Have you ever capsized your C22, or do you know of someone who has? We recently bought a 1977 C22 swing keel,and we heeled it over pretty far!!
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M
Mark
Here is a story of a Cat22 Sinking
Here is a story in the local paper earlier this year about a Catalina 22 that sank during a spinnaker jibe on Lake Travis. These guys didn't have their companionway hatch in place and this contributed (in a large way) to the sinking of the boat. Part of Steve Starr's heart is at the bottom of Lake Travis, but some undersea adventurers are going to help him get it back. Starr's beloved sailboat, a Catalina 22 dubbed IIObscure , sank Jan. 30 during an Austin Yacht Club race. Almost a month later, it remains lost in cold, murky waters as deep as 170 feet. ``I think about it quite a bit,'' said Starr, a 46-year-old manufacturing engineer. ``I've grown attached to it after putting hundreds of hours of work into it." Now, Wayne Gronquist, an Austin lawyer who is president of the National Underwater Marine Agency, a nonprofit historical preservation group founded by adventure novelist Clive Cussler, has offered to help for free. Gronquist doesn't know Starr, but he thinks the hunt, even for a boat worth only about $6,500, will be good training for his volunteer group, which has found dozens of sunken historical ships in the past 20 years. ``It's fun, it's Lake Travis and we want the practice,'' Gronquist explained. ``We think it'll be a snap." Few boats sink in the combination flood-control reservoir and recreational lake, and losing one is unusual, said Sgt. Danny Hinkle , supervisor of the Travis County sheriff's lake patrol. The lake, formed in 1941 by damming the Colorado River in its course through canyons west of Austin, is cloudy with silt, and parts are too deep for most sport divers. This time of year, the surface temperature is about 58 degrees, and the water grows colder with increasing depth. Moreover, parts of the deep main basin, where IIObscure went down near the entrance to Cypress Creek Arm, cover a large grove of old pecan trees. Although they have been under water for almost 60 years, some of the trees are still standing, waiting to conceal a boat sinking through their branches. Nonetheless, Gronquist thinks the search will go quickly. His group has sophisticated sonar and other sensors to penetrate the dark water and commercial divers used to deep and dangerous work. Meanwhile, IIObscure has become the talk of sailors from Boston to San Diego on an Internet newsgroup in which Starr participates that is devoted to Catalina 22s. Most newsgroup members use their sailboats for sedate family cruising on lakes and coastal waterways. When Starr posted news of IIObscure' s sinking, they wanted to know how to keep it from happening to them. ``Sinking with a full racing crew in warm Texas waters surrounded with other competent sailors for a rescue is one thing; sinking with kids in a cold mountain lake while out all alone is quite another, '' newsgroup member Marvin Paule of Fort Collins, Colo., said in an e-mail. Starr assured the newsgroup that IIObscure sank during a wild ride in a race with winds gusting to 25 mph, conditions few family sailors would venture into with a 22-foot boat. A turn and a tip IIObscure sank during a routine turning maneuver in the Austin Yacht Club's annual Frostbite racing series on a sunny, 70-degree day. The boat was heading downwind, powered by a large, parachute-like sail called a spinnaker hoisted off its bow, in addition to a smaller triangle sail rigged on its mast. Everything seemed to be under control, Starr said, as IIObscure neared a race buoy marker where he and his crew of two friends would have to turn the boat by turning the sails. But during the turn, a gust of wind pushed Starr's almost-new, red spinnaker too far down, causing it to scoop up water. The combined weight of the water and the wind in the spinnaker made the boat roll so far over that its mast hit the water. Most sailboats will recover from such a mishap, called a knockdown, when the weight of the heavy keels on their bottoms counterbalances the wind. But things happened so quickly that Starr forgot to release the lines holding the spinnaker, and the water-filled sail held the boat on its side. Within a few seconds, IIObscure had rolled upside down. Starr immediately looked for his crew. They were OK, but the water was too cold for swimming, so he urged them