Absolutely right, and fact is I had not practiced that technique at the time. However, it is an essential skill.
And it is an essential skill that should be practiced on your OWN BOAT, before trying it when you really need it. Not all boats heave-to the same way and the amount of sail or combination of sails needed to do this varies widely. You would also be best to practice this in 25-30+ for the full effect. Doing it in 10-15 will not give you the most realistic sense of how your boat will react in 30+.... Also how do you plan to hold your wheel or tiller hard over? Lots of stuff that should be considered before the snot flies...
The last bad micro-burst we experienced put all but two boats in the anchorage on the solid granite shore. We spent the afternoon and evening pulling badly damaged boats off rocks.
You may also want to think about the lackadaisical "lunch-hook" approach to anchoring. I know Scott B. has also experienced a similar event but was well prepared with ground tackle that could handle it. When ever we drop the hook it is with 70+ knots in mind. There are no
half measures no matter how calm it may be when we anchor...
This event is very tragic, sad and frustrating all at the same time and yet sadly another
black eye on the sailing community in general.
My hip shoot on this is that a lot of the mayhem likely could have been minimized if more boaters monitored VHF 16 and had a VHF radio that does NOAA emergency weather alerts. Our VHF does this and there is NO IGNORING IT. The NOAA alerts for weather like this are not ignorable and are very, very loud.
Perhaps if we could get rid of the ignoramuses who insist on illegally radio checking on VHF 16, and the useless "Facebook" level of chatter on 16, that drives people to not monitor it, more would monitor the VHF and we would all be safer and better prepared for weather events like this.
In one video, shot during the storm by the Catalina 36, I noted zero VHF chatter and I played it very loudly specifically listening for it.. I find it a little hard to believe that in a 17 minute video, of a storm this intense, there would be NADA, ZILCH & NOTHING going on with VHF 16, you know, the
hailing and distress channel.....?
We are required by law to be monitoring VHF 16, if equipped. Is it possible a C-36 does not have even one VHF on board? Would the race even allow participation without a VHF? Monitoring VHF 16 means being able to hear it and no matter how loud I played that video I heard no VHF chatter.........:cussing: Christ we can't go 30 seconds on VHF 16 without some dolt asking for at least a radio check......
IF that boat was not monitoring VHF 16 what could they have possibly missed that they may have been able to help with, even something as simple as throwing a life jacket or ring buoy to a person in the water..? Perhaps the other boat they saw was trying to hail them? I don't know? What I do know is that we are required by law to monitor VHF 16, I could absolutely not hear it in that video. Maybe it is there and someone can correct me but from what I heard it was apparently not on or not on loud enough to qualify for "monitoring"....
There really is no excuse today for not having a VHF that can perform the simple functions below. Course you need to have the damn thing ON, as you are REQUIRED to, in order for these weather alerts to actually alert you.....
"NOAA Weather channels and Weather Alert10 NOAA and Canadian Weather channels are pre-programmed and easily selectable using the dedicated WX key. In addition, the MATRIX AIS+ can be set to monitor WX channels and provide an audible alert to inform of pending storm advisories."
