Strong winds

[Henryv]

30 in my B331

I spent a day fighting to windward with sustained winds around 30 knots and gusts higher. We had both the main and jib reefed to about 1/3 area. The boat handled things well - if we got too much heel we would just pinch a bit. We did get rather wet as we were heading into large swells that would break at the bow and travel the length of the boat giving us the equivalent of a pail of water in the face at regular intervals all day.

 

[Bob Guenther]

Queenstown Race '01

The annual Quuenstown race in the Chesapeake Bay is held in October. The start is at Baltimore Light and the finish is up the Chester River close to Queenstown, MD. We motored our 30' Lippincott out of our creek and into the Magothy at around 9:30 a.m. with winds steady from the South at 15 knots. When we reached the middle of the river we headed up and raised a full main and a 150 genny. With the winds from the South there was minimal fetch in the river and the winds seemed manageable with this configuration. As we neared the mouth of the river and sailed past Gibson Island we could see boats gathering around Baltimore light for the race. At this time, about half of the boats were reefed and half were under full sail. We chose not to reef at this point and continued on through the channel and out into the Chesapeake. As we cleared the lee of Sandy Point, the winds and the seas began to increase rapidly. By the time we reached Baltimore Light the wind speed had increased to 25 knots and gusting to 35 and the seas were 5-6 feet. We were caught under full sail and needing to reef in a hurry. As we had left the river on a beam reach, this was our point of sail when we encountered the higher winds. Our first move was to attempt to roll up about 3/4 of the headsail. Easier said then done in higher winds. We attempted to head up to reef both sails but the intensity of the wind and the building fetch in the bay made this extemely difficult. On our second attempt, we were able to head the boat up and hold her nose into the wind and start to crank on the furling line. As luck would have it, the line jammed under the drum and would not budge. I hastily moved/crawled forward to try to free the jammed line. As I was sprawled out on the foredeck, frantically prying away at the line with a flathead screwdriver, we started taking green water over the bow. The combination of the howl of the wind, the rise and fall of the bow in 6 foot seas and being awash every 30 seconds or so while trying to stay on the boat and free a jammed line is a great test of ones powers of both concentration and determination. After about 2 or 3 minutes (felt like an hour) the line was free and the crewman in the cockpit began to roll in the sail. The next task was to reef the main. This task was not nearly as harrowing as being sprawled on the foredeck, but I did manage to get some pretty decent "air time" while making an ill-timed dash from one side of the coach roof to the other. (Remember, one hand for you, one hand for the boat stupid!) With our sail area significantly reduced we fell off and ran back down toward Baltimore Light for our start. We took a quick inventory just before the first start and noticed that a number of the smaller boats had dropped their sails and were heading back home. Most of the boats with sails still up were at least 35 footers, many were bigger. Should have been a BIG clue for us. We decided that we had held togeher this long and that the race conditions could not get much worse (and were not forcasted to do so). We were in the last class to start and flew across the line about 10 seconds after the gun. At least we were off to a good start. The first leg was a long reach across the bay after which we would round and run back towards Kent Island before rounding again and beating up the Chester toward the finish. The sun had finally come out and although it was relatively cold (48 degrees) and the winds were steady at 25 knots it was starting to feel like a fine day for sailing. I was riding the rail, eating a sandwich, and feeling that we had made the right choice in continuing with the race...right up until the point where the second seam in the top of the jib ripped open across the width of the sail. I didn't see it at first, but I did hear a rather paculiar noise. I looked back at the helsman (and owner) of the boat and said, "what the heck was that?" He replied, "That was the sound of money leaving my savings account!"With the jib torn open we lost some of our pointing ability and got blown down course quite a bit. We had to tack 3 times before rounding the first mark and were soon well behind the bulk of the fleet. We ended up finishing last and the boat got beat up pretty good along the way. We motored up the Chester and dropped the hook in a place called Ditcher's Cove off of Queenstown Creek. We spent the night on the boat and were up bright and early the next day for the race back. During breakfast we listened to the marine forecast and heard that the conditions for Suday were going to be a carbon copy of what we had endured the day before. We had taken down the badly damaged 150 and replaced it with a storm jib but two of the reefing points on the main were torn. The only sane choice was to motor back across the bay and watch what we could of the race on our return trip. The bigger boats were all out again for the sail back and it was great to get to watch them sailing in 25 to 30 knot winds and seas that had abated to 4 feet. Many were under full sail, although spilling much of the wind from the main. It took us longer to motor back than it did to sail across the day before.There were a few lessons learned from that trip. The first is to set your sail configuration in anticipation of the conditions on bigger water. It is much easier to shake out a reef and unroll a headsail than it is to reef under poor conditions. The second lesson is to double check the condition of all of your rigging prior to sailing in higher winds. The third lesson is that if you are sailing in winds gusting over 35 knots and you hear something that sounds like Dacron tearing, it probably is.As a side note (and if you bothered to read this far) we motored out 3 weeks later for the Baltimore Harbor Cup race. Again, the start was at Baltimore Light. We already had the storm jib rigged and ran out of the river with a reef in the main. The wind was out of the Northwest so the wave height on the bay was only about 2 feet but the winds were strong again, gusting over 30 knots. This time, when we saw the smaller craft dropping their sails we followed suite. We ended up motoring to the Inner harbor with a stop for lunch, and a break from the wind in scenic Bodkin Creek.