to climb onto the bottom of the boat. ``The closest boat (mine) was still a hundred yards or so away,'' George Robison, of the Lake Travis community of Hudson Bend, said in an e-mail. ``IIObscure was clearly sinking." Starr and his crew tried to turn the 2,000-pound boat over, which proved surprisingly easy. ``However, once upright, she was full of water, was quickly down by the stern and sank almost upright,'' Robison said. Two sport divers later tried to find IIObscure, descending 97 feet in the vicinity of the sinking, but they had to quit because visibility was about 6 inches. Starr organized several attempts to find the boat by dragging grappling hooks along the lake bottom, using a winch on a barge to raise what was found. He succeeded only in finding part of the old pecan grove. ``We pulled up a good-sized tree,'' Starr said. A high-tech try Gronquist said the problem nevertheless looks easier than conditions on the Texas coast, where his undersea group is waiting until spring to resume a search for a French explorer's vessel that sank more than 300 years ago. ``We're used to working in the Gulf of Mexico with its currents, surges, very low visibility and generally high seas,'' Gronquist said. ``So coming to Lake Travis will be a pleasure." He plans to start March 6, hoping to wrap it up in a day or two, towing a metal detector and a side-scan sonar, a radar-like device developed for the Navy, behind a motor boat. Underwater objects identified by the devices will be photographed with an infrared camera lowered from the boat to try to distinguish an old farm tractor, or an engine block, from a sailboat. If a sailboat is found, commercial divers will attach inflatable bags it to the surface. Starr will go along, keeping his fingers crossed. ``But I still feel optimistic,'' he said, ``especially with (Gronquist) involved.'' Recovering a sailboat Wayne Gronquist, president of the National Underwater Marine Agency, is leadinf the eddort to retrieve Steve Starr's 22-foot Catalina sailboat named "IIObscure." Gronquist is using many of the same high- tech methods to recover Starr's $6,500 sailboat as he and his partner, Clive Cussier, used to find the French ship La Belle. The recovery team sees this as a training opportunity while acknowledging that is can be dangerous. Area where boat sank On Satruday, Jan 30, during a boat race, Steve Starr's boat is blown over and it sinks. Recovery methods Metal detector and side-scan sonar Boat will sweep area in a parallel fashion. Global positioning satelities used to set the search parameters. Infrared camera and buoy Infrared -- After locating possible sites, an infrared camera will be used to verify the boat is there. Buoy -- After verifying site, a buoy will mark area for divers. Divers and the lift bag Divers will first identify the boat, then a team of two divers will attach a one-ton lift bag to the boat and raise it. If necessary, divers may try to move boat to shallower water before attempting to raise it to the surface.
Here is a story in the local paper earlier this year about a Catalina 22 that sank during a spinnaker jibe on Lake Travis. These guys didn't have their companionway hatch in place and this contributed (in a large way) to the sinking of the boat. Part of Steve Starr's heart is at the bottom of Lake Travis, but some undersea adventurers are going to help him get it back. Starr's beloved sailboat, a Catalina 22 dubbed IIObscure , sank Jan. 30 during an Austin Yacht Club race. Almost a month later, it remains lost in cold, murky waters as deep as 170 feet. ``I think about it quite a bit,'' said Starr, a 46-year-old manufacturing engineer. ``I've grown attached to it after putting hundreds of hours of work into it." Now, Wayne Gronquist, an Austin lawyer who is president of the National Underwater Marine Agency, a nonprofit historical preservation group founded by adventure novelist Clive Cussler, has offered to help for free. Gronquist doesn't know Starr, but he thinks the hunt, even for a boat worth only about $6,500, will be good training for his volunteer group, which has found dozens of sunken historical ships in the past 20 years. ``It's fun, it's Lake Travis and we want the practice,'' Gronquist explained. ``We think it'll be a snap." Few boats sink in the combination flood-control reservoir and recreational lake, and losing one is unusual, said Sgt. Danny Hinkle , supervisor of the Travis County sheriff's lake patrol. The lake, formed