Man overboard !

Javelin

Javelin

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www.southwoldboatyard.co.uk
matthewriches and myself were down at St Katharine Dock yesterday working on a boat when we heard a muffled help, then another louder Help, which got us moving outside to look.
On a pontoon finger berth, a couple down from where we were working, a chap had obviously fallen in and was holding onto the edge of the pontoon.
We ran over and hauled him out, which for the two of us was reasonably easy though I doub't I'd have managed it on my own.
He was obviously quite shaken saying "I thought I was a gonna".

A couple of thoughts hit me since,
We take walking on pontoons for granted , forgetting actually how close we are to danger especially when you're carrying gear and getting on and off boats.
Its also amasing that even in an ultra busy place like St Katherines there were so few people about who would have been in earshot of this chap.
If he'd hit his head on the way in god knows what would have happened.
 
A nearby boat-owner in Titchmarsh fell in a couple of years ago. He is in his 80s and there was nobody around for a long time. There are ladders but none nearby for him, so he ended up swimming/hauling himself quite a way. Eventually he got out with help and needed to be ambulanced away as he was hypothermic, and was obviously lucky. I think it was quite late in the year. I was able to tell him later that he could have come to our stern a couple of boats away and used our stern ladder which is always free to drop.

Do I want to don a lifejacket every time I go to the boat when there is an R in the month? Probably not. I think we just need to be very careful when on our own.
 
I fell in at the SYH fuel berth a couple of years ago. I was wearing light clothing and I'm a good swimmer but until the LJ went off (auto) I was thinking 'this is very bad'. What's more, once the LJ had blown up and I surfaced, I struggled to get beyond the elbows on the pontoon level. I remain grateful to the two gents who hauled me up another 3 feet!
 
Having carelessly gone in whilst entering a canoe (not in our own marina) I can attest to the difficulty of getting out without a ladder. Two men could not lift me onto the pontoon (the LJ had inflated and I couldn’t do a lot to help them, but I’m not that heavy) and I swam across a lane to a low motorboat platform where with one helper I could manage. In our home marina I make a point of showing visitors the exit ladders.
 
The chap couldn't swim so his only thought was to hang onto something rather than trying to work out where the ladders are.
I believe there are ladders but I don't remember seeing any.

Also learnt today that the current thinking is to ensure that the patient should remain lying down for at least 15 minutes if shock immersed in cold water.
The reasoning is that to maintain body core temp the blood circulation reduces flow to the arms and legs and concentrates it in the central core.
The fear is that standing up after cold water shock can and does lead to a high risk of heart attack as it forces the blood down the legs.
 
I think the funniest overboard I saw was on the Norfolk Broads. Moored up at a pub for lunch we saw an old guy in his sunday best (old school dressing to go out for a meal) go in the drink when coming off the boat. I'd never seen a pin stripe suited person in the oggin before. He was fine, his pride was somewhat damaged I think though, as he had the whole of the beer garden drinkers as an audience.
 
Capt. Clueless said:
I think the funniest overboard I saw was on the Norfolk Broads. Moored up at a pub for lunch we saw an old guy in his sunday best (old school dressing to go out for a meal) go in the drink when coming off the boat. I'd never seen a pin stripe suited person in the oggin before. He was fine, his pride was somewhat damaged I think though, as he had the whole of the beer garden drinkers as an audience.
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There is a story told by someone who worked at Glyndebourne of an American who managed to fall into the lake during the long interval when opera-goers have picnics around the grounds. He was fished out, and the staff kitted him out with some dry clothes so that he could watch the second half. When the American went to collect his clothes he was presented with them all laundered and pressed. He was reported to have been impressed.
 
I must say it was a rather strange thing to witness. Couldn't believe how heavy an average sized bloke got when wet... poor guy looked like a drowned rat :biggrin-new: :biggrin-new: :biggrin-new:

Makes you really think about how close you are to death just getting on your own boat!! Let alone getting the thing started and out the marina!
 
My wife did safety boat duty every sailing weekend for 10 years at our club & regularly had to lift dinghy sailors into the rib.Quite difficult for a lady to do.
Of course dinghy sailors would be wearing buoyancy aids.
She says the trick is to bob them. She would push them under 3 times to get them bobbing in the water & pull them up on the third " bob".
Needless to say that as a windsurfer at the time my club had great pleasure in sending her to rescue me. ( which seemed to happen with great regularity) We would always have an argument about whether or not I would allow her to "bob" me first, as she seemed to take great pleasure in doing it more than 3 times !!!!!
 
