Safety & Seamanship

The hallmark of an overboard fall protection system is a system of jacklines running along the deck, with tethers attached so that the sailor can move throughout the boat with relative freedom. But this is not the real backbone of the system. A review of overboard accidents reveals that very few fall when transiting from cockpit to bow-they get washed overboard when they stop to perform a task. While moving, sailors are focused, holding on with two hands, and mindful of the approach of waves and the motion of the boat. But while taming a headsail or straightening up a tangle of line in the cockpit, the mind wanders, the hands are occupied, and risk increases. A wave strikes, we tangle our feet or step on a sail, and whoosh . . . were overboard.

Rules of thumb are rather useless when it comes to equipment that is stored in a locker and then used roughly. Weve broken lots of new and old equipment during testing and learned a lot about what to look for, but even so we are often surprised when good looking equipment fails and scratched up stuff works fine. Inspect closely and often, regardless of age.

On November 18, 2017, Simon Speirs, an experienced sailor, went overboard while at the bow assisting with a headsail change on a Clipper Round the World Boat CV30. It was blustery, with sustained winds of 20 knots, gusting to 40 knots. Shortly after he went overboard, his safety tether detached and he was separated from his boat. His body was recovered 34 minutes later. The cause of death has not been determined but drowning is the suspected cause. While such accidents are tragic, they offer a chance to re-evaluate equipment standards within a real-world context.

The sailing yacht CV30 was taking part in the third leg of the Clipper Round the World Yacht Race having left Cape Town on 31 October 2017 bound for Fremantle, Western Australia.

Testers used lab and field tests to evaluate each clips functionality, strength, and durability. After inspecting several sailboats to evaluate potential caribiner-benders and how we might replicate the loads, we returned to the lab and began pull-testing carabiners. The test data in the accompanying table resulted from tests that were modeled after those used to verify CE (European standard) and UIAA (climbing gear standards) specifications. All pull tests were carried out at a steady pull rate of about 2 inches per minute. These included the following tests...

Like a car seatbelt, the snap hook on a sailors safety tether has only one essential job to do. It must support the dynamic loads of a human body should a sailor fall overboard or get thrown across the deck to the end of his tether (about six feet). But late last year, when British sailor Simon Speirs was swept overboard during the Clipper Ventures Round the World Race, the resulting load bent and opened the stainless-steel snap hook that connected him to the 70-foot racing yacht CV-30.

Safety at sea has become more than a noteworthy slogan. Many feel it defines the right game plan and gear choice to ensure a favorable outcome in challenging conditions. But at Practical Sailor, we also recognize its role in incident prevention, and we understand why ones boat handling ability, navigation competency, weather awareness, and sound decision-making are just as important as the gear in the grab bag-perhaps even more so.

Many sailors want to tuck an additional instrument display or autopilot control at the binnacle, but just don't have the space. Seaview offers a very compact enclosure just right for this purpose. The Seaview SPOD is designed for adding a modern low-profile instrument display, autopilot, or other accessory to your sailboat helm. The SPOD is designed to be mounted either to the side of an existing chartplotter-sized enclosure or directly onto stainless rail.

Learning to sail is simple. Thousands of youngsters perfect the essential small-boat skills over the course of a summer. Mastering the art of crossing an ocean in small boat is a different story. Sure, we read about clueless individuals setting out in ramshackle boats making 1,000-mile crossings. The ocean, especially in tropical seas, is not nearly as foreboding as it might seem to the average landlubber.

Weve been enjoying desert-dry gasoline for five years, courtesy of silica gel vent driers from H2OUT (see EPA Mandate Sparks Fuel-Vent Filter Test, Practical Sailor, January 2013). As a result, carburetor corrosion and jet plugging have been eliminated. PS diesel testers have report reduced condensate water and corrosion. We tested H2Out space driers against desiccan'ts and dehumidifiers (Dehumidifier Field Tests, Practical Sailor, June 2017) and concluded they had insufficient capacity for cabin drying. However, we quietly put one to work, protecting our flares. Although marine signal flares are waterproof, are packaged in plastic bags, and include deliquescent ingredients in the formulation, it is well known that by the expiration date, as many as half will not function. When we cleaned out our new-to-us boat 10 years ago, we discovered a package of four Orion Hand Held Signal Flares stored in a damp transom locker. They looked shaky, so we tested them, still a year short of expiration. Three of the four flares lit, but only one burned properly. The others sputtered, one going out and the other burning long and dull. This time, with fresh flares, we included an H2OUT SD109 space drier inside the bag and stored them in a dry cabin locker.