Blow Out Tide

RAD · Feb 26, 2012

Had the same affect in Bay Shore, NY

Cool Beans · Feb 26, 2012

hehe, enjoyed the same thing today while I was out at the boat. I Showed up as the tide was going out, spent 4-5 hours working inside and in the lazzerate. . .really didn't notice how low the tide was until the wave motion changed. . .when a boat would pass, usually the boat rocks. But when it is hanging from the dock lines it is more of a pendulum motion

I had to cut a spring line to take some tension off the stern lines. I had to remove one stern and loosen the other. . .and the tide was still going out!!! When I left the finger pier was at eye level. I had to climb on the stern pulpit to get high enough to climb out

I should have taken pictures. . .there was like 10 sail boats stuck in the mud. One was so high and dry you could see the entire prop sticking out of the water.

What sucks now is the lines are so loose that at high tide the boat is more or less going to be bouncing around on the pilings

Little Creek, Norfolk BTW. . .

Manny · Feb 26, 2012

Same in Middle River

Wind blew the water right out, I'm lucky to be towards the end of the dock where there's plenty of water. It was a bit of a stretch climbing up to the finger pier from the cockpit. Most if not all of the "landward" sailboats where touching bottom (except for the one powerboat

)...
Oh yeah, there's a Westerly at our marina, looked right at home sitting in the mud

The pictures where from the next dock over, that mud is normally covered by a few feet of water.

M

Kermit · Feb 27, 2012

BillyK said:
I've never seen the river here in Mays Landing NJ this low.. 45mph winds blowing out with a peak tide at the same time... looks like the tide may be -4 feet for the area.. 8 feet below high.. normally we have at most a 4 foot swing here.. the real kick is that this is an hour before low... so it will drop another foot or so.

Its a siding off the Great Egg Harbor River.

Looks like it took all the boats with it!

WayneH · Feb 27, 2012

Incredible!!! I've seen the water blown out of Galveston Bay before but never to that extent. Good luck up there, guys. Keep watching your boats. If the water is that low, you may get caught under the pier on the rise and THAT can get ugly.

JVB · Feb 27, 2012

Once upon a time I lived on a Galveston Bay bayou called Clear Lake. With a strong South wind for several days water would build up in Galveston Bay. Tidal change at my location was normally just inches. My apartment was on land created by dredging channels and filling in between the channels, so the land was only a foot or so above bay level.

One windy night at 1 AM a neighbor knocked on my door and advised me to move my car to higher ground, which I did. The next morning I looked out the window and saw a canoe passing in knee deep water where my car had been parked. The wind combined with a high tide brought the water level up 2 to 3 feet above normal.

Jackdaw · Feb 27, 2012

Amazing pix guys. It's wild the effect wind can have on water levels. This happens on the Great Lakes as well, with shallow Lake Erie suffering the most. It not uncommon for 500 foot lake freighters to wait for a strong westerly to pass so they get to Detroit and beyond.

Something to the effect here:

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/news/125429954522780.xml&coll=2

Nodak7 · Feb 27, 2012

BillyK said:
"some of the boats stayed suctioned to the bottom"

that's not good... i have a wing keel... which looks like a nice large anchor to me now if she sank in the mud.. crazy.

Billy that is exactly the part that impressed me!

Has anyone ever heard of this happening? Can it be possible for the mud to "hold" the boat down until if fills with water?

wgkenney · Feb 27, 2012

We had the same in the Chesapeake Bay. Photo attached from Haven Harbour in Swan Creek near Rock Hall, MD

TedGrant · Feb 27, 2012

Billy, you might find the following link useful:
http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv?01410510

It's a real-time water gage of Absecon Creek at the White Horse Pike / Shore Road intersection. So unlike tide prediction charts, it shows you what's really going on including blow-in and blow-out tides. I set up my smartphone to view it while I'm on the water.

Unfortunately there's no station on the Great Egg, however Absecon Creek tracks really close.

I was sailing on the Potomac yesterday in Washington DC, lowest tide I've ever seen there, too!

Also attached today's chart, you can sure see the blow-out effect.

For the rest of you, there are many stations around the country, just peruse the USGS (not NOAA!) website.

Cheers,
Ted

Bill Roosa · Feb 27, 2012

I suspect that there is NO chance of a boat getting stuck in the mud in that fashion to the point that she filled with water. The amound of boyancy even a smalish boat will provide is staggering. if it was 20' long and 8' wide and had a 2' freeboard and assuming a "sailboat shape" that would give you almost 10,000 lb of uplift. 5 tons!!! If the keel is is 3' long at the bottom and has some modist fins of 1' on each side of trianglar shape that would be 3 sq ft or 432 sq inches. doing the math 10,000/432=23 PSI 14.7 psi is enough to crush a 55 gal barrel flat. It would have to be some pretty "sticky when wet" mud IMHO. Even modest rocking is going to break the suction in all cases.

Nodak7 · Feb 27, 2012

Bill Roosa said:
I suspect that there is NO chance of a boat getting stuck in the mud in that fashion to the point that she filled with water. The amound of boyancy even a smalish boat will provide is staggering. if it was 20' long and 8' wide and had a 2' freeboard and assuming a "sailboat shape" that would give you almost 10,000 lb of uplift. 5 tons!!! If the keel is is 3' long at the bottom and has some modist fins of 1' on each side of trianglar shape that would be 3 sq ft or 432 sq inches. doing the math 10,000/432=23 PSI 14.7 psi is enough to crush a 55 gal barrel flat. It would have to be some pretty "sticky when wet" mud IMHO. Even modest rocking is going to break the suction in all cases.

My thoughts as well Bill (albeit not as technical) but I have been proven wrong a number of times in this forum already! I figured someone would come up with a picture or personal story regarding how it happened to them (or a friend).

Thanks

MrBill_FLL · Feb 27, 2012

a well tied boat won't have a problem. but tied to tight on one side...

this is pretty common when a hurricane comes ashore, but 50 miles away... all that storm surge water had to come from somewhere.

rpwillia · Feb 27, 2012

All Math Aside

Bill Roosa said:
... would give you almost 10,000 lb of uplift. 5 tons!!! ... It would have to be some pretty "sticky when wet" mud IMHO. Even modest rocking is going to break the suction in all cases.

Bill your boat appeared to be floating at the extreme low tide so you are good. Judy on the other side of the marina must have been planning on careening her boat and forgot the time she was going to do her bottom.

Jumpstart · Feb 29, 2012

Hey Bill you might want to reconsider your statement. We get this condition which is called a "seiche" on Lake Erie in the fall sometimes. A couple of years ago a guy in Grosse Ille Michigan had just launched his new Flying Tiger 10 in October. The water blew out and the keel was deep in the mud.. The suction was so great that when they tied to lift the boat out of the mud it collapsed the cabin top and did other damage. Repairs were extensive on a 2 week old boat.

Bill Roosa · Feb 29, 2012

I'd think that using a crain to pull something out is much harder on the hull than using water to lift it. Also, the water tends to soften the mud and make it easier to lift out while it also allows you to rock the boat to break the suction. Normal wave action would do that too.

Blow Out Tide

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