in 1941 by damming the Colorado River in its course through canyons west of Austin, is cloudy with silt, and parts are too deep for most sport divers. This time of year, the surface temperature is about 58 degrees, and the water grows colder with increasing depth. Moreover, parts of the deep main basin, where IIObscure went down near the entrance to Cypress Creek Arm, cover a large grove of old pecan trees. Although they have been under water for almost 60 years, some of the trees are still standing, waiting to conceal a boat sinking through their branches. Nonetheless, Gronquist thinks the search will go quickly. His group has sophisticated sonar and other sensors to penetrate the dark water and commercial divers used to deep and dangerous work. Meanwhile, IIObscure has become the talk of sailors from Boston to San Diego on an Internet newsgroup in which Starr participates that is devoted to Catalina 22s. Most newsgroup members use their sailboats for sedate family cruising on lakes and coastal waterways. When Starr posted news of IIObscure' s sinking, they wanted to know how to keep it from happening to them. ``Sinking with a full racing crew in warm Texas waters surrounded with other competent sailors for a rescue is one thing; sinking with kids in a cold mountain lake while out all alone is quite another, '' newsgroup member Marvin Paule of Fort Collins, Colo., said in an e-mail. Starr assured the newsgroup that IIObscure sank during a wild ride in a race with winds gusting to 25 mph, conditions few family sailors would venture into with a 22-foot boat. A turn and a tip IIObscure sank during a routine turning maneuver in the Austin Yacht Club's annual Frostbite racing series on a sunny, 70-degree day. The boat was heading downwind, powered by a large, parachute-like sail called a spinnaker hoisted off its bow, in addition to a smaller triangle sail rigged on its mast. Everything seemed to be under control, Starr said, as IIObscure neared a race buoy marker where he and his crew of two friends would have to turn the boat by turning the sails. But during the turn, a gust of wind pushed Starr's almost-new, red spinnaker too far down, causing it to scoop up water. The combined weight of the water and the wind in the spinnaker made the boat roll so far over that its mast hit the water. Most sailboats will recover from such a mishap, called a knockdown, when the weight of the heavy keels on their bottoms counterbalances the wind. But things happened so quickly that Starr forgot to release the lines holding the spinnaker, and the water-filled sail held the boat on its side. Within a few seconds, IIObscure had rolled upside down. Starr immediately looked for his crew. They were OK, but the water was too cold for swimming, so he urged them to climb onto the bottom of the boat. ``The closest boat (mine) was still a hundred yards or so away,'' George Robison, of the Lake Travis community of Hudson Bend, said in an e-mail. ``IIObscure was clearly sinking." Starr and his crew tried to turn the 2,000-pound boat over, which proved surprisingly easy. ``However, once upright, she was full of water, was quickly down by the stern and sank almost upright,'' Robison said. Two sport divers later tried to find IIObscure, descending 97 feet in the vicinity of the sinking, but they had to quit because visibility was about 6 inches. Starr organized several attempts to find the boat by dragging grappling hooks along the lake bottom, using a winch on a barge to raise what was found. He succeeded only in finding part of the old pecan grove. ``We pulled up a good-sized tree,'' Starr said. A high-tech try Gronquist said the problem nevertheless looks easier than conditions on the Texas coast, where his undersea group is waiting until spring to resume a search for a French explorer's vessel that sank more than 300 years ago. ``We're used to working in the Gulf of Mexico with its currents, surges, very low visibility and generally high seas,'' Gronquist said. ``So coming to Lake Travis will be a pleasure." He plans to start March 6, hoping to wrap it up in a day or two, towing a metal detector and a side-scan sonar, a radar-like device developed for the Navy, behind a motor boat. Underwater objects identified by the devices will be photographed with an infrared camera lowered from the boat to try to distinguish an old farm tractor, or an engine block, from a sailboat. If a sailboat is found, commercial divers will attach inflatable