This is a very educational thread!
I had a scary - actually, more mortifying than scary - marina experience last week. I was coming in running dead slow, so slow that I barely had steerage way. The channel is only 100' wide, with the docks to stbd and shallow water, marked with a line of buoys, to port. I am still getting used to handling my new-to-me Pearson 26 which is a very heavy boat compared to my little centerboarder. The wind outside was blowing about 15-20 kn but it was fairly still in the cove which is pretty well sheltered. I was a little ways to port of the centerline of the channel, preparing to swing 90 degrees to stbd to go down to my slip, when the breeze picked up on the stbd bow - between windage and lack of sufficient speed the wind was pushing me over further to the port side of the channel - I had the tiller down to port trying to round up into the wind (much like being stuck in irons) but she just wouldn't turn and I kept sliding over towards the buoys. I didn't feel like I had time or room to jump back and throttle up the outboard. So I thought, maybe with the wind already pushing, I could reverse the helm and make a 270 to port, so i put the tiller over to stbd. I almost made it, another 10 feet of searoom and I would've been home free, but no - I'm coming around, hoping and praying - made it 180 degrees and I have a marker buoy on my port bow - crunch! not only aground but wiith the buoy's mooring chain wrapped around the keel.
This was Labor Day weekend and everybody and their dog was down at the lake, so I had a good crowd on shore and a veritable parade of passing pontoon boats and jet skis to witness the guy in the sailboat turning the wrong way and grounding his boat. There may even be a You Tube or two documenting the whole inglorious episode.
The marina sent out a work boat which towed me back off stern first. The grounding occurred in slow motion so I don't think it did any damage, but the buoy's mooring chain could have damaged the knot meter impeller.