Cat capsize off oregon coast
 

I too would not like to take sides on this debate but I wonder, if
multi's are safer than monos because they won't sink, where is the crew
of the lost cat?

It seems there was a shred of line tied to a sail drive. So someone,
presumably, survived the flip. But then what? Dead is dead.

Now, they might have been dead faster in a mono, I don't know.

Multi or mono either one is a risk, I guess the question is, which one
is the greater risk.

I went to the Annapolis boat show this fall and saw a bunch of big cats
with sliding glass doors across their cabins and no bridge deck. So, it
made me think, how hard is it for that massive expanse of glass to give
up the ghost. And there is nothing to stop downflooding into the cabin.
And they had these escape hatches in the hulls.

On the other had there are many pilot house monos with huge expanses of
glass. A friend of mine was on a boat lost in the Atlantic this fall.
They had a hull mounted port that punched out and were consequently
taking on water. Not sure if that was a fatal flaw.

I have seen Montisiers (sp?)"Joshua" described as more submarine than
sailboat, with a glass turret for inside sailing.

Maybe the comparison is not mono or multi but "sea hardened" (to coin a
phrase?) or not.

Just some thoughts.


Capt. JG wrote:
"Don W" wrote in message
.. .

Jonathan Ganz wrote:

Multihulls don't sink from a capsizing. On the other hand, monos will
sink if enough water gets below. It's disingenuous to claim that I
said monos always sink when they capsize. How many multis have you
heard than have sunk? Perhaps far fewer than monos. Either that or
you're not in touch with the real world.
Not taking sides in the multi vs mono debate although I do own two mono's
at the moment.

I did read a while back about a ~45' Cat that was abandoned due to
structural failure during a storm in the Gulf of Mexico. I'm thinking
that this type of structural failure is probably far more common than
outright sinking for multihulls, but I could be wrong about that.

A friend was one of three crew on a ~60' Cat on a passage from Belize to
Florida several years back. They hit a storm in the gulf and suffered
enough damage that the insurance company totaled it. They made it into
port, but the boat was toast. The skipper was a professional who had
sailed the same boat all over the world for more than ten years with many
Atlantic crossings etc. I had a hard time understanding what kind of
damage you could suffer that would cause an insurance company to total a
$1.5 million boat. He said that among other things, the mast was punched
through the top of the salon, and the "structure" of the boat was damaged
beyond economical repair.

It doesn't do much good to have two hulls which float if they are no
longer attached to each other

Don W.



Well, I guess they made it into port, so it must not have sunk... I
currently own a mono... Sabre 30, and the only multi I've owned was a
Windrider 16. I used to occasionally take it off Crissy Field (San
Francisco) and would regularly get it complete filled with water. Rode low,
but wouldn't sink. I'm pretty sure that if I filled my Sabre with water, it
would sink.

Cat capsize off oregon coast
 

Howard wrote:
I too would not like to take sides on this debate

Agreed. it reminds me of an argument that I had with two friends years
ago. The debate: which would kill you faster a .44 or .357 or .45. We
were 16- or 17 at the time.

Maybe the comparison is not mono or multi but "sea hardened" (to coin a
phrase?) or not.

Sea hardened... sea capable....? I to have seen thoes sliding glass
doors. I wonder how many kids runn into them. Maybe the owners could
put black outlines of waves on the glasss so the waves dont get
confused and slam into the glass. Seem to work using falcons to scare
off song birds.

When is was 13 I put a message in a bottle and threw it over the side 5
miles off Oregon coast. Two years later I got a reply from a woman in
the Philipines. IN the 1980s I threw another bottle over the side about
20 miles off Oregon coast. It only took one year for it to reach
hawaii. Conclusion: If a glass bottle can float across the Pacific so
can I.

however, the boat I chose was a 39', double ended, cut away, full keel,
26,000 lbs slug with 1 1/2" glass at the water line and have upgraded
to mil spec on the refit. If Im going to sink I want to be comfortable
on the way down. There are many ways to get the same place.
However I will take one thought to the grave. Dont let charter
operators, marketing departments, and boat brokers tell you why their
boats are safe. Again I I feel compelled to post a quote from a person
who was sent to save the hapless soles caught in the Fastnet disaster
of 1979:

__________________________________________________ ____________________
Interview with Bill Burrows, Chief Engineer Royal Navy Lifeboat
Institution. Retrieved three disabled sailboats in a 21 hour rescue
during the fatal 1979 Fastnet Storm.

"... Look, you get 300 Yachats in poor weather and you're going to
have some trouble, almost certainly. But the majority of the trouble
was hysteria created by the situation and by inexperienced crews. And
that it was. They were blaming rudders and such, but none of those
rudders would have snapped if they had put drogues out and storm jibs
and run before the weather. They were under bare poles, most of them,
and they were getting up on the seas. And the seas were about 45 feet.
Not what we around here call big.

They got up on these seas and they were running. When the boats were
starting to broach, what the helmsmen were doing was hauling on the
rudders to stop them from broaching. They were putting too much bloody
strain on the rudders, and they had to go.

Yes, I know they were racing sailors, not cruising men, but that's no
excuse. We went out that night and we passed a little old hooker sort
of thing with a family of kids aboard and they were going away to
Ireland with no trouble at all...."
(The Yacht, April 1987)
__________________________________________________ ______________________

BOb

Just some thoughts.

Cat capsize off oregon coast
 

"Howard" wrote in message
rvers.com...
I too would not like to take sides on this debate but I wonder, if multi's
are safer than monos because they won't sink, where is the crew of the lost
cat?

It seems there was a shred of line tied to a sail drive. So someone,
presumably, survived the flip. But then what? Dead is dead.

Now, they might have been dead faster in a mono, I don't know.

Multi or mono either one is a risk, I guess the question is, which one is
the greater risk.

I went to the Annapolis boat show this fall and saw a bunch of big cats
with sliding glass doors across their cabins and no bridge deck. So, it
made me think, how hard is it for that massive expanse of glass to give up
the ghost. And there is nothing to stop downflooding into the cabin. And
they had these escape hatches in the hulls.

On the other had there are many pilot house monos with huge expanses of
glass. A friend of mine was on a boat lost in the Atlantic this fall.
They had a hull mounted port that punched out and were consequently taking
on water. Not sure if that was a fatal flaw.

I have seen Montisiers (sp?)"Joshua" described as more submarine than
sailboat, with a glass turret for inside sailing.

Maybe the comparison is not mono or multi but "sea hardened" (to coin a
phrase?) or not.

Just some thoughts.


It's always possible to find an inappropriate boat crewed by inappropriate
people and put it in an untenable situation.

They clearly had a stable platform to survive after the flip, and it's at
best speculative to wonder why someone died afterward. It's also easy to
say, "If I had been there, I would have done X."

BTW, even with the expansive glass sliders, modern cats won't sink just
because the glass gives way. It would just be more of a dangerous mess. The
cat in question clearly didn't sink.


--
"j" ganz @@
www.sailnow.com