 

[Craig Steinkraus]

July 2,1999

We were on "The Around The Islands " race which is the International protion of Bayfield Race Week on Lake Superior. This is 67 MN race around The Apostile Islands. Around 5:00 PM the weather started building rapidly. By 6:00 PM the first of 5 consecutive squall lines hit. The first line contained sustained winds in excess of 60 kts. The second line was a little less. The third line contained winds in excess of 70 kts. The fourth line had measured susrtained winds of 100kts (AWOS on Michigan Island)The fifth line was 50-60 kts. The entire storm lasted about 3.5 hours with approx. 20 minuites of "just regular thunder storms " in between the squalls. At one point we were doing 7.5 kts on the stick only ! Many of the boats involved sustained some damage, most with blown sails, some rigging damage and only 2 personal injuries. Considering there were over 30 boats involved and over 300 people, we were a very lucky group. If we didn't have 12 good and expreienced sailors on board, our situation may have turned out differently as we suffered no damage except for the loss of all the masthead wind sensors. Craig SteinkrausC-38 "Wings" #280

 

[King Elliott]

Key Largo Race

Four or five years ago, I was sailing in the annual Key Largo race sponsored by the Miami Yacht Club. It is a single start at 8:00 a.m. with all boats, ranging from 16-feet up, multi-hulls as well as monohulls. The course is straight down Biscayne Bay to Jewfish Creek, about 40 NM. We had just passed Featherbed Channel and were west of Elliott Key when the storm hit. We quickly were in winds of 40 to 45 knots, and barely got our sails down and the engine started before we were in real trouble. We headed for an anchorage between Elliott and Adams Keys and rode the storm out. We learned later that many of the small catamarans were blown up into the mangroves, a Stiletto flipped and lost mast, sails, rigging, cockpit covers, and all the gear on board. Fortunately, no lives were lost, although one woman was washed overboard and was eventually rescued by a helicopter. After being checked out at the hospital, she conned the paramedics to take her down to Key Largo for the party. When you sail in Miami and the Keys, you expect storms, but this was the worst I have ever been in.

