Stupidest accident I ever nearly had afloat.

graham

graham

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The boat was moored to a long pontoon ,a water tap with a hose coiled up hanging on the tap but not connected was next to our cockpit. I was wearing crewsaver boots which have a lace around the top.

Stepping aboard after letting go with a fresh breeze blowing the boat away from the pontoon the brass end on the hose managed to tangle itself in my boot lace. I now have one foot inside the guard wire and the other outside with the full weight of the boat about to make me do the splits unless I leap over board.

Luckilly after a good tug it came free. Laces are cut off now but chances of that happening again must be low.
 
I have a tonneau cover that attaches to the sprayhood with a zip and covers the cockpit.

Once at anchor, and singlehanded, I fitted the cover and managed to close the zip on my hair. There was no knife or scissors within reach and the extraction process was extremely painful. :(
 
Not sure that the laces are the problem. There are many reasons to slip lines from on board rather than the pontoon and this is just one of them, though I often meet real resistance from crew who are adamant that shoving the boat hard then leaping aboard is the way to go.
That said, I've done far worse but lack the cojones to publicise my errors.
 
Many years ago (thankfully before mobile phones, YouTube & You've Been Framed) we were coming alongside a pontoon in Mylor with yours truly outside the guard rails ready to step off with the stern line. Took the step of faith and the back of me bloody smock snagged on a stanchion post! There I am dangling with feet about 18" above the pontoon whilst gently swinging in the breeze unable to get off or get back on deck. The crew were in fits of laughter (barstewards) and had to come and lift me off said post! :o
 
Quiddle said:
There are many reasons to slip lines from on board rather than the pontoon and this is just one of them
Click to expand...
:encouragement:
Likewise, as a solo I do not leave the boat until I have a centre cleat attached and always double my lines back on board ready to slip them.
But I have walked backwards off the end of a pontoon when paying out my water hose!
 
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Poignard said:
I have a tonneau cover that attaches to the sprayhood with a zip and covers the cockpit.

Once at anchor, and singlehanded, I fitted the cover and managed to close the zip on my hair. There was no knife or scissors within reach and the extraction process was extremely painful. :(
Click to expand...

According to Voyage for Madmen, Knox-Johnston manage to sew an eye-brow to a sail when he was repairing it. He had the same problem of no knife or scissors to hand.
 
Giblets said:
Many years ago (thankfully before mobile phones, YouTube & You've Been Framed) we were coming alongside a pontoon in Mylor with yours truly outside the guard rails ready to step off with the stern line. Took the step of faith and the back of me bloody smock snagged on a stanchion post! There I am dangling with feet about 18" above the pontoon whilst gently swinging in the breeze unable to get off or get back on deck. The crew were in fits of laughter (barstewards) and had to come and lift me off said post! :o
Click to expand...

Ditto!

Not at Mylor but coming alongside our marina pontoon in the NW. The bottom of my jacket snagged on a stanchion post as I was about to step nimbly ashore with a bow line. Husband moved the boat even closer and I was able to free my jacket and step ashore.

Nowadays I always check that my jacket isn't snagging a stanchion.
 
The worst accident I had was in a marina in Portugal I did what I have done hundreds of times and that is step from one cockpit seat to to another and this time my foot slipped. My left ribs hit the top corner of the coach roof and I heard them crack, if you cough or sneeze, even with painkillers, the pain goes through the roof.
 
I think I've been lucky. My worst (so far) was a rather breezy day (6, gusting 7). I was out with my teenaged son and picked up a mooring in Langstone Harbour. I got into the dinghy, which we were towing to do something sensible (can't remember what) and went to step back onto the stern boarding ladder. At this point, the dinghy moved promptly away from under me, resulting in a Tom & Jerry moment and a splash. Unfortunately, the ladder was tied up with a fender across it to protect the dinghy. I couldn't untie the knots with one hand and my knife was in my trouser pocket, under my oilies. Fortunately, my son was able to haul me up; had I been alone, especially in cold water, it could have been very nasty.

Since then, I've been a bit fanatical about being able to get a boarding ladder down from in the water with no tools.
 
I made a stupid mistake which still gives me a cold sweat many years later.
Dropped the mooring at Pin Mill, pre-dawn on a beautiful calm morning to head down river. Wife and sprogs still asleep, just enough wind to give steerage, so peaceful.
After a few minutes I noticed a red light high in the sky, wonder what that is? I then see a green one as well! I'm right in the path of a large ferry heading for Ipswich, it pretty well filled the fairway. Stuart Turner engine so no chance of a quick start, but had just enough speed to steer out of the channel.
So stupid, a near disaster from a lovely, peaceful start.
 
When I was with the surveyor going over the boat I was soon to buy, I lent on the top wire of the gate at the back of the boat. The pelican hook was not quite engaged and the wire gate "opened" completely unexpectedly. I am not sure how I managed not to fall 5metres down onto the concrete below - the boat was on the hard!

Ever since then I have cable ties on each pelican hook and always slide them over the hook after I have closed it.

Pelican hook.jpg

TudorSailor
 
Not me but my mum..

We were in Goes tied up in the harbour with the stern next to one of the ladders..I dropped the bathing platform to give us an easy access to the ladder. Went out for a lovely meal in a restaurant next to the harbour. We came back to the boat and climbed down the ladder and onto the bathing platform... nice and easy. Mum followed..

Suddenly she is squeeking .. uh oh.. wet feet... Wet feet.
 
Recently I was picking up swinging mooring on a falling tide on a stormy day after leaving a repair boatyard at high tide, while my wife was driving along the coast from the boatyard to meet me, thus single handed. I was also soak through to my thermals as I had foolishly not put on my good oilies at start but was unwilling to leave the helm for long due to weather. So after one pass I dashed out from the helm and grabbed the pickup buoy with a boat hook and promptly lost boat hook due to falling tide turning me back beyond my strength to hold. Never mind I have homemade whisker pole with a boathook on the end so after 5 passes in strong winds with ebb now at 2 kts I managed after about 45 minutes to grab my dinghy painter which of course causes dinghy to rear on end with outboard now underwater- much force on the hook and I try and lower my end so dinghy more horizontal and then the snap hook on my end of the dual purpose pole latches on my lifejacket belt and I start to be pulled violently through the railings. Scared I hunker down as tide increases, no way to get to engine to move against tide, my sailors knife is in the cabin, and even if I can undo the lj buckle and simply lose it and whiskerpole hook I will possibly have no way of ever picking up the mooring and what's more I will have to row ashore nearly a mile in troubled water without lj. Fortunately I eventually managed to grab a rope threaded it through snaphook to a stanchion then threw it round dinghy painter and eventually managed to take lj off with boat semi secure. Boat now broadside on and it took an hour before tide eased enough so I could get mooring lines to bows. So exhausted that when I got ashore I just asked my wife to drive me 2 hours directly to home then realised halfway I was suffering hypothermia and in struggling I had split a mostly healed wound so I was leaking. I also had to repair lj webbing with additional tape as very very mangled .

Now why was it I sail?

Of course my next worse accident was due to getting down stern ladder in yard while wearing reading glasses, then stepping off ladder 6 foot up as ground seemed near. Very very bruised ribs and lucky not to crack a few

Now what was I saying about enjoying maintenance work?
 
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