Stowable Anchor is Good Insurance
Between here (Puget Sound) and Alaska the weather reporting is not very good for a number of reasons and it is good insurance to carry a storm anchor.
Because there is no land for many miles westward of Washington, Alaska, and B.C., there is limited weather information available for weather forcasting purposes. Just a few offshore weather buoys. By the time the limited weather data starts to be input into the computers it's almost too late so one has to be prepared. The rest of the country, on the other hand, has the benefit of a masive amount of weather information as systems move eastward.
Adding insult to injury, Congress has never funded weather radar that can see past the Olympic Mountains. The Olympics block the view of Sea-Tac's radar so we get very little warning.
Between here and Alaska safe harbors are often few and far between. What one needs, ideally, when a major system passes is a harbor which is protected from all winds, i.e., 360 degrees. On the coast, for example, the winds will be from the northwest. As the front approaches and passes the winds will increase and then clock around to the southeast and then east. Depending on the mountains and the wind funneling up and down the channels, the winds will be different. Bottom line, one needs a really good storm anchor setup.
We carry a storm anchor with 45-ft of 5/16-inch High Test chain and 425-ft 5/8 braided-line rode for our 35-footer. This complements our standard 35# anchor with the same chain and rode.
Do you need all this stuff? Well, we rode out a 103+ (weather station was blown away at this speed) knot storm in August (oh yea, and this is the "safe" month!) so now we go really prepared.
Good storm groundtackle is good insurance.
