Missing yachtswoman in South west.

I make that passage round Lands End at least twice a year and usually 4 times or more. I certainly do it in the sort of weather that she experienced according to earlier posts and I would not think twice about doing so in a bilge keel Moody 31. And I would use the inshore passage which in half decent weather is a better proposition than going round the Longships.

However I would not recommend anyone unfamiliar with the route to round Lands End at night. The inshore passage has some nasty half submerged rocks and whilst the passage is wide enough to navigate between the rocks on gps alone, doing so isnt a good idea. Better to be able to see where the nasties are. Not to mention the lobster pots some of which dont have sticks.

I've anchored off Sennen before now and gone fishing for pollack in the tender off the longships itself. Calm weather of course but it illustrates how close they are. Any boat hitting a rock like the armed knight or peel rocks could easily end up washed ashore in bits by sennen cove. It almost goes without saying that that is what happened to the boat itself. What happened to the skipper herself will always be speculation. 60 pages of it so far!

As for passage planning, you need to do at least three things before making that passage - get a good weather forecast, plan a daisy chain of waypoints in the gps, and depart at the sensible time so you catch the early change of tide in the inshore passage. Apart from making it a night passage I havent seen in any of the limited pages of this thread anything to suggest she did something wrong.

Sad to see this end for a fellow sailor.
 
franksingleton said:
All we really know is that the person who took her out for a “refresher” sail was reported as saying that she did not have any charts. It would be hard to convince a marine insurer, or any sailor with a RYA Coastal Skipper’s certificate, that a passage plan for what she was doing could be made without reference to charts.
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We have some evidence she had charts - she had every opportunity to get hold of charts and how else did she find her way into Mousehole? We have some evidence she had a passage plan - she picked a good time to depart Mousehole and she picked a good weather window.

That's not proof but the conclusion that she had charts and a plan has far more evidence than the conclusion that she didn't which seems to be based on the idea that if she had no charts/plan at one point in time then she must have continued to have no charts or plan at all future points in time! Which is nonsense.

I've yet to see compelling evidence that this woman did anything wrong at all.
 
Retired in Crete said:
Isn't a smashed up boat compelling evidence that she did something wrong, though not necessarily against the law?

John
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It isn't compelling enough to exclude the real possibility that she was incapacitated by a heart attack or other medical emergency, or slipped and fell overboard.
 
The gist of the previous post was that we have seen no proof that she had done anything inherently wrong in taking that boat to sea at that time and with what we hear was the proposed trip.

It is the same type of sail that many of us would have undertaken (and still do).
 
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Retired in Crete said:
Isn't a smashed up boat compelling evidence that she did something wrong,
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Well if you rule out a serious and immediate medical problem [1] as the root cause (which I don't), then I suppose the smashed up boat is evidence she did something wrong, in much the same way as Mallory and Irvine's deserted tent was evidence they did something wrong.

I don't think she deserves the personal attacks even if she did make a mistake that caused her own death.

[1] Heart attack, stroke.
 
I'd like to make it clear that I have read the whole thread as it has been written.

Jimi and a few others have repeatedly said that this was an accident that could have happened to any of us.

My first few years of sailing had me making passage plans. Coupled with that experience was the fact that I then started racing.

At some point I must have realised that passage plans are not only irrelevant in a sailing boat, but can actually cause stress because they often come apart.

Thirty years later this thread has made me realise that I have not made one for thirty five years.

Boating is about gaining the experience that allows you to say that I'm going from a to b and working out the how after you've untied. Knowing the weather forecast is always important, but often knowing the tide is not. And waypoints are just places accurately defined but not really important when you know the coast well.

This year I sailed from Poole to Lymington with no charts. Lovely evening, tide against most of the way, and knowing the shape of the Shingles, just kept the depth at two Metres.

From twenty five to ten years ago I spent three weeks each year sailing from A to somewhere else in Greece undecided. No passage plan.

So my thoughts on this accident? High probability of a collision with a ship. Best other probability was her health. Looks like a walking heart attack. (I've had one and don't look like that, but anyway). In that moderate wind the boat could well have been sailing fast enough to sink after hitting a rock.
 
boguing said:
My first few years of sailing had me making passage plans. Coupled with that experience was the fact that I then started racing.

At some point I must have realised that passage plans are not only irrelevant in a sailing boat, but can actually cause stress because they often come apart.
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Complete thread drift I know, but...

