Captain Joe Redcloud wrote:

On Sat, 22 Oct 2005 19:10:23 -0400, "Jim Carter" wrote:


"barry lawson" wrote in message
. au...
What would a lifejacket have done?
If he had a life jacket with a harness and the harness was clipped to the
life lines, he would not have been lost over the side. Most people that I
know use the safety harness and life jackets when they are off shore. I
always wear the Mustang SOS inflatable life jacket when I am on the Great
Lakes.


Yikes! Bad idea - really. You need proper jacklines that prevent you from going
past the lifelines. Clipping onto the life lines won't keep you onboard.

He probably meant jacklines and it just came out lifelines.

In bad conditions, I also heartily recommend that you wear a foam vest rather
than an inflatable. Many sailors are disabled when they fall on deck or against
something. The foam jacket protects your ribs and back somewhat. I wear an

We sail mostly in hot weather, so we prefer the inflatable vests as
they are cooler. We also don't go onto the foredeck - certainly not
in weather where falling is possible. If we should be going out
there, we would be clipped onto the jacklines and also we would be
holding onto whatever was available to hold onto.

I haven't fallen on the deck in any way where any kind of life vest
would have helped. My husband slipped and fell down the companionway
and landed on his shoulder and dislocated it, but the boat was tied to
the dock at the time. I've tripped over a line that he tied across
the finger pier (because of nowhere else to put it) and fell, but I
fell to my knees.

We did have a friend fall and a foam jacket might have helped him, but
he shouldn't have fallen - he was trying to jump from our boat to a
boat we were going to raft on, and slipped and missed and fell on his
side on the rail of the other boat. He was lucky he wasn't crushed
between the two boats. Even after that, we had to keep telling him
not to jump. We don't jump from our boat.

His SO also fell, but that was my fault and she fell in the cabin and
hit her head, so no life jacket would have helped. (I ran aground)

inflatable only in mild conditions. In fog or limited visibily, everyone wears a
foam PFD and clips on. That's even with no wind and flat water. If you get hit
by another boat in fog, rain, or dark, you'll instantly understand why that's so
important.

I recently saw an interesting idea that I intend to check out. It was suggested
that when working on the bow in bad conditions, and additional attachment to a
spare halyard would pretty much guarantee that you stay on the boat. Probably
not very workable when single handing, since you need a crew person to play the
halyard as you move around. Still worth investigating...


Captain Joe Redcloud


grandma Rosalie