August 2024
By Bob Muggleston
My days of competitive sailboat racing ended many years ago, but I still find the big offshore events endlessly fascinating, mostly because of the stakes involved and the drama that invariably occurs when men (and increasingly, women) head for blue water at a time not of their choosing. When you’ve signed up for the Newport Bermuda Race, or the Marblehead to Halifax Ocean Race, or the Transpac, or the Sydney Hobart, you don’t get to pick your weather window. The race starts when it starts. You’re at the mercy of whatever conditions happen to be on the course. So you prepare, and you prepare, and you take the Safety at Sea classes, and you make sure your boat is kitted out with all the latest safety gear, and you prepare some more. And then? You cross your fingers.
Which brings me to this year’s Newport Bermuda Race. Was anyone following? It didn’t feature unusually bad weather, but there was an unusual amount of chaos. No less than two well-found yachts sank during the race (one with a sailing magazine journalist aboard), and one of the bigger racing sleds, likely being driven hard by professional sailors, was dismasted. It’s not unheard of for folks to go in the water, but sinkings and dismastings are pretty rare. So what happened?
The sinking of Alliance, a J/121, in the Gulf Stream, likely wasn’t weather-related. The crew of Alliance believes they collided with the scourge of most offshore races these days, a submerged container, after which super-heated Gulf Stream water poured in at an uncontrollable rate. In the case of Gunga Din, a Swedish Yachts 41 that sank just 80 miles from the finish line in Bermuda, what happened remains a bit of a mystery. It will be interesting to see what explanation eventually surfaces. There were no injuries or fatalities on these boats; other racers performed the rescues and then continued on to Bermuda. In the case of Ceilidh, the 40-footer that came to the rescue of Alliance, taking on nine new crewmembers meant that there were now 16 people aboard with two more days of racing. Talk about drama! (And a funky smell belowdecks). I bet that was an interesting 48 hours.
In re-hashing the events of this race with my buddy, Tim, the topic of breeze out of the wrong direction came up. Twenty five knots on a coastal cruise rarely has negative implications, unless it’s an especially tricky docking situation. But 25 knots out of the north while you’re in the generally south-to-north flowing Gulf Stream can be absolutely terrifying. Having been in the Gulf Stream twice now when this was the case, I can testify to as much. In this extreme wind-against-tide situation, waves take unnatural shapes. In the first Newport Bermuda Race I ever did, with the legendary Jim Mertz, we saw square-sided waves as big as houses that traveled unnaturally close to each other. Since our time in the Stream was during daylight hours, it was easy enough to steer around them. But what, I thought, if it was blowing 40 knots out of the north? Or 60? And it was at night?
The wrong place at the wrong time. This is precisely the situation that the four-person crew aboard the 50-foot, Aage Nielsen-designed sloop Solution found themselves in on their return from Bermuda. After a fairly fast and uneventful race, Solution’s owner and daughter, and a couple they didn’t previously know, left Bermuda headed for their homeport in Maine. Along the way events occurred that are familiar to anyone who has ever gone offshore: First, one of the crewmembers was thrown headfirst into something when the boat lurched unexpectedly, resulting in a concussion. Then the engine died. Then the wind began to blow out of the north just as they reached one of the outer walls of the Gulf Stream, where currents are generally the strongest. In the wind-against-tide scenario they began to see the giant, physics-defying square waves I’ve just described. They fell awkwardly off two of them, after which the owner thinks Solution’s hull cracked. How does this story end?
Me? It’s tough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time if you’re on your couch.
But one day, I’m sure, I’ll rejoin the fray.
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