Final Incident No. 13 - Steering Seizure - and try your hand at all 13

8:31 PM Sat 10 Oct 2009 GMT

'Figure 1' .

The best mistakes to learn by are other people's. This is especially so with sailing.

In this anecdote, the 13th and last of a series, we present a real sailing situation which was investigated by the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB), and THREE lessons deduced. Can you identify the lessons? (Find the answers at the end of the story and links to the other 12 Incidents)

Three crew on board their 11m yacht left their home port in the early morning, having determined that the weather should be good for their intended passage.

The wind was south west force 5-6 and good progress was made, the yacht sailing first on a beam reach and then a broad reach. The mainsail had one slab reef taken in, and the roller reefing foresail was also reduced.

Some way into the passage, when the yacht was about 1 mile off a lee shore, the steering wheel mechanism started to make a clicking noise. Soon afterwards, the mechanism jammed completely, leaving the yacht with no steering.
The boat gybed, and swung round 180 degrees, through the wind and into a hove-to position with the genoa secured on the windward side. The crew rigged the emergency tiller, but the rudder would not budge. At this time, the depth of water was 25m, but the yacht only had 20m of anchor chain attached to the anchor.

The crew tried to investigate the steering mechanism further, but at 1350 the skipper decided to make a "Mayday" call, following which the local lifeboat and SAR helicopter were launched. The yacht drifted inshore, but once in a water depth of 15m, the jib was furled and the anchor let go.

Despite using the engine to alleviate the drift, the snatching of the anchor on the bottom caused such loads that the rope connecting the bitter end of the chain to the anchor locker failed and the anchor was lost.

With nothing now to restrain it, the yacht continued to drift ashore. At about 1415, and with the lifeboat in sight, the
yacht beached. The lifeboat manoeuvred in close to the shore to try and pass a tow line, but grounded on a small reef. After freeing itself, the lifeboat stood further offshore and the crew fired a rocket speed line to the yacht.

It missed, but a passer-by ashore helped get the speed line to the crew on the yacht, which allowed a tow line to be
passed. The tow line was secured and the lifeboat started to pull the yacht off the beach but, unfortunately, the line parted and the yacht beached once again.

At this stage, the lifeboat coxswain decided that the risk to the yacht's crew was too great, and they were evacuated from their vessel by helicopter. The crew suffered no injuries during their ordeal, and returned to the vessel at low tide to salvage some belongings.

The yacht, however, was not able to be salvaged and became a total loss.

Figure 2 - .. .

Click here for the THREE lessons that the MAIB deduced.

Sail-World Cruising is grateful to MAIB for its permission to use these incidents

To try your hand at the 12 previously published incidents, along with the lessons, click the following links:

Incident No. 1

Incident No. 2

Incident No. 3

Incident No. 4

Incident No. 5

Incident No. 6

Incident No. 7

Incident No. 8

Incident No. 9

Incident No. 10

Incident No. 11

Incident No. 12

by MAIB/Sail-World Cruising