Sailboat Capsizes In San Diego

[MSN-Travelers]

Eye witness report has the boat with genoa up and at least one adult on the foredeck immediatley before the incident. Center of effort forward, adult weight forward, no ballast and the bow will plow under.

This is a link to slideshow - http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/Overturned-Sailboat-Kills-2-118786924.html

Note the cockpit packed with passengers in the first photo. Just one with a PFD and sitting on the leeward rail. Bow is riding very high. This is a picture of an accident waiting to happen and the wait time wasn't very long.

I'm sure that the investigation will show that the ballast tank was either empty or worse, partially empty. The ballast tank is flooded via a gate valve on the stern just below the waterline. If you forget to close the valve, the ballast tank will start to empty itself when the boat is under power. A partially filled ballast tank works against you by throwing what weight is available to one side in any kind of turn. If it is determined that the ballast tank was empty or the gate valve left open, then you will have the primary cause for the incident with overloading a major contributing factor.

It has been reported that the two fatalities "didn't know how to swim" and that leads me to believe that they didn't have PFD's on when they went into the water. The first picture doesn't have the majority of the passengers wearing one.

I had my Mac for 4 seasons, two of them while on Lake Michigan. The boat, when properly used, is virtually impossible to knock down. It tends to roundup almost immediately when overpowered. It's kinda tender, it doesn't point worth a damm but it's price point has brought many people into sailing, many of whom have moved on to traditional keel boats.

I don't think we can fault the boat for this incident. There were too many human errors involved and we still don't know the whole story yet.

 

[soling42]

Someone asked and this isn't a slam on Macs but Macgregor and Hunter are two very different WB boats. Our Hunter H260 carries roughly 2000lbs of ballast(nearly twice that of the Mac) which is loaded immediately after launch and the boat should not be moved until it is full. After the tank is completely full it is tightly capped, only then is the ballast totally secured creating a very firm ride. Our CB weighs about 100lbs and when down will add to the boats stability. The H260 is no hybrid power/sailboat, it's top speed is 6.2kts at best and it sails very well with abundant room topside and below.

The mac in the incident isn't the high powered Planning version but the picture in the slideshow is frightening knowing what transpired shortly afterward. No less scary than kids riding the bow of powerboats or a dozen jetskis running wide open in a crowed bay. As sailors we see a lot of crazy issues.

Many people have learned to sail on trailer boats but errors in judgement become magnified on a small, over crowded boat. I've reluctantly had as many as 8 adults/teens on board, but our 260 was perfectly stable in all respects. Far less ballast, more people, unfamiliar captain, too much sail, all/some certainly added up to a sad day.

Liability will surely bring the attys into this one.

 

[Indysailor]

It looks as if this was a trip with Heart of Sailing, which sponsors day sails for people with autism. There are several pictures of George Saidah in that slide show. He founded the group on my lake in Indiana and I know at least one person who has skippered for them. We looked into taking our son on a trip with them before we bought our own boat. What a tragedy.

Here is an article about this accident from the Washington Post.

 

[chp]

From the pics, looks like a mac 25. I believe they had a weighted keel and not water ballast.

 

[FourPoints]

This picture says it all. As far as I am concerned, Any skipper willing to leave the dock with a boat in this :cussing:condition is criminally negligent for everything that happens.

I can't believe the person who took this photo thought it was bad enough to take a picture, but didn't try to call the coast guard...

 

[Witzend]

Stupid is what Stupid does, and you're correct the captain should be held on manslaughter charges.

 

[alexco38]

Looks like Blue gunwale is a M25, which is steel swing keel. The outboard rudder also confirms the model. M26 has an inboard rudder stock. If the keel was not down, it may turn turtle.

I believe all M26S or D were made with black gunwale.

M26S doesn't have a gate valve on the stern as one post said. It has a flapper valve under the boat that screwed close. You can't let the ballast water out even under motor.

 

[MrUnix]

From the pics, looks like a mac 25. I believe they had a weighted keel and not water ballast.

Pretty sure it's a water ballasted 26D.. big difference between the 25 and 26D portlights. here is a picture from the brochure.

Cheers,
Brad

 

[Bob McL]

If you look at the sides of the cockpit on the boat that capsized, you can see that they are higher and slope slightly to the rear as compared to my Mac/Venture 25 where the sides are flat and lower. My 25 had an iron keel and the 26 (either S or D model) is waterballasted.

 

[walt]

Its a water ballast Mac 26D.

On a water ballast boat, there is usually an access port at the top of the tank - used to vent the air when filling and there is also some sort of valve control. Under normal loads, this access port at the top of the tank is above water line – no problem. But if you load the boat very heavily, the access port can be below the water line. If it's sealed well, no problem. - but if the vent/access hole leaks or if the stopper happened to be completely removed or never installed after the tank filled, water comes into the boat. The vent hole is about 1 inch OD.. if no stopper at all and the load in the picture, you can imagine the water flow..

