On Tue, 31 Oct 2017 09:05:10 -0400,
wrote:

On Tue, 31 Oct 2017 05:33:44 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 10/30/2017 10:15 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 30 Oct 2017 19:17:25 -0400, Alex wrote:

Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 10/29/2017 12:35 AM, wrote:
On Sat, 28 Oct 2017 23:18:12 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

This could also be titled "How Not to Run an Inlet in Heavy Weather."
Burying the bow into the back of the wave in front is not unusual but
this is a bit extreme and with the wrong boat.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BayTiEmneTm/

Some guys I know were going out of the inlet at St James City into
those standing waves in a 24' Carolina skiff. at night. They got
sideways to the sea and flipped it. Everyone got out OK but it was
scary. They were able to swim home, get another boat and go get the
skiff.



There's a video somewhere on YouTube of a 48 foot sportsfish capsizing
in the same manner leaving Jupiter Inlet. The boat's captain fell out
and drowned.

Here's a video of some guys on a 34' center console approaching
Jupiter inlet. It shows how it gets rougher as you get closer to the
inlet due to the shallow water. (and this wasn't a really *bad* day.
The guy sitting in front of the console gets soaked at about 2:18 into
the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8notH7LZnM

That takes some expert throttle control.


===

Best strategy in my experience is to run slower than the waves with
the bow trimmed well up. Once you crest a wave and drive down into
the next one in front, you never know what's going to happen. I've
been on 50 ft sailboats where we've taken solid green water all the
way back to the mast after surfing into the wave in front.


I remember heading for an inlet to the ICW after an offshore run with
some very large, short period and fast moving swells following right on
the stern.

The channel was narrow, so there really was no choice but to head
directly towards the inlet. Every time the stern would lift as one of
the swells passed under the boat, I could feel the rudders lose bite and
the bow would plant it's self off in a totally different heading. It
was nerve wracking.


===

It certainly is. The loss of steering control is what leads to boats
being turned sideways to a breaking wave, with a subsequent broach or
capsize. Even larger boats are vulnerable if caught sideways in the
curl. On our first transit of Barnegat inlet in New Jersey there was
an 80 foot commercial fishing boat high and dry on a sand bar to port
after being broached out of the channel. If they'd been broached to
starboard it would have taken them into the breakwater rocks.

It has been calculated that a breaking wave slightly higher than half
your boat's beam can cause a capsize. For the average trailerable
boat with a beam of 8 1/2 feet that's a wave height of less than 5 ft,
a fairly common occurrence near ocean inlets.

It is probably not an option in passes with rock breakwaters but the
ones around here usually have a channel you can navigate right next to
the shore line so you can run a ways along the beach and turn seaward
past the ugly water. Big Carlos is that way but you do need a little
local knowledge and the sand still may have moved if you have not been
there recently.
I know right now there is a lot of sand that isn't where it used to
be.