US circumnavigator's plywood yacht breaks up near Ibiza

mrming

mrming

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The 76 year old American had been circumnavigating in his plywood 30 footer. He managed to step off the boat and onto the rocks before the above happened. The island is Tagomago, a private island off Ibiza's East coast.

Report on his blog here: http://www.cometosea.us/?p=4216

More info on the SA thread here:
http://forums.sailinganarchy.com/index.php?showtopic=152906#entry4389069

Scary stuff and he is very lucky to have survived. He had covered over 35,000 nm in the boat up to this point.
 
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The guy is bashed around at sea for a few days; he ends up having his physical and electrical batteries drained to zero; the boat is blown onto the rocks; he steps off uninjured and remarks, "I'm glad God has other plans for me". Then the boat is smashed to pieces, which the current collects into a little Damian Hurst style photogenic bundle.

Amazing Story!
 
I think it's bit disparaging to describe his boat as his "plywood yacht". It's not like the one that other clown was making. He's been sailing this since 1980 and has crossed oceans in it!
 
CreakyDecks said:
I think it's bit disparaging to describe his boat as his "plywood yacht". It's not like the one that other clown was making. He's been sailing this since 1980 and has crossed oceans in it!
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Only on YBW could using the words "plywood yacht" to describe a plywood yacht be somehow construed as disparaging. Any links to the home depot plywood monster cat to which you allude are strictly in your own mind, not in the title of the thread or in the subsequent post.
 
mrming said:
Only on YBW could using the words "plywood yacht" to describe a plywood yacht be somehow construed as disparaging. Any links to the home depot plywood monster cat to which you allude are strictly in your own mind, not in the title of the thread or in the subsequent post.
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I have some sympathy for that view. On the other hand, why use the yacht's material in the heading at all unless it's germane? "US circumnavigator's yacht breaks up near Ibiza" would have served just as well.
 
SAPurdie said:
Because she would not have made such a photogenic wreck had she been made from steel or grp...
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Exactly. :)

I actually thought it looked like a nice boat. I tried reasonably hard to buy an epoxy ply quarter tonner last year. The seller was very slow to respond however, and by the time I managed to have a proper chat with the broker about it I had imported our current boat from Ireland and was sitting on it when the phone rang. She's still for sale: http://www.apolloduck.co.uk/feature.phtml?id=285770
 
mrming said:
I actually thought it looked like a nice boat. I tried reasonably hard to buy an epoxy ply quarter tonner last year. The seller was very slow to respond however, and by the time I managed to have a proper chat with the broker about it I had imported our current boat from Ireland and was sitting on it when the phone rang. She's still for sale: http://www.apolloduck.co.uk/feature.phtml?id=285770
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I had something similar a long time ago, a professionally built YW Buccaneer, a van der Stadt designed quarter tonner, constructed in 12mm marine ply with a lead keel. She was a great little yacht, very competitive and really tough - as I found out once in the middle of the North Sea when hit by a strong SW gale six hours out from Den Helder returning from Holland.

Nothing wrong with plywood for a boat if built properly.
 
Border Terrier said:
Perhaps the mad Mini Transat yachts might learn some lessons?

You don't need exotics to make a seaworthy yacht.

Much respect.
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You'd be surprised how many plywood mini's there are, and have been. I'm afraid it's the rest of the world that learns lessons from the Mini Transat, they have a history of being the first to do pretty much everything.
 
Poor chap, three nights of storms, attempted harbour entrys, a wind shift and a cul de sac with no engine start available..As he says. God has spared him for something new... respect. Nice looking design too

Therer is a generation of GRP sailors who wouldnt dream of a wood boat at all, how perceptions change!
 
Barnac1e said:
Nothing wrong with plywood for a boat if built properly.
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When I lived in Hong Kong I had a 22' YW People's Boat that had been professionally built there. She was a fine seaworthy little boat and easy to handle under sail.
I liked her so much that I made serious enquiries about having her shipped back to the UK. I've no doubt that, given a more capable skipper than I, she could have been sailed back.

http://bills-log.blogspot.co.uk/2010/04/yachting-world-peoples-boat.html
 
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JumbleDuck said:
God also sent three storms after him. I wouldn't bet on the "something new" being good ...
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Na, he just ran out of searoom. The Med, no thankyou Sir!

Shane Acton is (was) yer man for small plywood boats and careful practical planning and getting amazing distances of adventure .
 
parsifal said:
When I lived in Hong Kong I had a 22' YW People's Boat that had been professionally built there. She was a fine seaworthy little boat and easy to handle under sail.
I liked her so much that I made serious enquiries about having her shipped back to the UK. I've no doubt that, given a more capable skipper than I, she could have been sailed back.

http://bills-log.blogspot.co.uk/2010/04/yachting-world-peoples-boat.html
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That's a sweet boat. The example has rounded chines, just as mine did. It means some intricate construction where substantial strakes join the panels that rebate into them and then planed into a rounded curve to soften it and protect the ply edges at the chines rather than have a vulnerable butt join.

No doubt yours was very similar and created in the same way by Yachting World publishing plans for DIY construction. But many were so good that professional boat-builders also adopted them. The competition in the 1950s for my Buccaneer was won by Ricus van de Stadt who later used it himself for the Primaat, of which many still sail on the continent and Scandinavia. Here is a Swedish one.

1.jpg
 
That is a lovely pic..long and lean ln the spirit of the Baltic metre boats?

Re Jumbleduck.
Yup.
Time for an airing, 'timely intervention':

SailorSam is a very religious man. One day, a nearby river floods its banks and rushes into town, forcing SailorSam to climb onto his garage roof. Soon, a man in a boat comes along and tells SailorSam to get in.
SailorSam says, "That’s very kind of you, but no thanks. God will take care of me."
So, the boat leaves.
The water rises and SailorSam has to climb onto the roof of his house. Another man in a boat comes along and tells SailorSam to get in.
SailorSam replies, "That’s very kind of you but no thanks. God will take care of me."
The boat leaves.
The water rises further and soon SailorSam is clinging to his chimney. Then a helicopter arrives and lowers a ladder. The helicopter pilot tells SailorSam to climb up the ladder.
SailorSam replies, "That’s very kind of you but no thanks. God will take care of me."
The pilot says, "Are you really sure?"
SailorSam says, "Yes, I'm sure that God will take care of me."
Finally, the water rises too high and SailorSam drowns. He goes up to Heaven and is met by God.
SailorSam says to God, "You told me you would take care of me. What happened?"
God replies, "Well, I sent you two boats and a helicopter. What else did you want me to do?"
 
CreakyDecks said:
I think it's bit disparaging to describe his boat as his "plywood yacht". It's not like the one that other clown was making. He's been sailing this since 1980 and has crossed oceans in it!
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It sounds like a headline the tabloids would use to imply it was one step above cardboard and the owner therefore dangerously unsafe. Mind you, I did come across a guy planning to build a boat with hardoard as the core of a sandwich construction. That really was dangerous.
 
If You Want To Help

I have found out that Jack Van Ommen is an author. He wrote a book about two cousins who were on opposite sides in WW2, originally in Dutch, but now published in English and available as an e-book as well as in print.
Link to the Amazon page http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mastmakers-...8096&sr=1-1&keywords=the+mastmakers+daughters

If you feel like helping him financially buy his book.

I learned about it from the Marmaris Bay Cruisers blog, here http://cruisingtips.net/mbc/?p=1794
 
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