Capsized Austrian sailor rescued off Western Australia coast

[JAFO]

https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/stat...escued-off-wa/


Not much information at this point.

Must admit I'm curious as to why he chose to abandon ship, though. After all, you cat-fans are constantly saying that unlike monos, cats don't sink. So why would he not stay with the boat?

No surprise though, that the journalist can't tell the difference between a liferaft and an inflatable dinghy.

[Franziska]

Originally Posted by JAFO

https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/stat...escued-off-wa/


Not much information at this point.

Must admit I'm curious as to why he chose to abandon ship, though. After all, you cat-fans are constantly saying that unlike monos, cats don't sink. So why would he not stay with the boat?

No surprise though, that the journalist can't tell the difference between a liferaft and an inflatable dinghy.

As we do not more, all speculation.

Maybe they asked him to get in the dinghy before the airlift?
Maybe his cat was barely afloat?
Older boats often do not have enough floatation to be really safely inhabitable when capsized.
If filled up to the brim with cruising gear a smaller cat could sink if it has not enough floatation. All depends on the material, number of airtight compartments, the amount of damage and so on.

As I feel a very slight bit of the usual anti multi sentiment [emoji16] better barely afloat than alone in the drink...

Great they found him alive!

[catsketcher]

Gday JAFQ,

You are right in thinking that most cat sailors are overly optimistic about the ability of their inverted cats to float. Most will barely float and most will not provide a good safe place to wait for rescue.

It is basic physics - you need lots of volume ( in the order of 4-5 metres cubed for my boat). Some designers have tried putting full height bulkheads fore and aft and voids in the bridgedeck. Others recommend putting non skid on the underside of the bridgedeck and installing handholds. Few owners will follow these recommendations and most cut into bulkheads to get more interior access to voids. As such their boats float very poorly when inverted.

Most cats should carry liferafts. I think the number of modern cats that could safely provide habitation would be somewhere around 1-2% of the cats I see. So the common refrain of "Cats give you somewhere to stay after capsize is erroneous. You can tell the ones that will float well inverted. They have full bulkheads fore and aft, the have voids between the double berths on the bridgdeck, top opening deck hatches with taps on the drains and some sort of place to sit waiting for rescue.

Trimarans are a different kettle of fish. It is very easy for a typical trimaran to provide excellent inverted accomodation. The Rose Noelle story illustrates how a tri with little fore thought for inversion can provide safe accomodation. BUT cats are very different in this regard from tris, a fact most cat sailors seem to ignore.

[Factor]

Originally Posted by JAFO

https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/stat...escued-off-wa/


Not much information at this point.

Must admit I'm curious as to why he chose to abandon ship, though. After all, you cat-fans are constantly saying that unlike monos, cats don't sink. So why would he not stay with the boat?

No surprise though, that the journalist can't tell the difference between a liferaft and an inflatable dinghy.

And your purpose in this post is? I haven't heard anyone say cats cant stunk, A piece of crap is a piece of crap independent of hull numbers. A properly designed and built cat won't sink. Can't sink. That cannot however be extrapolated to all multihulls.

[Galumay]

Originally Posted by catsketcher

... the number of modern cats that could safely provide habitation would be somewhere around 1-2% of the cats I see.

The number of made up statistics to support a personal opinion is about 99% of the statistics I see.

[AKA-None]

So then shall we say that a proper monohull with full bulkheads and water tight doors/hatches would react the same?

[catsketcher]

Originally Posted by Galumay

The number of made up statistics to support a personal opinion is about 99% of the statistics I see.

The reason I stated this broad stat is because there was a fair bit of work done by designers in the mid 80s about inverted flotation. I have an article written by the designer of my cat (Robin Chamberlin) and in it he details how to make a cat suitable for inverted flotation. Robin and I talked about this a bit when I built his design. He was surprised by my requirements that the boat float well upside down, he said most owners cut into the spaces he designed. But I am a child of the 80s in multi terms when almost all my friends had flipped a multi. So it was drummed into us that our boats could flip. Clever sailors owed their lives to the ability of multis to support them upisde down. I knew Ian and Cathy who flipped their Twiggy (I had one too) twice. I knew John Glennie and was invited to sail with him on Rose No-elle. He then set a record for the longest time inverted. We all thought he was dead. Capsizing has been a part of my life for 40 years.