The picture of that boat looks like its maybe taken on a bunch of water inside the hull. Once you get a bunch of water in the hull, the ballast stops giving a righting moment because the buoyancy of the hull and ballast don’t work together, the ballast just rotates instead of being lifted.

The value and access of the ballast tank are in the rear - putting all that weight back there would accelerate things...

I think they may have been 1/2 swamped – this may not have been due to operating without ballast.

FYI, if this did have something to do with the accident; a simple dam around the vent would have only resulted in the dam getting filled with water – no problem as nothing leaks into the boat.

 

[Scott T-Bird]

I was kind of astonished by the purported statement by Roger Macgregor that the capacity of the 26 is only 6 and without water ballast, the capacity is just 4. It's a 26' boat with a cabin. Is it reasonable to expect people to know that the capacity is so little? Consider the rule of thumb that I provided which suggests that the capacity of a 26 foot boat should be much higher ... not any different than the way it was loaded.

How do you Macgregor owners reconcile this? I think it's kind of bizarre that the capacity is so low. How clearly is the capacity stated? I don't think a small placard really deserves to be relied upon by the manufacturer for indemnity. I have 2 boats that don't have any such placard.

 

[FourPoints]

How clearly is the capacity stated? I don't think a small placard really deserves to be relied upon by the manufacturer for indemnity. I have 2 boats that don't have any such placard.

There is no (federal or USCG) regulation that I am aware of requiring any capacity plate or manufacturers capacity assertion to be displayed anywhere on the boat for any mono-hull vessel over 20' in length. For any mono-hull under 20', it is federally required to be displayed and visible from the helm. However, there is no federal regulation stating you must comply with that. Some states do have regulations requiring compliance, but no federal regulations exist.

 

[mark_swart]

We as a group are spending a lot of time dissecting the water ballast and the swing keel, but honestly, I think the overweighting would give most production 25 foot sailboats some serious problems and quite possibly do the same thing. My guess is even though the keel may have been deployed, once it got over to a point, gravity took over and pulled the keel back into its retracted position.
Trying to put 10 people on a very light 25 foot boat is inexcusable. I don't advocate manslaughter charges, but at the same time this skipper will have to live with the knowledge that he made a serious error in judgement.

 

[Scott T-Bird]

Mark, I think you miss the point. As FourPoints stated, there is no requirement for boats of this size to have a capacity placard. If you take a boating course, you will learn that a boat the size of a MacGregor 26 is supposed to be safe for about 12 people. I'm astonished that MacGregor says the capacity is as low as 4 depending upon whether or not the water ballast is deployed. It may be on a placard, but it may as well be in the (extremely) fine print. When the boat is sold, do you think the seller says "by the way, you can only carry 4 people on this boat unless you fill the water ballast, then you can have 6". I think not. Who would buy the boat knowing that you can easily fit enough friends on the boat to capsize it?

Mark, your boat, like mine, is not all that much different in size from the boat that capsized. I'd bet that you could easily put 10 or 12 people on your boat for a motor cruise around the harbor. I know it wouldn't be practical to have that many people on board for sailing but you could deploy the genny as well, I bet. Your ballast, like mine, probably weighs more than 10 people on board and capsizing wouldn't be an issue. I know that my 20' ski boat has no placard and that I could seat 8 people on it. It's been done numerous times, not for skiing, but maybe just for a ride around the lake. There is no danger of capsize because the inboard engine sits low and at the midpoint of the boat, but taking on a boarding wave in the bow is something I have to take precautions against in an instance like that.

My question is ... how responsible is it to design a boat with such severe capacity limitations? Isn't it unreasonable to expect that the restriction won't easily be abused by unknowing people? I don't think the standard capacity calculation has anything to do with the keel type or whether or not a swing keel is deployed. I know that without reading about these instances, I wouldn't give any thought to how many people could fit on the boat within reason, and reason would indicate that up to 12 would be alright.

The picture shows a ridiculously crowded cockpit and the boat is listing badly, but the situation might be a lot less visually silly looking if the people were distributed around the boat in a more rational way. If people were in the cabin and up by the bow, the boat may not appear to be overloaded, yet still be over-capacity and unsafe according to MacGregor. This is what does not make any sense to me. How do they justify having over-restrictive capacity limitations?

 

[MSN-Travelers]

Scott, your line of thinking is typical of an experienced sailor who has never set foot on a water ballasted MacGregor. My MacGregor came with a VERY LARGE warning label that listed the boat’s capacity, no small print. The label is prominently placed and can’t be missed.

