Jackstays and lifelines

[eddystone]

After coming back to yachting after a number of years when I've only been on boats 20ft. or under, taking the boat from Dart River to Southampton gave me time to reflect on attachment point for lifelines. Clipping onto the jackstays with a long line, although allowing freedom of movement, also seems to guarantee, in the event of falling overboard, being dragged in the water alongside the boat with a fair chance of head being dragged under. Using a short line offers an equally unattractive option of dangling over the side/safety wires. What is current thinking on this? Don't want to go over old ground so please point me in direction of any existing threads.

 

[johnalison]

I have no idea about official thinking but my routine is always to clip onto the windward jack stay. Given average luck, this should prevent me from coming to too much harm.

 

[KellysEye]

We had harnesses and tethers with one long and one short tether. When I was going forward to the mast to reef, on my knees in bad weather, I would clip the short tether to the jackstay then I'd reach up and put the long tether around the mast to stop being thrown back. No way can you go over the side doing that.

 

[nigelmercier]

I've got jackstays on my boat, rolled up in a locker where they will remain. There is always something firmer or closer inboard to clip on to.

 

[LadyInBed]

I have mixed feelings re jackstays, I fit them if a passage is forecast to be a bit upperty but tend not to fit them most of the time.
It's the bit forward of the mast where they are most useful, I use them with a short (doubled back) life line to my harness.

 

[eddystone]

We had harnesses and tethers with one long and one short tether. When I was going forward to the mast to reef, on my knees in bad weather, I would clip the short tether to the jackstay then I'd reach up and put the long tether around the mast to stop being thrown back. No way can you go over the side doing that.

That sounds good strategy

 

[trapezeartist]

I share the OP's feeling about the hazards of jackstays. They simply induce a false sense of security in my view. As my boat has the halyards led back along the coachroof, I have a pair of tethers clipped to them and then laid back over the spray hood so that crew can clip on before leaving the cockpit. This allows crew to go as far forward as the mast. If going all the way to the bow they need to take a second tether and clip that to the pad-eye at the foot of the mast. As well as several standard tethers, I have made a couple of shorter ones: one for the helm with JUST enough length to reach the primary winches and a super-short one for clipping to the main sheet where it runs along the boom, for when working at the boom.

 

[siwhi]

Worthy of consideration:

http://www.maib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/Lion.pdf

See page 36:
"This accident shows the benefits of using a short tether when the risks of falling overboard are high. While the RYA Personal Survival Training Course attendees are advised of this, it would be beneficial to further promulgate such advice to the wider yachting community."

 

[lw395]

I like to have a 3 hook tether.
I think jackstays are pretty vital on a boat with a wide pram hood when you have to go forwards.
I don't like people clipping on to random bits of running rigging.
Clipping on to standing rigging is absolutely wrong on a small to medium yot.

 

[jerrytug]

Worthy of consideration:

http://www.maib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/Lion.pdf

See page 36:
"This accident shows the benefits of using a short tether when the risks of falling overboard are high. While the RYA Personal Survival Training Course attendees are advised of this, it would be beneficial to further promulgate such advice to the wider yachting community."

Good link thanks, if anyone reads it, that's why I always make my own lifejacket crack straps.
And a good advertisement for the shortest useable tether.

 

[Downsman]

I have a single heavy duty webbing jackstay running from a strong point in the cockpit, up over the cockpit hood and forward along the centre line of the boat to the foot of the mast. I rig another similar jackstay from the deck fitting where the forestay attaches, aft to the foreward side at the foot of the mast. On each jackstay I have two mountain safety grade screw gate locking caribiners to act as 'running cars.'
I can clip on to a caribiner in the cockpit and go forward on hands and knees and it will run along the webbing until I get to the mast. Working on the foredeck I just clip onto one of the forward caribiners. The harness tethers only allow me to bodily go from the centre line as far as the toerail. Working at the mast standing up, I do what Kellyseye does, put a long harness tether round the mast.
The only weak point (I think) is in the cockpit where the jackstay is secured with a rigging screw which allows me to tension it but it's a good 12mm bottle screw and so far has done the trick. I'm always singlehanded and the system was about the safest I could come up with that allowed me to scuttle about on deck fairly safely.

 

[SimonFa]

Someone posted some time ago that they run a line from a forward cleat to a stern cleat that is just above the water line. The idea being that if you do go over the side wearing a tether you have something to stand on. I think it was in one of the single handed threads.

This thread reminds me I need a short tether.

 

[snowleopard]

After coming back to yachting after a number of years when I've only been on boats 20ft. or under, taking the boat from Dart River to Southampton gave me time to reflect on attachment point for lifelines. Clipping onto the jackstays with a long line, although allowing freedom of movement, also seems to guarantee, in the event of falling overboard, being dragged in the water alongside the boat with a fair chance of head being dragged under. Using a short line offers an equally unattractive option of dangling over the side/safety wires. What is current thinking on this? Don't want to go over old ground so please point me in direction of any existing threads.

A good point to be concerned about. A few years ago there was a well-reported case of a boat in the ARC crewed by two brothers. One went over the side and was held by his tether but his brother didn't have the strength to haul him back aboard. He died.

 

[blackbeard]

FWIW
My boat (25') originally had jackstays running along the side deck in the usual manner. I suspect that, when using these, falling would result in either being towed, or else being suspended between deck and sea and unable to climb back. Neither prospect appealed.
I still have these jackstays but now also have, in addition, jackstays running along the coachroof on either side, allowing me to get from cockpit to mast while remaining clipped on with a short tether. Falling would, I think, leave me still on the side deck. (The coachroof is quite a bit higher than the side deck.) Also much easier to clip on, and to move about, and doesn't leave the tether tangling around one's feet.
Would not work quite so well if I had a spray hood.
Yet to be tried in anger, so to speak.

 

[Deleted member 36384]

My jackstays are wire, and stop a harness line length from the bow and stern, they are made up to a tension tension where you can easily lift the wire off the deck but it wants to stay there. I should, if I fall over the top of the guard rails be hanging eye level with the gunwale. I don't like webbing jackstays and have never slipped or rolled on wire ones. In fact I have deliberately stood on wire jackstays to test this, most of the time I suspect that my soft soles boots/shoes moulds around the wire. I only wear hi heals in harbour, then I need to be a bit careful. I only have one safety line but have granny bars at the mast, which I transfer too when it is appropriate.

 

[LadyInBed]

This thread reminds me I need a short tether.

As I said above, I double my lifeline.
ie both ends clip onto my harness, the middle goes round the jack line.

 

[Resolution]

Watching a TV prog last night called Australian Coast or something like that, and the long haired Scottish presenter was hitching a lift on a pilot boat. this had a track type of thing all round the outside of the guard rails, which were in turn set in a bit from the edge of the deck. On the track was a car on ball bearings, to which he had hooked his harness strop. The freely moving car on a firmly positioned track meant he could move around quickly and easily but safely held by a short strop.

 

[prv]

Watching a TV prog last night called Australian Coast or something like that, and the long haired Scottish presenter was hitching a lift on a pilot boat. this had a track type of thing all round the outside of the guard rails, which were in turn set in a bit from the edge of the deck. On the track was a car on ball bearings, to which he had hooked his harness strop. The freely moving car on a firmly positioned track meant he could move around quickly and easily but safely held by a short strop.

More or less all pilot boats have such a system, but I've never seen a pilot using it. I guess they only bother in rough weather.

It's also been used on superyachts, where some minion has to climb around the outside on a tiny toe-ledge to clean the windows

Pete