Inflating LJs are dangerous :eek:

This is said with tongue firmly in cheek, BUT it makes one think (well it did me)
Inflating LJs are dangerous and should be banned, because when wearing an inflated LJ:-

You have great difficulty swimming
You have great difficulty climbing out of the water
Rescuers have difficulty getting a grip on you
Anything in pockets is almost impossible to "dig-out" (PLB, phone, knife)
Accidental/intentional inflation "down-below" severely restricts ease of movement (e.g. exiting hatch)

Climbing the mast while wearing an in-inflated one on can result in an accidental inflation (toggle-caught), with shock and restricted mobility when you least need it.

Leaving them in a back-pack/bag in the bottom of a dinghy with water in the bilge renders them impossible to remove for wearing going back to the boat - don't ask me how I know this one :o

As I said, tongue in cheek, but inflating LJs are not without their own inherent risks.
 
Daydream believer said:
My wife did safety boat duty every sailing weekend for 10 years at our club & regularly had to lift dinghy sailors into the rib.Quite difficult for a lady to do.
Of course dinghy sailors would be wearing buoyancy aids.
She says the trick is to bob them. She would push them under 3 times to get them bobbing in the water & pull them up on the third " bob".
Needless to say that as a windsurfer at the time my club had great pleasure in sending her to rescue me. ( which seemed to happen with great regularity) We would always have an argument about whether or not I would allow her to "bob" me first, as she seemed to take great pleasure in doing it more than 3 times !!!!!
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Sounds like she understands you all too well!

Peter
 
I fetched someone out of Ramsgate outer marina..

Dark and late, he would have drowned. As PP's say, marinas are dangerous places..... but ever they should remain so. If we go down the no risk permitted approach, it undermines everything about being a master of your own vessel
 
When lifting someone out of the water, I was taught to have them facing you next to the pontoon, cross your hands over lean down and grab the persons hands dnpull them up uncrossing your arms as you pull upwards to swivel them round so that they end up sitting on the pontoon. It works very well, although lifejackets may have to be deflated a bit to easy the pull upwards. If you aren;'t very strong a few bobs might help, although I'm fairly big and powerful and the only time I've done it adrenaline helped.

The lady I pulled out was suitable impressed, although her husband was still cross she'd let go the mooring line as she fell in...!

I've certainly had to deflate my lifejacket a bit when practicing getting into a liferaft. I wore one once in a training exercise that was so heavily inflated I nearly asphyxiated myself...

Anyone who's done a survival course knows that if you HAVE to swim in an inflated lifejacket, you swim on your back doing a sort of backwards butterfly flap your arms sort of stroke.
 
Part of my carelessness was using an inflatable LJ rather than (as we normally do with the canoes) a buoyancy aid, though the bigger part by far was failing to realize that the canoe had moved along from the buoyancy block, such that it ducked under the pontoon when I was getting in. JM’s technique, plus bobbing if needed, sounds good.

As to going in in a pinstripe suit, I have a sailing book of the 1920s (in the form of epistolary advice to a novice on the East Coast) which advises that a grey flannel suit is the best sailing attire as it does not show the salt.
 
Hydrozoan said:
Part of my carelessness was using an inflatable LJ rather than (as we normally do with the canoes) a buoyancy aid, though the bigger part by far was failing to realize that the canoe had moved along from the buoyancy block, such that it ducked under the pontoon when I was getting in. JM’s technique, plus bobbing if needed, sounds good.

As to going in in a pinstripe suit, I have a sailing book of the 1920s (in the form of epistolary advice to a novice on the East Coast) which advises that a grey flannel suit is the best sailing attire as it does not show the salt.
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I once sailed up the Thames in a friend's boat, a Trappper 28. On board was one of my friend's subsidiaries at work who was keep to make himself useful. At Queenborough we picked up a mooring an d wanted to go ashore, so this chap volunteered to put the 2hp outboard onto the old-style Redstart. He managed to capsize backwards with the weight and ended up in the water. My friend and I rushed to the rescue - of the outboard, and got it back to a place of safety. The twerp was eventually got out in his Harris tweed jacket. The contents of his pockets, including his rail ticket, were bone dry. In a further attempt to ingratiate himself with his boss this hypothermic idiot managed to upend my mate's toolbox and spill the contents around the cabin sole.
 
Daydream believer said:
Of course you have never ever done anything like that yourself - !!!!!!!!:nonchalance:
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Er. Not to that extent, which was quite spectacular, with little bits everywhere. I have a ship's rule now that tool boxes must either be fully open or clipped shut. So far so good, but punishment for ignoring the rule will be severe.
 
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