bags it to the surface. Starr will go along, keeping his fingers crossed. ``But I still feel optimistic,'' he said, ``especially with (Gronquist) involved.'' Recovering a sailboat Wayne Gronquist, president of the National Underwater Marine Agency, is leadinf the eddort to retrieve Steve Starr's 22-foot Catalina sailboat named "IIObscure." Gronquist is using many of the same high- tech methods to recover Starr's $6,500 sailboat as he and his partner, Clive Cussier, used to find the French ship La Belle. The recovery team sees this as a training opportunity while acknowledging that is can be dangerous. Area where boat sank On Satruday, Jan 30, during a boat race, Steve Starr's boat is blown over and it sinks. Recovery methods Metal detector and side-scan sonar Boat will sweep area in a parallel fashion. Global positioning satelities used to set the search parameters. Infrared camera and buoy Infrared -- After locating possible sites, an infrared camera will be used to verify the boat is there. Buoy -- After verifying site, a buoy will mark area for divers. Divers and the lift bag Divers will first identify the boat, then a team of two divers will attach a one-ton lift bag to the boat and raise it. If necessary, divers may try to move boat to shallower water before attempting to raise it to the surface.
J
J. brandt
capsizing a c22
it is not unusual when racing a 22 for the winch to be in the water on the upwind leg. I don't recommend it but the boat can handle that degree of heel. I once caught a strong puff and was knocked over to the point where the spreader was in the water, but the boat came back up, although slower than I would have preferred under the circumstances. If the wind is over 12 knots sailing the 22 with any foresail larger than a 110 becomes somewhat thrilling for an inexperienced sailor.
it is not unusual when racing a 22 for the winch to be in the water on the upwind leg. I don't recommend it but the boat can handle that degree of heel. I once caught a strong puff and was knocked over to the point where the spreader was in the water, but the boat came back up, although slower than I would have preferred under the circumstances. If the wind is over 12 knots sailing the 22 with any foresail larger than a 110 becomes somewhat thrilling for an inexperienced sailor.
L
LaDonna Bubak - Planet Catalina
Thanks for the article Mark
Very sobering but uplifting to know that people are still willing to help out others for free. I think the important factor in that story is that they were using a spinnaker. This can happen on any size boat (whether it would sink or not is another matter) and care should be taken when flying a spinny. But it sounds like Lorie's question was about at what degree of heel a C22 could capsize. I think J. Brandt's response was more typical. You may heel over REALLY far but it's doubtful you could actually capsize due to the "heavy keel attached to the bottom of the boat" (as the article said). There are obviously weird circumstances where anything could happen but it would be extremely unlikely. In the meantime, know that the farther over you heel, the slower you go. It may seem like you're going faster but you'd actually maintain a better speed if you adjusted your sails so that you stayed on your bottom a little more. "When in doubt, let it out" (re: the main) is a good thing to remember. LaDonna
Very sobering but uplifting to know that people are still willing to help out others for free. I think the important factor in that story is that they were using a spinnaker. This can happen on any size boat (whether it would sink or not is another matter) and care should be taken when flying a spinny. But it sounds like Lorie's question was about at what degree of heel a C22 could capsize. I think J. Brandt's response was more typical. You may heel over REALLY far but it's doubtful you could actually capsize due to the "heavy keel attached to the bottom of the boat" (as the article said). There are obviously weird circumstances where anything could happen but it would be extremely unlikely. In the meantime, know that the farther over you heel, the slower you go. It may seem like you're going faster but you'd actually maintain a better speed if you adjusted your sails so that you stayed on your bottom a little more. "When in doubt, let it out" (re: the main) is a good thing to remember. LaDonna
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Ted
It's not the capsizing. . .
