Safety Lessons Learned Part 1

Recent sailing accidents and their US Sailing investigations offer important lessons for all sailors.

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Youth sailors in Sarasota

Psychologist Carl Jung might have called it synchronicity, or a meaningful coincidence: three highly publicized sailing accidents occurring in close succession-one for each month of summer 2011. In June, 14-year-old Olivia Constants tragically drowned during the first week of sailing practice on her Club 420 on Chesapeake Bay. In July, a veteran racing skipper and his partner died while still tethered to their boat, WingNuts, when it capsized in the Chicago-Mackinac Island Race. In August, the presumed epitome of racing sailing engineering, Rambler 100, lost its keel, capsized, and every member of its crew-representing the top echelon of racing sailors-survived, despite a long list of reasons why they shouldnt have.

With summer fast approaching and with still enough time to learn from these events, Practical Sailor is taking a look at what happened last summer to try to make some sense of it all. This article is the first in a two-part series that examines three extensive reports produced by a highly credentialed team of experts who volunteered their time for US Sailing, the governing body of racing sailing in the United States. Each capsule summary of the reports is followed by a brief analysis of the US Sailing report, and our recommendations for sailors. We encourage every reader to download the full reports, available at the US Sailing website: htp://about.ussailing.org/US_SAILING_Meetings/USS_Reports.htm.

Club 420 Capsize

Thirteen-year-old Sarah Alexander and her partner 14-year-old Olivia Constants were in their first week of sailing in the Severn Sailing Associations Chesapeake Racers Club 420 travel team. The boat they sailed was a Club 420 equipped with a trapeze, used for hiking out when sailing under the spinnaker. Their boat was among six others under the supervision of professional instructor Arthur Blodgett, who was monitoring the fleet from a 16-foot Zodiac RIB. Both wore Type III PFDs.

The teams purpose that day was to practice trapezes and spinnakers in waves. The boats were sailing a windward-leeward course near the mouth of the Severn River, in Maryland. Conditions were described as light and gusty 5 to 10 knots, with the nearby weather station at the U.S. Naval Academy recording 8 to 15 knots.

Just prior to the accident, Sarah was steering on the leeward side trimming the spinnaker. Some 50 to 75 yards from the turning mark, Olivia began stowing the spinnaker in the forward compartment, which required her to sit in or reach across the starboard forward corner of the cockpit, where the trapeze wire and bail-the loop that harness hooks into-were hanging. Before the spinnaker was completely stowed, the boat accidentally jibed to port tack and the boom swung across the cockpit, pressing Olivia against the starboard stay.

Im stuck on something, Olivia said, showing no distress, according to Sarah. As the boat heeled more toward the starboard side, Sarah reached over the port side for the centerboard-with the hopes of counteracting or slowing the capsize-and slid off the boat. The boat capsized and when Olivia did not appear Sarah waved for Blodgett, who was near the turning mark.

When Blodgett arrived-in less than a minute, according to Sarah-the boat was upside down. Blodgett asked Sarah to swim below and look for Olivia. She ducked under the air pocket in the overturned cockpit and saw through the murky water that Olivia was immobile and completely submerged. Blodgett then went in the water and his efforts were so vigorous he inadvertently removed Olivias life jacket before he discovered the problem. The trapeze harness was awkwardly hooked on the bail so that it could not be unhooked. Olivia had been accidentally hooked in the trapeze system. Blodgett was unable to extract the hook until he loosened a buckle on the harness. Olivia was eventually pulled free and rushed to the hospital where she was pronounced dead.

Analysis

After a fairly detailed account of what happened on the water and the rescue efforts, the US Sailing report detours in a lengthy and mostly positive discussion of the clubs response to the media blitz and the shock among club members. It also mentions several positive steps that the club afterward took to prevent such an accident from occurring-a float on the mainsail head to help prevent a full capsize, among them.

It is hard to read this report without noticing the minimal attention given to harness and trapeze gear, which apparently contributed to the entrapment. Only passing mention is made of the various optional harnesses that have been designed to prevent entanglement; the rest is left to a footnote link to a public discussion on the Internet. Sailors would have been well served by photos and a brief description of the various trapeze hooks, at the least.

The premise that the crew was prepared for the conditions seems difficult to support. As the report states, neither girl had practiced capsize or escape from a trapeze-equipped boat. The appropriate number of instructors on the water is not directly questioned. Some clubs insist on having two supervisors on hand (together in one or two different boats), leaving one to go in the water if needed, and the other to maintain communication with shore. Finally, although college-age sailors race virtually the same boat without trapezes, the report sidesteps the question as to whether a trapeze-equipped 420 is an appropriate boat for young sailors who have recently stepped up from an Optimist.

Bottom line: In our opinion, the narrative of the clubs emotional public relations and management struggles, while valuable, overshadowed the more important discussion of boats, skills, gear, and training. There are far too many gaps in the sailing-training and gear-related aspect of the report. Fortunately, many clubs are already taking the most obvious steps toward a safer youth sailing program without waiting for the trials and research that the report wisely recommends. (See US Sailing Recommendations.) One point tucked into the final commentary deserves more emphasis-such incidents of entanglement, though seldom fatal, are not as rare as one might think.

Recommendations

As the report recommends, an accelerated examination of trapeze-related equipment and practices is critical. Likewise, a closer look at the equipment that reduces the chance of a full capsize in the Club 420 and other boats popular among youth sailors should be a priority. Although a one-size-fits-all solution may not exist, it is becoming clear that some of the boats and gear still in use in youth sailing programs across the country may add unnecessary risk.

In addition to the well-reasoned recommendations made by the US Sailing report, PS recommends that sailing clubs that include trapeze-equipped Club 420s in their youth program carefully assess the risk-versus-payoff of the trapeze. If a programs purpose is to develop competent collegiate-level sailors, then the trapeze could be unwarranted at this early level, before the sailors are fully competent on the basic Club 420-or at all.

Finally, at this level in a young sailors development, sailing clubs and governing bodies such as US Sailing must own a share of responsibility for the boats and gear that its participants use. These organizations and individual clubs must be in a position to confidently recommend the types of equipment young sailors should be using. Avoiding this responsibility because it adds too much liability is not an acceptable solution.

Next: A look at the Rambler 100 and WingNuts accidents.
US Sailing Report
Darrell Nicholson
Practical Sailor has been independently testing and reporting on sailboats and sailing gear for more than 50 years. Supported entirely by subscribers, Practical Sailor accepts no advertising. Its independent tests are carried out by experienced sailors and marine industry professionals dedicated to providing objective evaluation and reporting about boats, gear, and the skills required to cross oceans. Practical Sailor is edited by Darrell Nicholson, a long-time liveaboard sailor and trans-Pacific cruiser who has been director of Belvoir Media Group's marine division since 2005. He holds a U.S. Coast Guard 100-ton Master license, has logged tens of thousands of miles in three oceans, and has skippered everything from pilot boats to day charter cats. His weekly blog Inside Practical Sailor offers an inside look at current research and gear tests at Practical Sailor, while his award-winning column,"Rhumb Lines," tracks boating trends and reflects upon the sailing life. He sails a Sparkman & Stephens-designed Yankee 30 out of St. Petersburg, Florida. You can reach him by email at practicalsailor@belvoir.com.