Safety & Seamanship

The US Sailing report makes several specific recommendations to prevent future accidents such as the one that involved WingNuts, among them:

If you don’t have any plans for the last weekend of March and beginning of April, you can still register and attend the Annapolis Safety at Sea seminar, presented by the Marine Trades Association of Maryland and the U.S. Naval Academy. The seminar runs March 31-April 1 and will be held in Alumni Hall at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.

This is the first in a two-part series that examines extensive reports on three sailing accidents. Each capsule summary of the reports is followed by a brief analysis of the US Sailing reports, and our recommendations for sailors. Fourteen-year-old Olivia Constants died last summer when her harness was accidentally hooked in the trapeze and she could not surface after the boat turned turtle. US Sailing made recommendations regarding capsize and recovery training; life jackets; trapeze gear and training; entrapment; electronic communication; language; and crisis, incident, and disaster plans.

The US Sailing report makes seven specific recommendations, several calling for important research into ways to prevent future accidents such as the one that took the life of Olivia Constants.

Do try this at home: Don your favorite inflatable-PFD/harness and inflate it. Dont waste a gas cartridge; use the oral inflation tube. Wade into the water. A pool is fine-make sure it is still shallow enough to stand. Now, imagine you are underneath an overturned hull and are trying to escape. Try to swim beneath the surface as you might do to get out from under the turtled boat. You don't have to dive deep, the imaginary overturned boat could be as small as a dinghy.

In the wake of “repeated product failures,” Orion Safety Products has instituted a replacement program for older XLT flares and 12-gauge signal systems that some boaters may still have in their emergency kits. According to the company, some XLT and 12-gauge signals made before October 2008—when the designs were revamped—have failed to launch or to ignite.

In May 2010, Practical Sailor reviewed a prototype man-overboard (MOB) recovery device called the Seascoopa. The parbuckle-type device functions much like a human trawler net, enabling the recovery of injured or unconscious MOBs while the boat is slowly making way. While the device performed as advertised, it needed some design fine-tuning. After an extensive re-design, the production version of the new Seascoopa addresses most of the concerns testers had with the prototype and cranked the construction quality and design up a notch. Testers felt there are certain benefits to the improved Seascoopa that other recovery aids do not offer, but it's not our preferred device for use as a primary MOB aid.

Titanium is of particular interest to sailors due to its resistance to galvanic corrosion. It has the highest strength-to-weight ratio of any metal and is non-magnetic. It is up to 20 times more scratch resistant than stainless steels. Practical Sailor contributor Patrick Childress takes an in-depth look at the metal and its use in the marine industry as his boat, a Valiant 40, is refitted with titanium chainplates and other rigging.

It’s a good idea to keep expired flares on hand to use as backups (on board or in a vehicle), but be sure to store them in a clearly labeled container separate from your current flares. If you find yourself with an overstock of old—or unwanted—hand flares, however, you must dispose of them properly. Unfortunately there’s no set agency that deals with expired flare disposal or recycling. Because state and federal laws pertaining to flare disposal and transportation vary, there’s no single disposal policy.

On Oct. 31, U.S. Sailing released independent reports on three highly publicized sailing accidents that happened this year. Practical Sailor has been closely following the WingNuts capsize, in which the captain, Mark Morley, and Suzanne Bickel died of head injuries and drowning, while still tethered to the boat, and six crew were saved by fellow racers. Practical Sailor Technical Editor Ralph Naranjo served on the U.S. Sailing panel; his focus was on the weather and the boat design features that led to the accident.