that you need to worry about. It's the sinking. As stated in the IIObscure article (I wonder if they actually found that boat), the boat filled with water and went down (after turning turtle). The thing about the C22 (and similar boats) is that the keel is only about 25% of the overall weight of the boat. Fixed Keel boats usually have about 35-40% of their weight in the keel, giving them more righting moment. When I got my C22 (used 1982 model) I was somewhat surprised to find out that there was no built-in flotation. Understanding the potential danger of a family out sailing and going over (or even just taking on water), I added flotation to my Catalina. I would recommend doing the same to anyone who is concerned about going over. The boats ability to stay afloat after a know down (capsizing)(without flotation) is based on it righting itself fairly quickly. That may not always be the case, and was the situation with IIObscure. Also, wear PFD's too. Regards, Ted
that you need to worry about. It's the sinking. As stated in the IIObscure article (I wonder if they actually found that boat), the boat filled with water and went down (after turning turtle). The thing about the C22 (and similar boats) is that the keel is only about 25% of the overall weight of the boat. Fixed Keel boats usually have about 35-40% of their weight in the keel, giving them more righting moment. When I got my C22 (used 1982 model) I was somewhat surprised to find out that there was no built-in flotation. Understanding the potential danger of a family out sailing and going over (or even just taking on water), I added flotation to my Catalina. I would recommend doing the same to anyone who is concerned about going over. The boats ability to stay afloat after a know down (capsizing)(without flotation) is based on it righting itself fairly quickly. That may not always be the case, and was the situation with IIObscure. Also, wear PFD's too. Regards, Ted
L
Lorie
Thank you from Lorie
Thank you all very much for your help in answering my question about capsizing a C22. I feel much better informed now......Thanks a million! --Lorie
Thank you all very much for your help in answering my question about capsizing a C22. I feel much better informed now......Thanks a million! --Lorie
H
Hayden Watson
open hatches
The one thing in this article that averyone seams to have missed is that the HATCHES WERE WIDE OPEN!! If you are in bad conditions the hatch boards should be in and the hatches latched. Not doing this is what caused the boat to sink. If you have a air filled glass under water and turn it over it fills instantly, right? If you put your hand over the top no water gets in. On my boat when the wind gets over 25 kts. or 15 w/ spinnacker I shut the hatches. Hayden Watson S/V Papillon C30 Spokane, WA
The one thing in this article that averyone seams to have missed is that the HATCHES WERE WIDE OPEN!! If you are in bad conditions the hatch boards should be in and the hatches latched. Not doing this is what caused the boat to sink. If you have a air filled glass under water and turn it over it fills instantly, right? If you put your hand over the top no water gets in. On my boat when the wind gets over 25 kts. or 15 w/ spinnacker I shut the hatches. Hayden Watson S/V Papillon C30 Spokane, WA
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BJ
The Lost is Found?
Check out Catalina Fleet 69's web page at: http://www.main.org/catalina22/recovery.htm.
Check out Catalina Fleet 69's web page at: http://www.main.org/catalina22/recovery.htm.
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Ted
Was it ever found ???
I checked several updates in the local online newspaper (Austin Tx) and as of June (5+ months after sinking) the boat had not been found after four attempts. They were going to do a fifth attempt in Mid-June. The lack of updates would indicate that they did not find it. Probably gone forever. Regards, Ted
I checked several updates in the local online newspaper (Austin Tx) and as of June (5+ months after sinking) the boat had not been found after four attempts. They were going to do a fifth attempt in Mid-June. The lack of updates would indicate that they did not find it. Probably gone forever. Regards, Ted
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Jim Johnstone
II obscure not found
Unfortunately, Steve's C22, II Obscure was not found. (It really was too obscure) Steve can be seen sailing on Lake Travis in an S2.
Unfortunately, Steve's C22, II Obscure was not found. (It really was too obscure) Steve can be seen sailing on Lake Travis in an S2.
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