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Training and practice prevent tragedy at sea

Sunshine Power & Sail Squadron
power and sail

The middle of Georgia Strait. Sunny skies. A 30-foot sailboat. Over ground speed is six knots. Motor sailing in a moderate sea. The start of a vacation cruise. What happens next catches all three of us by surprise. We’re changing helmsmen. This requires climbing over the bench in the cockpit to get around the large wheel. In the process, the helmsman stumbles sideways, loses her balance, slams against the stainless safety cable strung across the stern. Her body twists awkwardly, the fitting of the safety wire lets go. The helmsman executes an awkward backward somersault over the transom, arms and legs thrashing helplessly, vainly searching for support. She hits the water in a shower of icy spray. Becoming briefly entangled in the lines of the inflatable dinghy towing behind, she silently slips beneath the surface, out of sight. 

We had been alone in the cockpit, the skipper having gone below to don warmer clothing. She reappears in the cockpit, just in time to see what has happened. While she grabs the wheel, I search the dark waters astern for some reappearance of the helmsman. The distance is rapidly increasing. Finally, I see her head break the surface, way off now, hat and glasses gone. I immediately shout to the skipper and begin pointing to the floating helmsman’s location. I never take my eyes off her, continuing all the while to point. Skipper makes a quick 180-degree turn, to retrace our track. I see that our helmsman has fired the cartridge to inflate her Personal Flotation Device and is floating face up in the water. The inflation, and resulting hyperextended position of her arms, makes it difficult for her to move, or to help with her own rescue. 

As part of our training, we have practised just such scenarios previously. We bring the boat about downwind of our helmsman, then ease forward slowly until the dinghy is within her grasp. By now, some time has elapsed. I pull them in and snug the tender to the stern. I help her up the boarding ladder, attached to the swim grid. She is shaking from shock and the cold. After a change into dry clothes, and a hot cup of tea, she falls asleep, exhausted. What might have been a disaster simply turns into a lively topic for discussion at Happy Hour that evening. 

There are important issues here. First is the element of surprise. None of us was remotely expecting this to happen. When it did, our previous training and practice kicked in automatically. Would that happen without prior training? What if the helmsman had not been wearing a PFD? There was no time for her to grab one from the boat. The vessel had a high freeboard. If it hadn’t had a walk-in transom and swim grid, would the outcome have been different? For older boaters, do we have a reboarding device to raise a sodden, helpless individual in full gear out of the water? Have we got the strength? Will our device function on a vessel with high freeboard? Have we ever tried using it? What if the weather had been worse – seas higher, spotting more difficult, or the person overboard wasn’t normally comfortable in the water? 

Get some training. The Sunshine Coast Power and Sail Squadron (CPS) is active here where we live. Contact them at 778-734-0737 or sunshineccps@gmail.com to learn what training is available. CPS’s purpose is to provide the training required for you to have a safe boating experience. RCM-SAR, with whom we collaborate closely, are only called out if we have failed in our mission. One is prevention; the other – cure. Take your pick.

– By Jack Adams/Past Commander