As a race tactician/naviguesser I wouldn't agree with that view. A passage plan for an offshore race can easily take a couple of weeks. It's not like a cruising passage plan where you might draw a line on a chart and follow it. You have to cope with not knowing when you'll reach a certain point nor what you'll decide to do when you reach that point. You end up doing pilotage plans to cover various what if scenarios of going inshore to beat the tide around a headland or find a back eddy, whether documented or simply postulated by yourself.

There is a law of diminishing returns as you plan covers less and less likely scenarios but there is a huge sense of satisfaction if your plan, for example, allows you to gain places by sailing straight over a hazard rather than working your way around it like the other boats.

Apart from anything else, you loose a lot of cudos if the skipper says, "Can we do this..." and you have to reply "I'll just nip below and check". Hatch Rat is a bit of a derogatory term for a navigator.

However, I do agree with other points you make where local knowledge gets rid of the need for a detailed written passage plan, but I would say that is because you can plan sufficiently well in your head.
 
boguing said:
I'd like to make it clear that I have read the whole thread as it has been written.

Jimi and a few others have repeatedly said that this was an accident that could have happened to any of us.

My first few years of sailing had me making passage plans. Coupled with that experience was the fact that I then started racing.

At some point I must have realised that passage plans are not only irrelevant in a sailing boat, but can actually cause stress because they often come apart.

Thirty years later this thread has made me realise that I have not made one for thirty five years.

Boating is about gaining the experience that allows you to say that I'm going from a to b and working out the how after you've untied. Knowing the weather forecast is always important, but often knowing the tide is not. And waypoints are just places accurately defined but not really important when you know the coast well.

This year I sailed from Poole to Lymington with no charts. Lovely evening, tide against most of the way, and knowing the shape of the Shingles, just kept the depth at two Metres.

From twenty five to ten years ago I spent three weeks each year sailing from A to somewhere else in Greece undecided. No passage plan.

So my thoughts on this accident? High probability of a collision with a ship. Best other probability was her health. Looks like a walking heart attack. (I've had one and don't look like that, but anyway). In that moderate wind the boat could well have been sailing fast enough to sink after hitting a rock.
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+1, completely agree; this lady didn't bumble onto rocks in good weather ( which I see some people and papers have revised into a suicidal hurricane or similar ! ), something nasty like a collision, medical snag, going overboard, gas explosion etc must have got her; at least she was having a go.
 
Seajet said:
+1, completely agree; this lady didn't bumble onto rocks in good weather ( which I see some people and papers have revised into a suicidal hurricane or similar ! ), something nasty like a collision, medical snag, going overboard, gas explosion etc must have got her; at least she was having a go.
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That's my view too.

Cheers, Brian.
 
I seem to have sparked off a storm.

First, contrary to what some seem to believe, SOLAS now applies to leisure vessels as well as commercial ones. If we do not comply with the requirement regarding a passage plan, at least in a fairly brief and rather cursory manner, then we are breaking the law. That, of course, leaves aside that only an idiot would set off on a passage without thinking about navigation or weather.

What has long intrigued me about this is how the law might be enforced. That is why I was acting as devil’s advocate. I really cannot imagine a random check on boats going to sea. It does seem unlikely that anyone would have initiated the arrest of Mrs Unwin. So, is there any point in SOLAS taking leisure sailors into its purview?

My only thinking is to wonder what would happen in the event of an accident that might have been due to poor navigation or going out when bad weather was predicted. Would an insurer ask questions to see whether a passage plan had been made – including consideration of weather? It is for this reason that the Unwin case has interested me.
 
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Plans at the end of the trip

A few days ago there was some discussion/speculation here about what Seagair was going to do when she got to Bideford, Northam or Appledore, all of which have been reported as her destination.

In the context of the more recent "passage planning" discussion, I still find this aspect intriguing. It seems to me the most likely viable possibilities are:
1. Seagair wasn't a fin keeler, despite the brokers listing. It seems unlikely.
2. She had a deep water mooring arranged in the Estuary. It has been pointed out that there are very few of these.
3. The visit to the Torridge was only intended as a very temporary thing- just one tide maybe, or borrow one of those few moorings. Calls out the next question - where was going to be home for Seagair?
4. She was to be lifted on arrival and put ashore for the winter. In which case presumably a crane was booked or hired.

In all cases, you would think someone other than the owner must have known exactly what was planned, and perhaps it will emerge.

The point is that evidence of a viable plan for the end of the voyage would go a long way for me to tip the scales towards "there but for the grace of God go I" and away from inadequate preparation and overstretched capability. The instructor's first hand account of his misgivings is the strongest reason I'm presently leaning towards the latter.

A.
 
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dt4134.