 

[Chris Gonzales]

40 kts

This summer on San Francisco bay. The usual summer winds. We started out at 15 kts leaving the marina, blowing 30 with frequent prolonged gusts to 40-45 by mid day. We sailed for about 6 hrs that day until we just got tired of it. Single reefed only with the 135 jib rolled in to about 100-110. Bay chop was not too bad and we had her trimmed fairly well so heeling wasn't too extreme, either. We decided to quit rather than tie in the second reef. Some have posted that they douse sail in this kind of blow. My C30 sails better than motors in these conditions so even if we cut the day short and head in we keep the sails up.Chris

 

[Nicholas Webley]

Cook Strait New Zealand

on a recent trip across the Cook Striat between the North and South Island of New Zealand we had the wind gauge sitting on 50-60 knots the swell about 4 metres high ,we were sailing with the top reef in and the motor ticking over. we ca me down one wave and braoched filled the cotpit up with water , This is what we do for fun at the bottom of the world.

 

[steven f.]

balmy spring night

Sure can't top that Cook Straight story but for us it was a lovely night sail from Naples to Key West. Broad reaching with 15 kts at supper time. Just after sunset squalls from the Everglades hit us and we sailed under bare poles at 8.5 knots on a H33. The winds were steady at 40-45 kts on our port stern. The old boat handled the 10' following seas great, wife also did great. Her quote for this trip was "why couldn't you have taken up golf like all the other old men?". After a midnight arrivel into Key West under full storm conditions and a six pack of brew she agreed that it was one hell of an adventure, we are both anxious to do it again. We'll hope for some better weather next time since our last several night passages have had storms in them.

 

[Bill Bell]

Dry Tortugas Florida 4/17/99

We got caught in a wind shift of 90 degrees and wind speed change from 12 to 75 knots in the Dry Tortugas area. We were trying to beat the storm back to an anchorage and finally decided that we wouldn't make it. We went into the wind and furled the genny and was ready to drop the full main when the wind shift hit. The boat blew over on its port side with the mast head into the water. My wife said, "We're going to die!", My response was, "No we aren't, hold on to the wheel." The boat righted itself in 10 to 15 seconds and the main totally schredded, the genny unfurled itself and had to be winched in, which destroyed the leach. The topping lift broke. Bimini straps broke. We were in about 25 feet of water with land and coral heads all around. I was afraid that we would go aground, but the wind moved us into 100 feet deep water. Now blowing downwind under bare poles (with a lot of rags blowing in the rigging), we were making hull speed plus, while we surfed the building 10 to 12 foot seas. The wind had gone down to about 50 knots at this time. Since Cuba was the next thing to hit at about 85 miles, we decided to motor into the wind, under the lee of Garden Key which was now about 5 miles away. We made it, got an anchor down in 10 feet of water with 2 feet upwind of us. Went below and made a couple of cocktails. The boats in the anchorage weren't in much better shape, 75% of them drug anchors into each other, sand bars and coral reefs. We escaped with about $5000 in damage to the sails, etc. Insurance covered about $1800.It didn't keep us from sailing. We got caught in a 45 knot thunderstorm near Key Largo on our back back from the Bahamas last June. This time with reefed sails we had no trouble, just a lot of water down the neck when it would come over the bow and down the deck into the cockpit.Storms are just a fact of life, you just have to prepair for them before they hit.

 

[Jim Slaughter]

Whoa!

I went out for a liesurely sail on the upper Tampa Bay one day when out of the corner of my eye I saw a squal line approaching. I didn't think too much about it at first but then I could see it was moving REALLY FAST! I got the main down but then WHAM! I had the 150 genny on and no chance to get it down in time (I tried and fell through the hatch and hurt myself pretty bad). My only choice was to heave to. The storm must have lasted at least 30 minutes. The gunwale went UNDER water several times. I finally retreated to the cabin and rode her out just hoping the keel didn't retract on me. I never lock it down because this is sandbar country. Man! I don't want to ever do that again! At least I was a short distance from shore and could have powered up and headed in if I had seen the storm sooner. I have always kept a much closer 'weather eye' since that day.