The main points Robin championed were - unviolated voids in the bridgdeckop, top loading deck hatches in the bridgedeck, full bulkheads fore and aft as far aft (for the forward one) and far forward (for the aft one) as possible, a flat space for people to sit upside down and somewhere to cut into that doesn't violate the air captured by the hulls. Also you need very few through hulls (or turn them off during a storm) and things like water tanks with taps on the breathers for long term use upside down.

Out of all the cats I have been on, and I have been on lots, none except my own and a Chris White Atlantic had any real capsize capability built in. I have been on around 100 cats so I reckon I am pretty close with the 1-2 figure. Very few cruising cats would be at all suitable for long term survivability and we have locally had a few deaths from owners being unable to use their inverted cat to survive even a few hours, even on a lightweight composite performance cat where 3 people died on a day sail, let alone a production cat that floats even lower inverted offshore further away from help. (Actually on reflection, a few of the Wharrams I have been on have lots of inverted flotation so my numbers may be out a bit say I should have probably said less than 5%)

I would rather cat owners talk to someone who understands volume and weight and make a proper assessment of the ability of their cat to float inverted rather than hope. My cat will float high in the bows - the sterns, though light have nowhere near the bouyancy the bows and front region of the bridgedeck has inverted. So I have an axe located in the engine pods and somewhere to cut into in the bow section (on a full length horizontal bulkhead). This won't violate the airlock and will allow me to get out of the water and rest until help arrives.

My boat was built with this in mind. It makes very little impact on the accomodations when done well. I am happy with not having a liferaft on my cat but would recommend most cats install them because few cats have proper details built into them for inverted safety.

So can monohullers laugh at us about statements about having somewhere to stay protected after capsize being incorrect? For the vast majority of cats they sure can. Monohullers know their boats can sink, most cat owners (not tri owners) should know that their cats are not suitable for inverted habitation and that they need a raft or some sort of lifeboat.

cheers

Phil

[Tin Tin]

I don't think many owners of factory built cruising cats expect to live in their boat inverted, they expect it not to sink to the bottom in a few seconds and that escape hatches will allow grandparents, kids and injured to exit, or be accessed by first responders or other crew without need of an axe. For longer term survival obviously a life raft will fulfill that role and being tethered to the inverted hull may allow access to ditch bags and other handy stuff in due course. Obviously a fire that sinks any boat is a good reason to have a life raft, if the cat is not inverted then dinghy access should be possible, maybe this is what happened to this guy.

[mark_morwood]

Originally Posted by AKA-None

So then shall we say that a proper monohull with full bulkheads and water tight doors/hatches would react the same?

As long as the keel had fallen off first.

[boatman61]

There be unsinkable Mono's, Sadler 26 & 29's, Etap's..

[Redreuben]

Why do these topics always descend into the same tit for tat drivel ?

I came looking for the type of cat it was and any other useful info.

[IslandHopper]

Some rescue footage.

https://www.news.com.au/travel/trave...f9f8ebb3ddb24e

https://spaces.hightail.com/space/h0HTa3bBJI/files

[NPCampbell]

Originally Posted by catsketcher

Gday JAFQ,
It is basic physics - you need lots of volume ( in the order of 4-5 metres cubed for my boat). Some designers have tried putting full height bulkheads fore and aft and voids in the bridgedeck. Others recommend putting non skid on the underside of the bridgedeck and installing handholds. Few owners will follow these recommendations and most cut into bulkheads to get more interior access to voids. As such their boats float very poorly when inverted.

Solid fiberglass is around 1.6 times as dense as water. However, most modern catamarans aren't made of solid fiberglass except in critical areas. A vast majority of the structure is foam or balsa core sandwich, including much of the furniture. 3/4" foam or balsa core fiberglass sandwich provides around 50 pounds of flotation per cubic foot.

Combined with airtight compartments I believe this is why most Euro made catamarans carry the CE "unsinkable" certification.

[Jim Cate]

Combined with airtight compartments I believe this is why most Euro made catamarans carry the CE "unsinkable" certification.

Unsinkable includes floating so poorly that the inverted cat does not provide a useful rescue platform... which is what Catsketcher was saying.

And as someone upthread mentioned, all too many owners cut access ports into supposedly sealed air spaces and stuff them with "stuff".

The result is shown in the various photos of French cats inverted and floating nearly vertically which appear now and then.

Now I wish that folks would stop this silly posturing about floatation and get back to the rescue that was the subject of the thread. I'd like to hear more about the cause and the rescue.

Jim

[catsketcher]

Thanks for the links - I can't see anything of the type of cat. Hopefully we will find something out later.