Here's one last article about where to store a boat in hurricane season.
Once again it was the the April, 2005 issue of The Compass. While The
Compass does make some non-current articles available, for some reason
they seem to have not included these articles. While it's nice to know
who won the St. Crois regatta, these seem to have a lot more substance
to them, and are something that I'd like to reference. Anyhow, here's
the articled that I OCRed and have reproduced here without permission.

-- Geoff

I don't know about anyone else, but after Ivan hit Grenada my boat
insurance took a whopping hike, and I am not sure how much longer I will
go on Insuring. I know that insuring yachts in the Caribbean is not
easy, but I cannot help but think some of the Insurance companies have
brought losses upon themselves.

Since Hurricane Luis in 1995, many companies have been insisting if you
wanted Insurance during the hurricane season you had to go below 12.50
degrees north. As a result, Grenada and Trinidad have been doing great
summer business, and the insurance companies, having put all their risks
in two baskets, complain when one of them smashes on the ground. Now to
compound that error, it seems some will take it a step further.
According to Al Golden of International Marine Insurance Services
writing in All at Sea. "It is our belief that, at least for a year or
two, the southern boundary of the box' will move south to 11°30' to give
Grenada a chance to recover, and the underwriters a chance to recover
from Grenada".

Now by driving everyone down to Trinidad, those insurance companies are
assuring themselves of the Caribbean's worst marine Insurance nightmare
when (and note I say "when" and not "if) a hurricane hits Trinidad.

Any island in the Caribbean can be hit by a hurricane historically this
includes Trinidad and Venezuela as well as Grenada. Records might show
hurricane strikes down south to be fewer than those to the north, but
with global warming and changing weather patterns, past performance may
not be an Indication of the future. And in any case, as Grenada showed,
a boatyard on an island that has not had a hurricane for 50 years is
going to be much more poorly prepared, so the disaster then becomes
worse. What is the solution?

Firstly, from an insurance perspective, I would think there would be two
alms. The first should be to spread the risk. While it is true that any
Caribbean island might be hit by a hurricane, it is most unlikely that
all would be hit at once. So, instead of telling everyone to go south,
it would make far more sense to encourage people to store yachts in as
many different Islands as possible, so that when a hurricane does hit
one Island, only a small proportion of those covered by Insurance are in
that particular location.

Secondly, It would be In the interests of the Insurance companies to
make sure that when yachts are in storage on dry land in the Caribbean,
that they are stored correctly, so that even when a hurricane does hit,
serious damage should only affect a small proportion of the yachts that
are stored. This, along with spreading the risk, should bring losses due
to hurricanes to a relatively insignificant level.

As I have sailed round the northern Leewards this. year, I have been
Impressed with the level of hurricane preparedness In many of the yards.
These yards have an excellent success rate In hurricanes, but owing to
the myopia of Insurance companies they are not as full as they should
be.

At Bobby's Marina in St. Maarten, Jeffrey Howell has shown what can be
done. Only a few of his boats had a problem In Luis, which destroyed
over a thousand boats in the lagoon and battered the island for 36
hours. Like many boatyards, his has hard-packed standing but not
concrete. His solution is two-fold. He insists that all monohulls in
storage for the hurricane season have their masts out, and has a set
price of about US$125 for pulling and replacing a mast (I assume the
owner has to get it ready). There is a big mast rack, where the masts
are stored, and this is properly secured. Masts are not pulled on
multihulls, but light multihulls are tied down. Jeff uses wooden props
for long-term storage, rather than adjustable stands. These props are
nailed together both across and along the boat, and are properly cross-
braced. How long does this take? About one hour.

In Antigua, both Jolly Harbour and Antigua Slipway have gone to concrete
standings. This is Initially costly, but it makes keeping boats upright
in hurricane conditions much easier. In the newer section, tie-down
rings are embedded in the concrete so stands or boats can be secured to
them. This system has also been used in the new haul-out yard in St.
Barts. However, while concrete standing helps, it alone is not enough.
Both the Antigua yards mentioned use regular adjustable stands, but once
in place, these are spot-welded together. Antigua Slipway initially
(some years ago) used re-bar and had some problems with it bending
during a hurricane. However, this was before the concrete standing. Now
they use one-inch water-pipe. Jolly Harbour uses re-bar, but say there
has been no problem with this during storms when the boats are on
concrete.

Bailey's Boatyard is the smallest of the Antigua Yards. Hugo Bailey alms
for quality, not quantity. He has six concrete keel holes (soon to be
expanded to 12). The boats are set In these and a wooden cradle rests on
the concrete and makes sure his boats are absolutely secure. More (over
12) boats would be on hard-packed ground, and Hugo suggests his
customers have stands welded top and bottom, which, given the standing,
makes sense.

That is It: as we come south, many yards don't think too hard about
hurricanes. "It's not going to happen, mon...." Except, as we saw In
Grenada, it does. It is time that we boat owners and the Insurance
companies both stopped being in denial and did something about hurricane
preparedness for yachts in storage. It seems to me that the northern
Leewards are leading the way, and being well prepared does not have to
be very expensive or difficult.

At minimum, yachts on concrete standing should have the stands all tack
welded together, using heavy re-bar. If there is no concrete standing,
then the tack welding should be done with one-inch water pipe. (It would
be preferable to do this top and bottom, or better still cross-braced,
but if this is too costly, any welded-together system will be better
than nothing.) Yes, the yards will have to buy some material, and yes,
we the customers will have to pay for the couple of extra hours of yard
time it takes for laborers to do and undo the tack welding but when a
hurricane does happen, the added safety factor will be more than worth
the cost.

The other, much more controversial idea, is to add mast removal.
Authorities tell me that masts apply 50 percent of a yacht's falling
force in a hurricane. Boatyard managers seem to think that the boat
owners won't agree to have their masts removed. Yet, I notice that
Bobby's Marina, which Insists on it, doesn't lose very many customers.
In part, I think leaving masts in the boat is a bad habit (as was
leaving up all those roller-furling Jibs and awnings In Grenada), but
also, right now, most yards do not make It easy. It is a special deal to
pull the mast, and often there is nowhere sensible to put It. At the
minimum, every yard should have proper secure mast storage, a set rate
for hoisting and replacing the mast (assuming the owner is going to
disconnect everything and do the prep), and that they should
automatically offer .people the option of mast removal and storage when
they haul. Masttess boats should be stored together, not mixed In with
the others where they might be hit 'by a falling domino.

If the Insurance companies would stop buying Into the Idea they can gain
security by sending yachts ever farther south, and Instead start
thinking about how well their customers' boats are stored, they would
have fewer losses, yachts would be safer, and when that hurricane does
hit Trinidad, the boatyards there might have been pushed into getting
ready.