 

[Walt]

50 Knots on a C27

It’s the first day of a two-week trip to and through the San Juan’s in Washington. Forecast is for some scattered showers, some sun, and 15 to 20 knot winds. We have a Catalina 27, 8 hr. OB, full main, 110% jib, running on a 160-deg broad reach. We are headed NNW into Saratoga passage, a north south channel about 15 miles long and three to four miles wide. The anemometer is reading 15 to 18 knots apparent. We are running less that hull speed about 5 knots. It was nice. As the channel narrowed the wind pick up to 20 to 25 knots. We were able to run about 170-deg down wind; waves picking up white caps; trough to crests about three feet. The fetch now is about five miles. It is exciting but still nice sailing so we commit to going down the passage. The winds pick up to 25 to 30 knots and I pull the jib in behind the main. The main is all the way out on the starboard side. The waves raise and slue the stern around. As the stern is picked up and pushed aside the wind spills out of the main and hits the jib witch pushes the bow back down wind. This seems to be working all right. We are cooking! The wind picks up to 35 knots and the waves are now about four foot from trough to chest all white horses. Gayle is on the wheel and having a hard time keeping a heading. We are now starting to surf with the stern being pushed off a lot. I move up to the mast to reduce sail. With the sail configuration Gayle can not bring the bow into the wind. What to do? Gayle solves the question. She yells “42 knots” (apparent)! Quick math says my hull speed is about 6.2 knots. We are surfing probably to 8 knot at 170 down wind. That’s real close to 50 knots true. Get the sails down! I let the jib go and just haul it down behind the main. The next time the stern slues around and spills the main I let it go and haul it down. Gayle heads down wind bare poll. I secure the sails and move to the cockpit. Bare poll we are doing about 3 knots but in control. We have about 7 more miles to go, so I take the cover off the lazarett to start the out-board. It's gone! It walked off the transom. But that’s another story. Yes, we are still married and we completed the trip in August, four months after the first adventure.

 

[Dave]

Summer storm

Summer weekend afternoon and I go out single-handing my O'Day 26. Weather forecast is minimal chance of thunderstorm activity, wind is southwest at 15 and the idea was to have a relaxing 2-hour sail. The sky went dark, then that sick green-grey color. In comes the jib. I locked my tiller in place to go forward to the mast where I would drop my main to the second reef point. I can "see" the first gusts coming across the harbor and I've never tied in a reef so fast in my 40 years of sailing. Made it to the tiller as the first gust hit me at about 35-40 knots. No problem, I think. Then it gets really snotty: Winds gusted to 65 knots (confirmed later by local CG station) and it poured about 2" of rain sideways over the next 20 minutes. Waves about 8 feet. Wind clocked around a bit and now I had a lee shore problem (mangled old piers) and no chance of anchoring due to soft mud conditions. I have a 10hp outboard on a transom-hung bracket and with the wave heights there was little chance of my prop staying in the water long enough to make any difference so I kept sailing. Watched a 45' power yacht take 2 rollers over the stern (gee, maybe with 800 HP and twin screws he should have come about instead of doing that power jibe???) and sank right in front of me. 5 people now in the water in life preservers. Winds still over 50 and I had VERY little control. CG came out from Station Govenors Island and picked up the swimmers. I made it back to my dock about an hour later, phoned my wife and drank a beer while listening to pandemonium on Ch 16. Had a third reef point sewn into my main the following winter...

 

[Bob Booth]

Savannah excitement

My son and I rented a Catalina 25 (We have a 27 at home) near Savannah, GA to see some of the barrier islands. I knew something was up when all the locals gpoing out for a race had on full foulies. Winds kicked up tyo a steady 20 gusting to 35 and clocking with out movement down the river to stay on the nose, of course. At thge mouth of the river, the wind and tide were against each other creating mixing bowl shaped waves about 8 feet high. The boat had blown out sails and wouldn't point, etc, etc. Finally I said "Let's go back. We're not going to make to a safe anchorage today." So we motored into the tide, mking 5 knots through the water, 1 knot over the ground, threw out the anchor out of the channel area and waited for the tide to turn. Finally got back to the marina around midnight to find the regatta party still going and free rum punch still flowing.Exciting trip just to find out that we can manage a little wind in the ocean and maintain some composure.

 

[Terry Griggs]

Water Spout????

