Four Rescued from Sailboat

[sailingdog]

From a story that was on the TV news tonight:

CG Rescues Four From Eight-Foot Seas
May 13, 2008

U.S. Coast Guard|by Donnie Brzuska



MIAMI - Four people were rescued by the crew of a Coast Guard cutter after their 38-foot sailboat began taking on water approximately 200-miles east of Charleston, S.C.


Paul Doughty, Linda Doughty, both of Keyport, N.J., and Berlinda and Antoinette Cole were sailing the Wolf when it began taking on water after the vessel apparently struck an unknown object in water. The vessel began flooding rapidly, and the group had no choice but to activate their emergency position indicating radio beacon to signal for help.


The Coast Guard Rescue Coordination Center at Atlantic Area Command in Portsmouth, Va., was the first to receive the distress signal from the Wolf's EPIRB. Rescue coordinators at Atlantic Area forwarded the call to Coast Guard District Seven Command in Miami to coordinate the rescue.


Rescue coordinators at District Seven diverted the crew of Coast Guard Cutter Reliance from Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, to make the rescue. The Reliance was only six-miles away from the sailboat's position when they diverted to help the foundering sailing vessel.


The crew of the Reliance arrived to the aid of the sailing vessel just in time. The sailboat's cabin had filled with approximately four feet of water, and the vessel's bilge pumps had lost power and were no longer pumping the water off the boat.


A rescue crew from the Reliance piloted their ship's small boat through 8- to-10-foot seas to the sailing vessel and pulled all four of the sailors off the sinking vessel safely.


The four sailors are aboard the Reliance and are in good condition. They will stay aboard the cutter until the ship pulls into Cape Cod, Mass., Wednesday.


"This rescue illustrates the importance of carrying a registered Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon," said Cmdr. Webster Balding, the commanding officer of Reliance. "These devices are one of the best tools for a vessel in need of assistance, especially vessels operating this far from shore."


The crew of the Wolf was on their way to Beaufort, S.C., from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., when they began to take on water.


The crew of the Reliance was unable to tow the Wolf in port safely because it was taking on so much water and the seas offshore were too large. The vessel is adrift and its position has been marked in order to prevent it from initiating any false mayday calls.

Doesn't say what kind of boat it was...but it was a sailboat.

[T37Chef]

What the hell did they hit, a submerged cargo container?

[sailingdog]

Doesn't say... but I'd imagine being in a boat with a big metal weight on the bottom of it and a hole in it, isn't the best place to be.

[hertfordnc]

here's a photo:

Coast Guard Rescues Four from Eight-Foot Seas

[hertfordnc]

What else could be done? It took at least 20 minutes for the Cutter to get there but it might have been longer so is it possible there was a way to save the boat?

I'm asking, I don't presume to know.

How big a hole might we be talking about?

Can you put a sail over the side to block the flow of water enough to bale faster than it's coming in?

Did the batteries flood before they could get the engine running?

makes me think about how my wires are routed.

Maybe a seperate bus to the bilge pump and the radio that could be isolated and connectied to a battery that's up high in the boat?

[sailingdog]

Putting a sail or other cloth patch over the side would only help if the hole were in a location where such a cover could be held tight against the hull. Given the complex curves found in most small sailboats, this isn't usually possible. If they had access to the inner portion of the hull, a patch or block could have been worked out, but most recent boats have poor access to the hull due to hull liners being a big part of their manufacturing process.

I generally recommend that a high-capacity manual bilge pump be accessible in the cabin and another in the cockpit. Sometimes, you'll have to be in the cockpit, and having a manual high-capacity pump there can give you some extra time. Having the wiring run as high as possible in the boat, and having the batteries not in the bilge is probably a good idea, although I don't know how high you'd want the batteries, given their extreme weight.

From the video, the boat looks to be a fairly new boat, with in-mast furling and roller furling headsails.

[JohnRPollard]

If you click on the photo in the link above, you can spool a video of the rescue,
or just go here:

http://www.uscgnewengland.com/posted...ort.203104.mov

Having looked at that clip, I have serious doubts that there were "four feet" of water in the cabin. The boat (looks like a Beneteau) is floating high on its lines, and is not behaving sluggishly as you'd expect a boat full of water would. Instead, it appears to be bouncing around much as you'd expect an under-canvassed boat would in a seaway.

Am I misreading this? Thoughts?

[sailingdog]

It certainly doesn't look like it has a cabin full of water...

[TrueBlue]

It will be interesting to see if the vessel is ever recovered - and to read an explanation from the captain.

Here's the USCG Quicktime Video, and a couple of screen shots from the low-quality video.





Note that the vessel seems to be floating on her lines OK - odd with "Four feet of water in her cabin". It is curious to note that between the time a mayday was transmitted and when the USCG arrived, most offshore crew in distress would deploy the inflatable, in case they needed to abandon ship. It''s still secured up against the transom.

Also, the running lights are working, so they didn't lose power.




EDIT - Dog - you're faster than me with those screen shots.

[hertfordnc]

I was thinking through a prepared response-

- "We are flooding" --turn on bilge pump, Start the engine, move one battery to high shelf where aligator clips are stowed connected to an emergency BUS for bilge pump and VHF; all of that takes less than a minute and the boat will have some elctricity until the hatches are awash.

Now you can look for the leak.

If the boat took 40 minutes to sink part way (as in photo) then how much water are we talking about?

1100 LB per inch? Down 40 inches so that's 5500 gallons ? just over 100 GPM? So if you can reduce the flow by 80% you might get in front of the flooding and save your boat?


But all of that is contingent on doing a few things right in the first 2 minutes.


Again, I don't know- I'm asking.