Expérience de traînards ...

Voila encore un sujet qui revient , et je trouve que le récit ci dessous d'un convoyeur qui a fait (si j'ai bien lu) 28 fois (respect) le trajet Capetown - Antilles est édifiant .

Pardon pour ceux qui ne lisent pas trop l'anglais , j'ai la flemme de tout traduire, en gros il parle de grosses conditions rencontrées à 3 reprises en Atlantique Sud entre Le Cap et Ste Hélène: vent 45-50 kn, mer forte (8-9 m) mais pas déferlante ni trop escarpée (steep) , tout s'est plutôt bien passé en fuite avec GV affalée et un mouchoir de génois (handkerchief): jusque là, tout va bien.

Mais lors d'une quatrième raclée, une mer bien plus mauvaise (9 à 11 m ....!!)et 50-60 kn de vent rendaient évidemment le cata (un Léopard 40 à convoyer à Fort Lauderdale) incontrôlable, et le risque de sancir (pitch pole) était réel : il a alors placé en boucle une aussière de 18 mm , 100 m de long entre les taquets babord et tribord ; mais cette longue boucle n'a pas ralenti le bateau , elle flottait à la surface . Il a ensuite ajouté une longueur de 10 m de chaîne , reliée à l'aussière par une grosse manille (cette manille se plaçait d'elle même au milieu de la boucle , donc la chaîne faisait un lest bien placé au milieu aussi ) :
résultat très probant, le cata ne menaçait plus de sancir ... et John est persuadé qu'il y serait resté sans cette "ligne de traîne mixte"!

A noter que vu les efforts énormes subis par les taquets, il a frappé l'aussière à la fois sur les taquets arrières et les taquets de garde.

Voila ; j'ai trouvé ce récit instructif, et peut-être cela servira-t-il un jour à quelqu'un?

Je vous souhaite plein de petit temps !! Eric .

Hi All,

The story below gives a bit of insight to one of my experiences, which I first posted on the Cruiserlog Forum a time back. It occurred in the South Atlantic and the measures taken if it had occurred in the Med or Caribbean would most likely have been different.

I have personally had four such situations in all the years whilst sailing (I am a delivery captain). One of them was as follows:

In mid 2007 I was enroute from Cape Town with my first port of call being Jamestown, St Helena Island, a trip of 1700nm which I had sailed 28 times before. I was delivering a 40’ Leopard catamaran to Fort Lauderdale. I had on previous trips experienced heavy seas of 8 to 9 metres and 45 knot plus winds turning from the south to northwest whilst a cold front passed by. None of these seas had been breaking or too steep – I had simply dropped sail with the exception of a handkerchief size bit of foresail and run with the wind and swell until it was comfortable to turn back on course and continue NW once the front had passed.

On this trip, however, things were slightly different – about 700nm out of Cape Town I started experiencing 9 to 11 metre steep swells with the occasional breaking waves as a huge frontal system approached. The wind picked up to just over 50 knots, gusting to about 60. In reality the swell was every about 7 or 8 seconds but seemed to be 4 seconds. We had started surfing uncontrollably down the waves and needed to do something to prevent this or we would be rolled or pitch-polled. The daylight was fading (amazing how the bad stuff always happens at night) when I instructed the crew (3 POB) to haul out our spare anchor warp, a 22 mm nylon line of 100 metres in length. We attached each end of the line to the mid-ships cleats and then lead it aft and around the aft cleats as well. Then dumped the entire remainder overboard and dragged it as a “U” behind the boat. The object was to stop the boat surfing down the front of the waves. It did not help! As we accelerated down the front of a wave the line simply pulled out of the water, forming no resistance at all. I needed to add weight to the line to keep it under water.

So, all hands pulled the line in and I took a 10 metre length of anchor chain and a large shackle and fastened the chain to the line. I did it so that the shackle could slide down the warp and “self centre” itself at the back of the “U”. It worked! There was now enough resistance to stop the cat surfing down the front of the waves. We took a lot of white water over the stern of the boat but she lifted comfortably to let the waves pass under her.

At about 02:00 I was on watch when I heard the “big one” come. All I heard was a few seconds of “Shhhhhhhhhh” before it hit. A wall of solid water came over the stern of the boat and blew out the saloon door. We took on about 2 tons of cold Atlantic in a split second – it took the bilge pumps over an hour to pump the hulls out. This was the only wave that actually caused any problems. Although the boat took water and violently shuddered when the wave hit us, it remained stable and kept going in the right direction with the warp keeping the resistance needed to prevent the boat taking off uncontrollably.

When we arrived in St Helena a week later we re-installed the sliding door and had no further problems on the delivery.

On subsequent deliveries I have always had the spare anchor warp and chain “ready for deployment” before I have departed. I experienced no chaff on the warp from the movement of the shackle or any at the cleats.

What would I have done differently – nothing! What would have happened if we did not have the warp and chain – I would more than likely not have been writing this post, simple as that! The route sailing boats take to St Helena in not near a shipping route and thus, if things had gone “pear-shaped”, there would not have been much chance of rescue.

John

The Delivery Guy

www.sailblogs.com[...]iveries