Was Heading down the Chesapeake Bay with a group of ASA 104 students, when we had some very dark clouds appear to the West. We dropped all sails, and started motoring. Twenty minutes later, we were hit broadside with very hi-winds and w/ bare sticks our toe rail was in the water. This on a 40' Island Packet!!!!!! Had student who was at the helm, point boat directly into the wind. I had a GPS in my hand so used it as a ref. for our location/directions. Was also trying to look out the side of the dodger as there was no vision thru it as we had so much rain/wind. After approx. 8 minutes, noted that to stay directly pointed into the wind, we were rotating thru 360 degree headings. This we did for approx. 2- 2 1/2 minutes. Wind speeds were excess of 50 kts, but after the inital readout, we had to concentrate on "visibility" problems so don't know what the max. wind really was. There were a lot of freightors in the area, and no visibility! Believe what occurred was that we had eventually ended up in the center of a water spout, and had to continually counter it's rotation to keep our bow pointed into the wind. Realize, that an Island Packet is a very heavy weather boat and we were talking abt. a 40 footer. After the fact, the students who had very little experience sailing in calm weather, let alone heavy winds, were relieved, but would love to experience it again, and again, and again. Great fun, for a couple mins! RegardsCapt Terry Griggs

 

[Mark Wells]

Storm front

We were out about 7/12/01 and had a nice morning sail. Heading back after lunch we heard the thunder coming. We started back and when it got close we put down the sails and headed south in the direction of the marina. It hit us about 2 miles out. We had the engine on slow and were still going fast down wind. It only took us a few minutes to get down by the marina where we ducked in behind the point and circled as the storm went by. After it was over another boat came in and his wind meter gave a reading of 72 mph. His rolled up jib had the cover and edge shredded. Actually once we were in it we weren't really scared but watchng it come at us made us very apprehensive. The boat handled very well.

 

[Robert Johnson]

Unnecessarily Agressive Sharing

2001 Swiftsure Regatta/Sooke Harbour ClassicI bought a Catalina 27 last summer and thought it would be a nice idea to share with my family, what I've been doing over the last couple of decades on other peoples boats.Started off at 1000 It looked good, light moderate with sun. 1400 raining on 6 foot seas with 35-40 knot winds. My thirteen year old son who's sailed and raced inshore with me since he was ten days old managed to get us down to two reefs in the main and a blade. Both he and my wife said enough when the Peterson 44 Keel and all flew out of the spume covered wave beside us on the same tack. We motored into Sooke harbour and as the first line hit the dock I heard my wife say "All I want is a car"! and my son's "reply All I want is a stiff drink"!After it was all said and done they both agreed Unnecessarily Agressive Sharing on my part.They'll be back I once entered Georgia Strait with my wife upside down hanging off the pulpit straddling the bow of our Tbird in thirty knots of breeze and she still sails with me. She tends to drive more though...

 

[AL PERKINS]

RIP TIDE THRASHING

We were enjoying a sunny 5-6 knot ride over long 8'-10' swells coming down the Strait of Juan De Fuca until a strong outgoing rip put us in a thrashing machine.Firing up the engine was short lived as waves cleared the bottom creating an air lock and we had to shut it down.Our C-30 was taking green water over the bow and stern all at once. Down below it looked like the inside of a dumpster while my son and I took turns hanging over the rail.We ran off under main only until the seas straightened up and we used our dinghy for a final push into Friday Harbor.

