and don't expect to be doing another. I have some great memories of the good bits but also remember the nasty bits - 30 knots across the Irish Sea will be nasty and sod's law says it will be ahead of the beam both ways!
Mind you a total eclipse while spinnakering in darkness at 10:00 in the morning was interesting coming back from the rock.
As for 50 knots - I've never seen this much on a boat and I agree survival only - definitely life threatening as 1979 showed. If 50 knots was even a remote possibility I'd stay tied up.
Mind you a total eclipse while spinnakering in darkness at 10:00 in the morning was interesting coming back from the rock.
As for 50 knots - I've never seen this much on a boat and I agree survival only - definitely life threatening as 1979 showed. If 50 knots was even a remote possibility I'd stay tied up.
