Sat 23 & Sun 24 June

Lousy weather!

Let me tell you about Lousy weather.

There we where sailing down the Orwell on Saturady afternoon, just be the 1st ship at Felixstowe.
A bit of sunshine, Black clouds ahead but that's o.k. as the wind is light from astern.
Next thing a few spots of rain.
Coats on.
Then the heavens opened. closely followed be a squall from the starboard bow and then a flash of lightening and a god almighty crash of thunder.
I have never been in the like.
It was raining that hard that the port cockpit seat had 3" of water in it in a few minutes.

Neil (Morgana) was walking along the river by Shotly and thought that we had been hit.
But apparently the lightning went to one to the large container loading cranes that had its outer arm raised to be clear of the ship.

It rained hard for the next 1/2 hour.
We finally stowed the sails and made for Shotly Marina to try to dry out.

Would not have missed it for the world but don't want to repeat the experience.
 
Hee hee....

I seriously thought it had hit Clive... it was one of those flash bang moment with little or no gap between the flash and bang.... I couldn't tell 3 seconds later whether it had hit Clive or not, as it was raining so hard that you couldn't see the waters edge, let alone a boat 400 yds away.....

I did have a moment of sympathy for him though when 20 mins later he locked through into Shotley with water dripping off the end of his nose...... /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
Neil

Thanks for helping us dry out.
On the outside at least. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Hope to see you next weekend at Bradwell.
 
I was off Clacton heading back to Bradwell when that lot let loose - we had an overhead storm in Brightlingsea on Tuesday night but the rain on Saturday was amazing. Got back to Bradwell in the sunshine wearing shorts. What a day!
 
Glad all OK.

Lightening & Boats in same sentance is bad enough but in same bit of sky / sea is distinctly worrying when afloat.

We had what seemed the parents of all thunderstorms 4 hours out from Den Helder a couple of weeks back. 3 of us in boat - each thinking but no one saying 'Whats the highest thing around here' - no cranes near by and the closed gas rig was too far away!!
 
Fabulous storm. Fortunately, I had finished the work on deck and was messing about down below, about to head home when the sky fell down. I couldn't see across Shotley Marina, let alone over to the cranes.

Smashing sail on Sunday afternoon though, good brisk 4-5, down to Stone Banks and back.
 
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Smashing sail on Sunday afternoon though, good brisk 4-5, down to Stone Banks and back.

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Aye, but the weather was pants Sunday morning, tho'. With the rain lashing down, I was glad the cockpit tent was up whilst I was servicing a couple of wenches - errm, sorry - winches
 
Re: This Friday - 29th.

Looked at the forecast and I think the weekend will be a washout.

Not certain yet but I might pretend to do some work on the boat on Friday, using BYH's Wireless Broadband, then skyve off for a quick sail. Anyone else around BYH on Friday to say hello to?
 
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