DSK wrote in message ...

[snip good stuff]



As a natural pessimist, I want to build the 'ultimate-unsinkable'
craft, which will weather the worst that the sea can inflict;

As a natural pessimist myself, let me assure that such a thing does not exist.
The ocean is incredibly powerful, it can tear up battleships & supertankers when
it's in the mood to.
__________________________________________________ ______________________________
The only answer for surviving such conditions in a small
sailboat is.... be elsewhere....
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After noting all of the very sage advice throughout this thread, I
suspect this is in fact the zen-essence of seaworthiness: minimize the
statistical likelihood that you will be caught in an ultimate storm &
trust the balance of fate to the Sea Gods & your own contingency
planning. On this point one of the less funny things that has
happened to me, is watching the Skipper of a sinking Indonesian ferry
- overloaded with wailing Indonesians - throwing prayer leaflets off
the bow in order to appease the Sea Gods.


That said, a high ballast displacement ratio and full positive flotation make a
lot of sense for ocean passagemaking sailboats.



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