 

[Jeffrey Posner]

60 kn Lake Erie

On Wednesday, July 28, 1993 during the MORC Int'ls in Sandusky, Ohio a front ripped thru during the afternoon of the long distance race blowing over 60 knots sustained. The race started and finished at the entrance to Sandusky Bay and went 65 miles around the Erie Islands. We were racing "Absolut," an S2 7.9 at the time and ran with it under single reefed main and no headsail. We actually tried to tie in a 2d reef but, because we would have to run the clew line from scratch could not get it done.  Luckily the course was NE, the same as the wind, but on the windward side of Pelee Island, heading for Pelee Passage and Canada. The MOB strobe kept swinging up and firing from the rear rail, and we thought it was P.P. Light ahead because it reflected off the rain in front. The boat averaged 12.5 knots with no real surfing as the fetch was too short for large waves to form. When this storm hit Cleveland 60 miles further east it was clocked at 104. The next year during Cleveland race week it hit 80 but we quit because they abandoned the race when the marks and committee boat got blasted off station. We did not have that problem at the MORCs because the marks were either islands or government buoys and the committee boat did not have to be on station until much later.

 

[Don Miehling]

T-Storms on LI Sound

Late afternoon summer thouderstorms are fairly common for Long Island Sound. This day's storms were predicted for late afternoon - I tried to beat them. . . Timing is everything.I left my mooring in Oyster Bay later than I'd planned with two passengers. Yes, passengers - neither woman could be called crew when the chips were down. We had a great sail in a brisk breeze at or about hull speed heading north toward Stamford Connecticut. About halfway back I start to notice the change in sky over my destination and that, as if by magic, most of the other sailboats were gone. Started to run for the Bay still sailing, full rig, at 5 to 6 knots. At the entrance to the outer bay, about a mile from my mooring, the storm was getting vicious looking, now with the extra added attraction of lightning! It was due west, heading east, (towards me), moving, the radio said, at 5 knots.I tacked back out into the sound and watched this marvelous weather anomaly steam by west to east, right over Oyster Bay Harbor and the outer bay. Doused sails, battened down, cranked up the trusty Atomic4 to cruise at 5 knots and ran for the harbor on the back of the storm cell. Unfortunately when about halfway in the bay, about 1/2 mile from the mooring I realized there was another storm cell right behind it. It was a race to the mooring - the storm won. Caught me entering the channel. I believe the weather report of 50 mile per hour sustained winds - the rigging was singing. Luckily the wind was right on the bow and waves were very small since the tide was ebbing - same direction as the wind, although the sea was complete froth. The rain, tons of it, was horizontal. Standing at the tiller I had to duck behind the cabin to take a breath - felt like I was under water, every breath was a mouthful of water. The passengers were below with two of three boards in. The A4 heroically maintained 2 to 3 knots into the wind. Two similar sized sailboats were within a 100 yards behind me. One kept pace, the other let his bow cross the wind, almost broached, and ran off before the wind under bare poles.Not 100 yards from the mooring field we came out the back side of the cell - calm winds and water and bright sun. Motored up to the mooring and picked it up single handed pretty as a picture. As we were celebrating our success with a cocktail we didn't see the next cell coming. . . . Luckily the launch got us to the dock with minutes to spare. The rule of thumb now is - if T-Storms are forecasted stay dry! The next rule of thumb is, if there's white caps at the dock - stay dry, but that's another story.

 

[Bill Howitt]

Gulf of Alaska

50 knots, 100 miles offshore, Gulf of Alaska for about 15 hours. Later that night, about 2 am, when it calmed down to 30 knots and 12 to 15 foot seas, it was a real pleasure. But, I have a good story about how a 35.5 can take it.

 

[Ian Beattie-Edwards]

Europa Point Gibralar

A 340, with fibreglass 'radar arch', single handed 60nm leg, plan to night stop and then return next day. max wind 3-5 kts Easterly, (most unusual), motored all way south until passing Europa point the lighthouse on the eastern corner of the ROCK. At last there was some potential wind activity, and not being one to motor into any port, I hoisted all the cloth, big furlex Geni, and in boom, furling.Then decided to run close behind a small fishing boat. The the gust hit, from a nice steady 3-4 the 28kts on the gauge filled the Geni,a nd what was a nice steady 289 became 370!!!!!and the fishermen had a look of total surprise.I was then reminded of the very powerful Geni, and the effect of a strong gust. The fishermen thanked me in the traditional way.......I then continued under power......and slept very well....Bumz rusH. Hunter 340. Spain.