BoatBanter.com - View Single Post - Mayday off coast of Mexico-rescued from catamaran

wrote:
"Andy" wrote:
...
The real lesson in this story is not about heavy weather
tactics, its about researching conditions before you start
a passage, which these people didn't seem to do.

I can't help but wonder if Richard Woods wanted to test
his catamaran design in a heavy weather condition but
just didn't expect it to get as bad as it did.

A desire to do some heavy weather sailing seems like the only
reasonable theory for why someone would charge into the Gulf of
Tehuantepec in January without first stopping in Puerto Madero and
waiting for an unambiguous weather window. The only other possible
explanation is that Mr. Woods had simply not read or heard anything
about the region he was sailing in and had no idea that he was sailing
into a wind tunnel, which seems unlikely.

In any event, it offended me that Mr. Woods described what happened to
him as if it was just some unlucky twist of fate that he got caught in
a gale, when in fact it was almost a certainty that he would get
plastered doing what he did.

Andy