Will she refloat??

[pcatterall]

Just considering next springs return trip down the Mersey from Fidlers ferry. Its a race down against the falling tide and with 3 seperate potential grounding spots.
On the journey up I did manage to go aground and used my beaching legs, all went ok but I felt that there was a possibility of scour undermining the legs and the boat crashing over. The alternative of letting the boat lie over seems quite fraught as well, what does the panel think.
My boat is a 32 foot Colvic with a long shallow keel, the grounding sites would be flat hard sand, the current is very strong.
Apart from not grounding at all would you be fairly relaxed or horrified in such a grounding situation?

 

[wanderlust]

Why dont you ask the harbour master to pilot you dont the river. He knows it very well. He wont charge you much and will put your mind at rest. He came with us last year and we never had any problem but we only draw 3 ft

 

[savageseadog]

I did warn you!
I was in the lock at Liverpool Marina when a boat arrived that had grounded on the way down from Fiddlers Ferry. The decks were thick with sand/mud from the tidal bore that hit them when the water came back.
Let us know when you're doing it I'll get my camcorder ready. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[bigwow]

Do it in two tides, stopping at Spike Island, by the time you get out of the lock at Fiddlers Ferry you've lost most of the incoming tide.

 

[pcatterall]

Its not so much the route as we will do a survey It is more a case of how far do you risk being caught out. All the potential grounding sites have plenty of water on the top of the tide but as you know its the travel time interval between these sites which create the problem. There are occaisions where you know you should get through but there is a small risk you wont. How serious is grounding under these conditions?
Yes I think we will be calling on Mikes expertise this year!!

 

[catalac08]

Some years ago I wintered 4 times at Fiddlers ferry so 8 times on the river I felt I was getting to know it reasonably well then. Been aground in 3 dfferent places with varying degrees of fraughtness. The first trip in sight of FF but advised by a "local expert" to cross the river at a particular point, thought it looked wrong but followed the detailed sketch he provided to me. Result aground until the next tide but no problem when floating off because went aground near the top of tide on a hump. On another occasion tried for Spike Island to break the trip as not certain of making return on one trip but ran out of water in the channel just short of S Island. When the tide returned it was dangerously strong and my 26ft twin keeler at one stage was heeling at 45 degrees in only perhaps 2ft of water and that was very worrying. Similarly I once went aground ihaving lost the channel near the airport gantrey with almost identical results from the bore.

I think a long keel boat, even with legs would be in serious trouble dried out in one of the channels as I did as I think the legs would just dig deep in the torrent and lay the boat over.

Eric Berquist who had the boatyard at FF for many years said to me that in his opinion an 8.5 M Liverpool tide was optimum there being enough water to get up/down in one tide but not so much that the speed of current would get you into difficulty. Makes sense.

Best of luck in the spring.

 

[pcatterall]

Good to hear that others have had excitment on this trip. My real question concerned the advantages of using legs versus just letting the boat lie over.
Take your point on the optimum tide. Duration and velocity can be as important as actual hieght.
Regards

 

[ShipsWoofy]

my father and I stuck TC fast into the mud opposite the power station, being a cat this was not such a problem. The thing was, we were only headed for spike island and the boat was empty of anything, food, cushions, blankets etc. It was a cold night and we elected to get ashore and eat before dark.

The mud is silly thick around the channels and even with legs out, I imagine you may sink to quite an angle before she settles.. Though, clever use of big balloon fenders if the worst happens might work.

We had to use the dinghy to get ashore (tide out) I was actually paddling the dinghy in the mud for some parts of the trip!

If I was doing it now, and reading this thread, I would seriously consider a pilot with us to spike island, once at spike the trip is simple. I wish I had come around this year, ho hum.

As for re-floating, it is always (to me) quite amazing how some boats come back up after drying. At Hoylake there were quite a few Achilles 24s in the club racing fleet, they seemed to dry almost horizontal and I never heard an instance of one not popping back up at high water.

I thought I had seen your boat on the piles at Pwllheli, obviously a sister ship.

 

[pcatterall]

Thanks for all the replies. Plenty of info on the Mersey but few answers on my query about using legs or not!!
Regarding the Mersey trip I propose to do a survey prior to the trip to produce a GPS track at low water to ascertain the channel situation. Secondly; not to risk getting stuck!!