sbman
Guru
- Joined
- Jul 25, 2017
- Messages
- 828
- Location
- USA
- Vessel Name
- Second Chance
- Vessel Make
- 42' Uniflite Double Cabin
On Saturday morning I was out on deck doing some maintenance and fussing with things when I noticed a sail boat approaching the mooring field at one knot or less. It was dead calm, flat water. The captain was towing an dinghy on a 20' or so painter. All sails up. He appeared to have at least some amount of steerage, maybe.
I thought to myself, this is not going to end well. He entered the mooring field between two rows and I figured he had steerage enough to choose his entry point. As he proceeded into the field, his dinghy chose to drift to starboard and caught an unoccupied ball, and then the ball spun around a few times and the dinghy drifted towards the sail boat. He then pulled himself to his dinghy and started trying to free himself from the ball. He didn't have much luck.
Another sailor on a boat a few balls down offered to help unstick him, which he gladly accepted. He got back on his boat and stood there on deck while the volunteer freed his dinghy and painter from the ball.
Once free, he started drifting again, now with no steerage whatsoever.
He drifted into the next boat down the line and him and the volunteer did their best to fend off. The volunteer returned to his own boat. The captain then jumped into his dinghy and pulled on his outboard to no avail while he drifted into the next boat, an occupied boat. This one was fended by off by a long pole by it's occupant, and possibly some strong words. After this one, he drifted into yet another and did another round frantically pulling on the outboard before jumping back into his boat and attempting to fend off. He had side-tied his dinghy by now so it wasn't getting caught up in each boat as he collided with them.
So, the question is, in this situation what would be appropriate with respect to the owners of the boats that were collided into?
It's hard to have sympathy for the drifting boat, as the captain chose to sail with no wind and no viable means of backup propulsion and steered his way right into the field. I don't know if any of the boats collided with were damaged or not. Thoughts?
I thought to myself, this is not going to end well. He entered the mooring field between two rows and I figured he had steerage enough to choose his entry point. As he proceeded into the field, his dinghy chose to drift to starboard and caught an unoccupied ball, and then the ball spun around a few times and the dinghy drifted towards the sail boat. He then pulled himself to his dinghy and started trying to free himself from the ball. He didn't have much luck.
Another sailor on a boat a few balls down offered to help unstick him, which he gladly accepted. He got back on his boat and stood there on deck while the volunteer freed his dinghy and painter from the ball.
Once free, he started drifting again, now with no steerage whatsoever.
He drifted into the next boat down the line and him and the volunteer did their best to fend off. The volunteer returned to his own boat. The captain then jumped into his dinghy and pulled on his outboard to no avail while he drifted into the next boat, an occupied boat. This one was fended by off by a long pole by it's occupant, and possibly some strong words. After this one, he drifted into yet another and did another round frantically pulling on the outboard before jumping back into his boat and attempting to fend off. He had side-tied his dinghy by now so it wasn't getting caught up in each boat as he collided with them.
So, the question is, in this situation what would be appropriate with respect to the owners of the boats that were collided into?
It's hard to have sympathy for the drifting boat, as the captain chose to sail with no wind and no viable means of backup propulsion and steered his way right into the field. I don't know if any of the boats collided with were damaged or not. Thoughts?