Got caught unprepared in high winds again

[Group9]

Originally Posted by Flagfish

Oh, ok. Global warming, eh? And here I thought sailing had always been like that.

You know if the Fastnet disaster happened again today, someone would be using it as an example of global warming.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Group9

You know if the Fastnet disaster happened again today, someone would be using it as an example of global warming.

Why , it wasn’t an exceptional storm for that area at all.

[Bill_Giles]

It is not said “keep a weather eye open” for nothing. If one thing changes: wind speed, direction, precipitation, cloud cover, cloud height, temperature (air and sea) wave height and direction and visibility they will all change. The faster they change the more dramatic it will be.

[Group9]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Why , it wasn’t an exceptional storm for that area at all.

That's the point.

[At Peace]

Maybe it's time for some lessons. It doesn't matter what school, this is pretty basic They'll teach you all about what to look for and what to do when things happen.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Group9

That's the point.

Sarcasm about climate change is often missed when tounge in cheek..

[LittleWing77]

Originally Posted by Wallaby

If you are not monitoring the weather and water on a continuous basis, you probably should not be on the water.

Originally Posted by JBsurfin

Somehow I find it hard to believe that winds came out of nowhere with no other climate signals being around...

Originally Posted by At Peace

Maybe it's time for some lessons. It doesn't matter what school, this is pretty basic. They'll teach you all about what to look for and what to do when things happen.

Captn_bill knows what to do when he gets caught out and did well in the circumstances.

Perhaps you hadn't noticed he was sharing his experience in the spirit of "lesson learned".

We could all do better and possibly even be better people - such as refraining from patronizing a fellow Forum Member or leveraging his sailor's tale as an opportunity to belittle.

Not cool.
LW77

[pbmaise]

I have done a lot of night sailing and have taken to dropping the main completely at dark. This left only the head sail to drop or furl. (I changed from hank to roller furl).

If we saw lightning flashes that was okay, but the moment we could hear thunder, then the foresail was to come down or furl. Frequently, there wasn't much time after we heard thunder to when we needed that foresail down. We were always happy to not have to be messing with the main at the same time.

During the day the important thing we look for are hanging cloud formations. When looking at a bank of clouds if we saw a section that was hanging down low below the bank we knew there was cause for concern.

A good video showing what these look like can be found here.

https://news.yahoo.com/hanging-cloud...020551653.html

Low hanging cloud formations don't always spawn tornadoes or water spouts, however, they almost always indicate sudden strong wind shifts. Therefore, upon any sighting of clouds like this all sails came down.

Of course, I should point out I didn't learn this lesson until I learned it the hard way when crossing the South China Sea. I got hit with a 50 knot blow and there was a bit of damage to say the least.

[Group9]

Originally Posted by pbmaise

I have done a lot of night sailing and have taken to dropping the main completely at dark. This left only the head sail to drop or furl. (I changed from hank to roller furl).

.

On our last cruise, we would double reef the main every night, mainly for unexpected squalls, but also because I figured, if we hit something unobserved at night, the slower the better.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by pbmaise

I have done a lot of night sailing and have taken to dropping the main completely at dark. This left only the head sail to drop or furl. (I changed from hank to roller furl).

Standard practice for me on passages.. reef the main right down at sunset and operate the genoa from the cockpit.. Wind picks up I'm ready, no charging up to the mast in the dark to reef down.. most of the power comes from the genny anyway unless close hauled and the safety factor more than compensates for any loss of speed.

[HeinSdL]

Sardinia a couple of weeks ago anchored in zero wind. Thunderstorm comes down from the mountain and within a minute the wind was at 50 knots. It lasted for 10 minutes during which the anchor (I love my delta anchor a bit more now) held even though the boat was, how do you call it, hunting around the anchor as if it was beating up wind.

I was a bit lost as to what to do so I started the engine to try and take some force off the anchor (which didn't help much) but also to have it running should lightning strike and the anchor chain broke and I was heading at a rapid clip into the bay ready to run aground.

After it was all over I was surprised at the silence, together with the complete chaos below. I never experienced something like this and don't want to experience it too often, especially not at anchor, what a pain. One flange on the anchor guide up front was bent 90 degrees, the delta did great though...

On a different topic I was also in need to furl the genny now and then and found that bearing away on a run made the difference between doing this task with cup of tea in hand and winching this thing in like there was no tomorrow. Not to speak of the wear and tear of the sail itself.

Edit: not that the lightning strike would break the chain, rather that if the chain broke, the engine was already on even if by chance lightning also disabled all the electronics.

[Cloroxbottle]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKzu-0JgKaI

A short video on the life cycle of thunderstorms along with a nice time lapse.




https://www.instantweathermaps.com/G...STANT&var=LFTX


A map where you can check lifted indices.


Lifted index is a measurement of the stability of an air mass at a given moment. Positive values denote stable air masses, and negative values denote unstable air masses. Negative values are an indication that strong thunderstorms may occur in the area. On our weather maps, lifted index is given in kelvins.




If you're going to be coastal cruising within cellphone range, some additional resources are the myradar app as well as terminal area forecasts and weather observations from airports along your route which are usually quite accurate.


You can find them here:


https://aviationweather.gov/metar/da...&date=&hours=0


Enter the airport identifier for a nearby field and click on "decode" and "include TAF".

[capn_billl]

OOOH, that surface lifted index is awesome. I'm definitely putting that on a tab.

From graph above there were a line of stage 2 along shore in the distance.

Stage 1, formed right above me. I might have noticed it a few seconds earlier if I was looking up.

After I finished getting sails back under control, it moved towards the coast, and joined other line of thunderheads.

[capn_billl]

Thanks on the suggestion to pick up a barometer.

I picked up a digital temp, pressure, humidity meter with wireless sensor.

definitely a game changer.

Just saw a steep increase in humidity followed by a pressure drop. screen changed from sun to rain clouds. Just looked outside, YEP, definitely thunderheads brewing, and going to rain.

[barnakiel]

I have found the barometer useless in the tropics.


But most helpful N and S of 35 degs.


b.