Traditional nautical math formulas don’t always fit the Mac 26 series. The boat is a hybrid and fills a niche market. ANYBODY that has used one knows the boats limitations immediately. The boat’s skipper has been using this particular boat, for this particular purpose, for quite some time. The photo collection at his charity’s web site shows this wasn’t his first outing. It is impossible for him to not know that the boat was dangerously overloaded.

How can you possibly fault a boat’s manufacturer when an experienced skipper overloads a boat and the majority of the people aboard, including himself, don’t wear a PFD? Especially when the water temps are as low as they are at this time of year.

If we were to follow your line of thinking, then we would have to apply it to every product sold in the marketplace. Should we condemn every arms manufacturer for making a gun just because a five year old might pick it up and unknowingly shoot his playmate. No, we would go after the careless person that left the loaded gun where a child could get his hands on it.

Remember … boats don’t kill people, irresponsible boat owners kill people when they disregard basic safety rules.

 

[Scott T-Bird]

Well then, just for clarification, what specifically are the capacity limitations of a MacGreggor 26? That seems to be the point that everybody dances around. I'll admit that the weakness of my argument is that I don't know, but that is also the point.

Our codes don't allow houses to be built so that the floor of our bedroom collapses if more than 4 people enter the bedroom, even if we put a sign outside the bedroom that warns of the condition. If 25 people entered my bedroom because they fit inside, I expect the floors to withstand the weight because the joists must support 40 psf live load or thereabouts (not even considering the factor of safety). Why should a boat be considered seaworthy and be allowed to be produced when the capacity is unreasonably low (and there appears to be no factor of safety)?

I don't think that fitting a niche market is an excuse for designing a potential death trap.

 

[jimq26]

Here's a link to the Owner's Manual

Well then, just for clarification, what specifically are the capacity limitations of a MacGreggor 26? That seems to be the point that everybody dances around. I'll admit that the weakness of my argument is that I don't know, but that is also the point.

Our codes don't allow houses to be built so that the floor of our bedroom collapses if more than 4 people enter the bedroom, even if we put a sign outside the bedroom that warns of the condition. If 25 people entered my bedroom because they fit inside, I expect the floors to withstand the weight because the joists must support 40 psf live load or thereabouts (not even considering the factor of safety). Why should a boat be considered seaworthy and be allowed to be produced when the capacity is unreasonably low (and there appears to be no factor of safety)?

I don't think that fitting a niche market is an excuse for designing a potential death trap.

Link - http://www.macgregor26.com/instruction_manual/OWNERS INSTRUCTIONS.pdf

 

[FourPoints]

I think Scott makes a valid point. The after checking out the website, it sounds like the skipper is used to regular keel boats, and when he hopped in this Mac 25, it seems he treated it like a normal keel boat. He may not have known that with 10 people, the boat would be horribly and fatally overloaded.

That said, any half competent skipper should have noticed that the bow was a foot out of the water, the boat was listing 15deg to port due to the uneven weight in the stern, and if that wasn't enough, The engine was half submerged! Do I think climbing on board and expecting the boat to act like a normal keel boat is wrong, not unless he was given warning, or there was clear warning posted in the boat for him to see. HOWEVER, he should have recognized the warning signs that are CLEARLY visible in that picture, and should have never left the dock.


From the Heart of Sailing website

What type of sailboat is used?
Our fleet consists of monohull sailboats which have keels to provide greater stability. As opposed to the traditional dinghy or sabot-sized sailboat used in traditional youth sailing instruction, the keel boats are larger with our fleet ranging from 22’ up to 56’. In addition to the stability provided for introductory Daysails, the boats offer more advantages such as larger cockpits to accommodate more participants, as well as larger deck service for moving around and exploring the boat. Also, the boat and cockpit are positioned higher up from the water, making it much safer and more appealing for novice sailors. You can read more details about our fleet by selecting your region of interest and viewing the pictures and boat descriptions under 'Fleet and Captains'.

 

[FourPoints]

Link - http://www.macgregor26.com/instruction_manual/OWNERS INSTRUCTIONS.pdf

In summary, most anything you do to this boat may cause it to capsize? And I wondered how the Mac's got a bad reputation....

 

[Scott T-Bird]

So 4 people, no more than average weight of 160 pounds (640 pounds total) and nobody is allowed on the deck, when unballasted. Only 6 people (total weight 960 pounds) when ballasted. Isn't this extremely limiting for a 26' boat?

I'll have to read further if loading food, drinks, clothing, etc. for a day's outing is a further limitation. It still makes me wonder ... how does MacGregor get away with such ridiculously restrictive use requirements? Comparitively speaking, a canoe is more stable than a MacGregor.