You've got my drift. My cross channel racing ended as early satnav became 'affordable' and Decca was the weapon of choice. GPS was not available. I then got married and ended up bumbling around the med.

As 'skipper' I tended to do the mental plan in the weeks leading up to.

But to write down all the variables would have been ridiculous. So my guesser on the day might or might not have done the same, but knew where to get the info we needed as and when I suppose I asked for it. We did pretty well. Now that we have pyooters I can see that there are now tools that we could have used to create a sort of plan that would introduce polars and weather to a dbase that could give good info.

The transition of yacht racing from dr and rdf to today's' pinpoint accuracy has been fascinating. Not least in the howls heard condemning technology. (Nothing has changed - tech still only tells you where you are, whole 'nother story on where next).

I should make an admission. If you saw a Contessa 32 having lunch just SW of Calshot in August, that would be me and my kids. Who the f thought that removing the three piles might be a good idea? Local knowledge, pah.

There seems to be no factual evidence of her ability, and I would hope that everybody would accept that she might well have known exactly what she was doing.

On this forum, the crew of Ouzo seem not to have been criticised to any significant degree, and yet there were several of them able to keep watch. We've all done it. Looking upwind/uprain ain't pleasant.
 
Sadly I'm not sure who 'has to be convinced' now but the coroner and MAIB; the only suggestion I'd make is 'take a crew', even if inexperienced, just a manual autopilot / tea and sandwich maker / helper if skipper has a MOB/ medical problem / caller on VHF !

The passage plan was quite do-able for a single person, but I'd have liked a capable chum along even if they had to be told one end of the boat from the other; maybe that's all we'll learn from this sad event.
 
boguing said:
There seems to be no factual evidence of her ability, and I would hope that everybody would accept that she might well have known exactly what she was doing.
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The lack of relaible info either way is the key thing. At least on this forum, if not elsewhere, I think we've discounted the wildest allegations that were in the press.
 
dt4134 said:
Apart from anything else, you loose a lot of cudos if the skipper says, "Can we do this..." and you have to reply "I'll just nip below and check". Hatch Rat is a bit of a derogatory term for a navigator.

However, I do agree with other points you make where local knowledge gets rid of the need for a detailed written passage plan, but I would say that is because you can plan sufficiently well in your head.
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Totally agree with the aim to able say "Straight over Bramble Bank." YM instructors have been failed for not being able to say that. But if conditions change or crew are getting tired, a quick consideration is often pertinent.

Whilst local knowledge is extremely valuable, one always has to assume the rest of the crew, or at least the watch leaders know of it. Perhaps an example: the Solent is an exempt area for written passage planning - if you did that on your YM exam don't expect to pass unless you have made it very clear.
 
Alan ashore said:
A few days ago there was some discussion/speculation here about what Segair was going to do when she got to Bideford, Northam or Appledore, all of which have been reported as her destination.

In the context of the more recent "passage planning" discussion, I still find this aspect intriguing. It seems to me the most likely viable possibilities are:
1. Seagair wasn't a fin keeler, despite the brokers listing. It seems unlikely.
2. She had a deep water mooring arranged in the Estuary. It has been pointed out that there are very few of these.
3. The visit to the Torridge was only intended as a very temporary thing- just one tide maybe, or borrow one of those few moorings. Calls out the next question - where was going to be home for Segair?
4. She was to be lifted on arrival and put ashore for the winter. In which case presumably a crane was booked or hired.

In all cases, you would think someone other than the owner must have known exactly what was planned, and perhaps it will emerge.

The point is that evidence of a viable plan for the end of the voyage would go a long way for me to tip the scales towards "there but for the grace of God go I" and away from inadequate preparation and overstretched capability. The instructor's first hand account of his misgivings is the strongest reason I'm presently leaning towards the latter.

A.
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Completely agree. Having revisited the pilot book it seems there are a very few areas where a fin keeler can stay afloat off Appledore, but it may have to be at anchor and is maybe not comfortable at springs. In general keeping a fin keeled boat here seems to be at least making life more difficult than needs be, so it would go a long way to know that there was a sensible mooring or storage arrangement at the destination. It's not easy to rule out an impulse buy of the boat otherwise, especially as the press have reported that no survey was done and the bill of sale etc left behind in Falmouth.
 
MrCramp said:
I am very surprised that there dosn't appear to be any more news of more wreckage etc being found/recovered.
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I'm not.

It's amazing how quickly, and over how big an area, a small amount (a yacht is only small after all) of wreckage can be spread - as we see regularly.

Of course, playing devils advocate, the lack of a body may be explained by an elaborate Reggie Perrin....
 
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