what would you have donein this situation.

[steveeasy]

Vhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7z89lF2z7c

Well I just watched this on youtube. How slow can you be !!. Seams they had a very lucky escape.

Steveeasy

 

[anoccasionalyachtsman]

No points to the boss - it was a race, and by all means leave it to the last minute, but they'd have had time to clear the deck and get LJs and harnesses on. And don't leave a GoPro running if you're going to be that slow getting a spinnaker off.

 

[NotBirdseye]

I looked at the first comment which was pretty much, "Why didn't you reef?" XD. Exactly what I'd been thinking but then, I'm not a racer.

 

[RichardS]

I've never been out in 60 knots so I'm not particularly qualified to comment but as soon as I see the wind getting up like that, I always seek to get the big genoa rolled away/dropped as that's always the sail which seems to want to kill you. :ambivalence:

Richard

 

[Ingwe]

The main thing is as the wind started to build they needed to point higher so that when they were dropping the genoa it falls onto the deck as opposed to the bow team trying to pull it in - by doing that it would have been down and tidy before the main wind hit. Then once the genoa is down keep pointing high enough so that you can keep the main sail fairly depowered, but still keeping some forward motion to keep steerage. I wouldn't reef if racing as you know that type of storm cell won't last long. Oh and get foul weather gear / lifejackets / harnesses on before the video has even started.

 

[Stemar]

If that sort of weather was forecast or likely, I'd have thought LJ & harness would be the rule before setting off.

As for what I'd have done, I don't race, so I'd have been alongside, drinking coffee in the warm and dry...

 

[johnalison]

The link as posted didn't work for me. Poor seamanship all round if you ask me, even if they were racing.

 

[FairweatherDave]

Credit to the skipper for posting that. He's pretty open to the mistakes he made. A good lesson for anyone to see from the comfort of home. Reef early and feel stupid,... until it hits. Particularly if you are slow at reefing. Easy in retrospect but that storm cloud did look pretty grim as it/they approached. No need to discuss lack of LJ's (dumb).

 

[lw395]

Terrible sailhandling.
Should have had the kite off in seconds.
Might have been best to ride through the squall not worrying too much about heading, as it was soon over, you can make up the height when it's passed?

 

[Paddy Fields]

No practical advice, but a bit of physics to help get your head around the problem - wind forces increase cubicly with wind speed. I.e. if you double the wind speed, you get 8X the forces. Add the fact that damp air in a squall is denser, you can add some more multiples.

So a good rule of thumb is 2X the wind speed, 10X the wind forces. Easy to see why its so easy to get into a spot of bother.

 

[john_morris_uk]

It's a good learning point for people who aren't used to the power of the wind increasing so rapidly as a squall approaches and goes through.

I'm not convinced by the pointing up comment from someone? Bearing away has a magical affect on apparent wind but might have made getting the Genoa down a bit harder if it wasn't sheltered by the main.

My main comment - they knew what to do - they were just a bit slow at doing it! Perhaps not very practiced and they lacked urgency.

 

[dom]

To answer the posed question: I'd book myself a sailing/sail-handling lesson!

 

[Ingwe]

It's a good learning point for people who aren't used to the power of the wind increasing so rapidly as a squall approaches and goes through.

I'm not convinced by the pointing up comment from someone? Bearing away has a magical affect on apparent wind but might have made getting the Genoa down a bit harder if it wasn't sheltered by the main.

My main comment - they knew what to do - they were just a bit slow at doing it! Perhaps not very practiced and they lacked urgency.

My heading up comment is about not breaking things and keeping control, at about a true wind angle of say 60 degrees you can keep the mainsail fairly depowered and still keep enough forward motion to keep good steerage / not flog the main too much / not put huge loads on rig etc. If you bear off you will reduce the apparent wind to 40 knots if your doing 10 knots boat speed, yes 40 knots apparent is better than 50 but it is still going to put massive loads on everything and there is a high chance of an accidental gybe which could mean ripping the main or losing the rig in those conditions. This is all assuming your racing and haven't dropped the mainsail - if I was cruising I would get the mainsail down, just leave a small bit of jib up and go downwind like you are suggesting.

 

[Ceirwan]

Sure we could argue that the sails should have all been down, which the skipper should have done, and the foredeck crew didn't seem to have any real sense of urgency until it was too late.

Just an experience thing. Chalk it up to a lesson learned.

I'm sure next time they see a similar situation developing they'll handle it much better. Interesting video to watch.

 

[john_morris_uk]

My heading up comment is about not breaking things and keeping control, at about a true wind angle of say 60 degrees you can keep the mainsail fairly depowered and still keep enough forward motion to keep good steerage / not flog the main too much / not put huge loads on rig etc. If you bear off you will reduce the apparent wind to 40 knots if your doing 10 knots boat speed, yes 40 knots apparent is better than 50 but it is still going to put massive loads on everything and there is a high chance of an accidental gybe which could mean ripping the main or losing the rig in those conditions. This is all assuming your racing and haven't dropped the mainsail - if I was cruising I would get the mainsail down, just leave a small bit of jib up and go downwind like you are suggesting.

I agree with all of that. Good points well made.

 

[chrishscorp]

To answer the posed question: I'd book myself a sailing/sail-handling lesson!

I did advanced dinghy, covers getting the spinnaker sorted whilst capsized
Joking aside lucky not to have someone overboard and no L Js as others have pointed out. It did look like it was going to get very squally, the kite should have already been down and crew well into reefing the main and Genoa but easy to call from comfort of armchair.

Interesting to watch and fairplay to the skipper for being up for posting it

 

[john_morris_uk]

My heading up comment is about not breaking things and keeping control, at about a true wind angle of say 60 degrees you can keep the mainsail fairly depowered and still keep enough forward motion to keep good steerage / not flog the main too much / not put huge loads on rig etc. If you bear off you will reduce the apparent wind to 40 knots if your doing 10 knots boat speed, yes 40 knots apparent is better than 50 but it is still going to put massive loads on everything and there is a high chance of an accidental gybe which could mean ripping the main or losing the rig in those conditions. This is all assuming your racing and haven't dropped the mainsail - if I was cruising I would get the mainsail down, just leave a small bit of jib up and go downwind like you are suggesting.

I’ve no argument with any of that except I wasn’t advocating sailing downwind any where near enough to run any risk of an accidental gybe. A decent broad reach should be enough?

 

[capnsensible]

After the first one of those I went through I very quickly learnt that if there is the tiniest chance of getting whacked then drop the main immediately and broad reach off under headsail.

It has always worked for me.

 

[armchairsailor]

They were running under spinnaker- I’d not have fancied running with one of those up in anything approaching that level of squall. However, I don’t have the Cap’ns experience or mileage, so I’m only offering what I’d be comfortable doing.
Given the circumstances, I think the right thing was done. Control was maintained and risk of damage to the boat minimized by spilling air from the main.

 

[Kukri]

I was taught a lesson by a thundersquall long ago. I am not a racer. I dislike sails flogging and assuming there was sea room I would bear off to blanket the headsail and reduce the apparent wind, but I don’t see they did much wrong apart from not taking the thunderstorm seriously enough.