Hurrying in a hurricane

[Cmdr. Maegil]

The name is Dean. Hurricane Dean!
And he's the meanest guy in town.

Yesterday evening the wind died completely, even though the hurricane's center was going to pass some 150NM to the North. Anyhow, I had all ready to receive him with two anchors out, but that doesn't mean the rest of the sailors in Chaguaramas bay were also prepared...

In the night, swell from the gulf of Paria started coming in into the bay from the South. Even in the usually sheltered area of the bay the boats started to jump as wild horses - nice enough to rock me into a sweeter sleep but terrible to anyone tied on the docks... And I would have slept late into the morning if I hadn't been woken by a foghorn just beside my boat!

Cracking the eyes open, I saw that there was light, but the sky was dark and rainy. The foghorn blew again, and someone called my name.
Pablo, from the Morabeza. No. Pablo, on the Morabeza! Two days before I've gone out to the gulf with him to test his new engine, and it wasn't quite well, so he was one of the poor souls on dock purgatory.

Used to be, at least, because he had cast off and was desperately calling me to help him move the Morabeza to a mooring. I got my oilskin and managed to go into the dinghy without being tossed into the water by the wild motions of both the Stardust and the dinghy, then into Pablo's boat.

He explained that his cleat had been broken from the fiberglass hull by the swell, and as a single-handed sailor he couldn't steer and get the mooring in this kind of weather. No problem, let's go!

He turned the boat around and headed for the nearest mooring, which we missed because he couldn't stop the boat with the wind from behind. When I suggested that he should go into the wind, he said that there wasn't enough room to maneouvre because the next boat was too near. Second attempt, the same. Third attempt, the engine stopped.

Oh, yeah! A boat that had been on the ground for some months, without sails and sporting a brand new, non-working engine! Oh, did I mentioned that he had received his new 70m of chain just the previous day? As you can imagine, it was still on the deck, waiting to be attached to the anchor...

What wan one do in such a situation? No drive, no anchoring gear, heading into a crowded anchorage and with a rough sea and strong(ish) winds? Yes, one drifts! The shackles were all in the construction area Pablo called his cabin, so there was no way to fix the anchor. Still, all was not lost: the Pilot boat was passing not far.

Anyone remembers about me mentioning a lost anchor and a pilot boat? Well, it were the very same bastards, and true to shape, they saw us in distress, saw the signalling, and went right on as if we were saying hello!!!

It was up to us. While he tried to find them without being buried under all the stuff he had lying around, I took his mooring lines, tied them together and was going to belay them to the anchor when we ran out of time: we were going head-on into the Tigressa's beam!

I called out to Pablo and went to the bow to push with my feet - risky business when the boats look like broncos in a rodeo. The boats got closer, and... whatablow! In a magnificent move, the Morabeza jumped high and clawed the Tigressa's wooden gunwhale with the hawsepipe's three plates. The Tigressa reeled as her trainer shouted in horror, and the referee got in the middle to separate the figh... oops! I was talking about boats, right?

So! Having left its mark on the first boat on her way, the Morabeza headed to the next victim. Pablo finished attaching the line to the anchor and threw it overboard. Saved? No! The anchor grabbed, turned the boat around, and guess what? We were just side by side with another fiberglass 35ft. boat, the Imagine.

By then, the Imagine's owner had already seen what had happened and was desperately putting out his fenders. Some other sailors were lowering their dinghies to come to the rescue, and while we tried to keep the boats apart, they passed a long line on a mooring and brought it to us, so we could finally secure the boat.

After a bit of thanks and apologies, things calmed down and I managed to returned to my boat. I've taken my breakfast and am writing this with one hand while holding the table with the other, least I topple... I imagine this is the kind of motion that got Hornblower seasick in Spithead.

[Captain Hesperus]

I eagerly await the printing of this Saaaaarrrrghha in hardback. I hope you will forward a signed first edition

Captain Hesperus

[TGHC]

You do seem to get into some tight spots!
At least noone got hurt, (except their pride)

[Commander Burton]

Thank the lawdy that Hurricane Dean dropped from a Category 5 to a Category 3 when it hit Mexico.

Not a good time to fly a kite there.

[Cmdr. Maegil]

That only means that it dissipated on the coastal area a minimum of 40Km/h from its over 250Km/h and more energy than your average nuke...

On related news, the toll here in Chaguaramas wasn't tragic, but reveals how unprepared some cruisers are. I've heard of another five boats dragging anchors, two serious (as in expensive, nobody sunk) boat collisions and one colliding with and breaking a floating dock. Furthermore, a friend got his bow smashed into the dock while he was out helping another sailor - one of his lines broke and the boat banged head-on repetedly on the concrete until the bow was flattened some two feet shorter.

What are the lessons?
1) prepare in advance (duh, right? Should be, but the results show differently...);
2) watch out for cable wear and tear, if in doubt replace them;
3) when in a crouded anchorage, anchor as upwind or to the side from the predicted direction as possible - keep out of the way least some moron manages to drag into my boat;
4) the puny fish hooks some boats carry as "recommended for the boat size" are the minimum acceptable size for calm anchorages (there is no such thing as overdimensioned anchoring gear).

[Captain Hesperus]

Hurricane Felix.

Category two to category five in a matter of hours.



Someone really has it in for Maegil....

Captain Hesperus
"Maybe it's time to consider a career plying the starlanes...."

[Star Gazer]

damn! ...that is bad news! ...hope the commander has battened down the hatches, and is somewhere safe...

[Cmdr. Maegil]

Felix started spiralling almost on this side of the Atlantic and passed just North of Trinidad a little before becoming a named tropical storm. The boats here jumped a bit on the southerly swell, but less than with Dean (that passed much further away). Its biggest effect on me was that my dinghy got swamped by the heavy rain, and it was a bit of a nuisance to read in the cabin.
AFAIK, there was just one boat dragging - unfortunately for the owner, it ended up on the stones...

I didn't even considered it worth to bother you guys with. However, I saw yesterday morning on the satellite photos that there was another forming at 12°N 40°W, and although it'll probably pass way to the North in another two days, I didn't like the way it was looking and wouldn't want to be in its way.

EDIT: I checked the new images and it broke up to unpleasently-looking 20NM radius circular clouds centered at 10°N 55°W, on a course likely to pass near here.
There is also a strange wall of clouds from 10°N 45°W to the NW until 25°N 57°W, but I have no clear idea of what that's all about. Maybe it's related to the Azores high, but I'm not sure.

Probably you won't see what I mean on these positions as it's regularly updated, but you can keep up with it on the satellite image, the surface analysis and the NAVTEX.

[Cmdr. Maegil]

I got a picture of the boat that got its bow bashed in during Dean. Remember: Chaguaramas is usually a very calm bay...

[LittleBear]

Wow!

"The Assassins Guild ranks you as The Hand."