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Little Scorpion anchorage is in the distance. There's a reef between the large rock and the island. Not a good place to park a boat.

Twenty-11 was brand new when the first incident at sea happened this year.

I have a personal interest in this one as the Bosun and I planned a New Year’s run to Santa Cruz, just as the folks in this story did.
We checked the weather a couple of times every day for a week before the trip. I know that’s a waste of time. Predictions more than a day or so out are famously inaccurate. But we checked and wasted our time.

By the 29th we were getting leery of the possibility of Santa Anas. When we got to our go-no-go decision point, the forecast said nothing about Santa Anas. However, a front would pass through the area and the prediction that kept us at home showed the wind shifting from a moderate westerly to a stronger northeast flow.

The timing was important to us, too. The last forecast showed frontal passage around midnight. We figured we could handle the wind shift, but it would mean we’d be up waiting for the shift and then would likely have to get underway in the middle of the night in adverse conditions.

Before canceling our trip, we had planned to anchor a mile or so off Smugglers to give us sea room to deal with a wind shift. But even that seemed dicey.

Weather always capable of the unexpected

We’re old and we don’t like to work after dark. Add to that the unease our wives were showing and we decided on a “fast cruise,” wherein we all hung out on the boat while tied fast to the dock. On New Years Day we were kicking ourselves for not going. It was bright, warm and still. Perfect for being at the islands.

Perfect it was … in Channel Islands Harbor, but the weather at the Channel Islands went as predicted. The wind shift came as NOAA had called and that meant trouble for a small Catalina anchored at Little Scorpion.

By the time our narrative starts, the wind has prompted the crew to get out of the anchorage. We don’t know if they were on two hooks or one, but they were definitely on a lee shore and very uncomfortable with the prospects. So they – wisely – got underway.

To their credit, they had asked local authorities specifically if Santa Anas were forecast and they were told, correctly, that none were on the horizon. Nobody mentioned the front and the wind shift which always accompanies a strong front.

In order to hide from wind and swell, most visitors to Little Scorpion Anchorage drop their hooks very close to Bird S**t Rock. If the wind shifts to the E or NE, captains find themselves on a dangerous lee shore.

The wind was gusting to about 20 knots, which raised a formidable chop in Little Scorpion. Their little boat was getting knocked around but they were able to start their outboard and pull in the anchor and move off the lee shore.

They had the same luck with their outboard that I usually have: it quit at a very bad time.

They pulled out their jib and tried to sail out, which might have worked if they had a bit of sea room. The Catalina sails just fine on headsail alone, but they didn’t have any room and got pushed back between Bird S**t Rock and the island. If you’ve kayaked in there, you know there is a reef that blocks that passage. And that is where they came to rest.

They called Mayday on channel 16, alerting the Coast Guard and Vessel Assist. Both got underway.

Abandon ship – a tough decision

Their position became untenable and the crew abandoned ship, rowing their dinghy safely ashore.

Vessel Assist Ventura’s boat arrived on scene. The captain assessed the situation and decided to stand off. The area was dotted by lobster traps, it was the middle of the night and the captain deemed conditions too hazardous for his crew and vessel, particularly too hazardous to put a swimmer in the water.

At daybreak, though seas and wind had not settled appreciably, the rescuers could maneuver among the traps. A swimmer secured a line to the Catalina and the boat was towed clear of the reef. They also picked up the crew from the beach and put a pump aboard the rescued boat.

On the way home some three miles west of Gina, something catastrophic happened on the Catalina. The pump could no longer keep up with the incoming water flow and the trusty little Catalina disappeared in a couple hundred feet of water.

Here are the lessons I take away from this accident.

These guys got the weather forecast and were satisfied that no Santa Ana meant they’d be safe in the anchorage. Somehow they missed the forecast wind shift. That said, we’ve had the wind shift on us with nothing in the forecast. So it’s something you have to consider any time you anchor. Setting an anchor watch and setting the GPS anchor alarm are always prudent measures.

We always anchor bow and stern in Little Scorpion. We’ve got a formidable bow anchor and chain road and we have a big Fortress astern that has held us in over 30 knots of shifting wind. Worst case for us – had we been there (other than screaming wives and children) would have been jettisoning our bow anchor and motoring or pulling ourselves back to the stern anchor – now the windward anchor, then getting underway. Of course, if our engine had quit, we’d probably have ended up on the same rocks. On the other hand, with a good bit more sea room, we might have been able to sail clear.

Outboards. Damned outboards. According to one of my friends expert in the matter, 4-stroke outboards have automatic shutdown systems that turn the motor off when low oil pressure is sensed. Severe rocking will make the sensors “think” the oil pressure is low.  And you know they must have been rocking in the chop.

Experts. They were misled by experts twice. The first was on the weather forecast.  The second was not so much advice as a suggestion that they might row their dinghy through the surf for pickup.They didn’t do that. It’s natural to act on advice in an emergency, but prudent to evaluate the based on your level of ability, your equipment and the conditions at hand. They did that and got home safely if short one boat.

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No wonder no one gets it

It’s that time of year, the time when I try to explain to my nav class how tides, tide tables, tidal current and all the other things  make sailing into San Francisco Bay so much fun and such a challenge.

Little did I realize that the tides are not a function (mostly) of the moon’s gravitational effect on the earth’s surface. Nope. It’s divine, at least according to Bill O’Reilly.

Fortunately, Bill doesn’t use the tides as an example of intelligent design, because the variability of tides worldwide might put a big question mark on intelligent design. (Many believe that there are two high and two low tides a day. True … in most places. Some places, there are but one of each).

So, if you’re in my nav class and don’t quite understand how the tide tables work, do not fret. Just invoke Bill O’Reilly, God or Neil deGrasse Tyson. You’ll ace the test.

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Too chilly for us

With apologies to my friends who sail (or have sailed) the “other” Channel Islands.

We canceled our overnight trip to Santa Cruz for weather considerations. I know, dear English friends, that you’re disappointed in our cancellation as it is far warmer than freezing and the breeze no longer has a gale warning in it. The seas are a modest 4 feet. Hardly proper (which apparently to Brits means cold, blowing like hell in sea states that go mast high).

But the thought of waking up to the chill … well that was too much for us.

We are, after all, SOUTHERN Californians and sailors of THESE Channel Islands.

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It's a no-brainer to don a life jacket

How many deaths did it take?

How many dead sailors have to line up before the leading authority on sail-training decides that everyone should wear a life jacket, at least in sailing schools?

The answer: none. Sort of. Seems the death of an American Sailing Instructor and his student prompted the insurer that covers us instructors to demand that everyone wear a life jacket.

They have also required that everyone sign a release.

That second step protects the insurance company, but the first step – putting on that life jacket – is the one that will save lives.

The ASA has always been a lukewarm promoter of life jacket use and a bit lame – my opinion – in promoting safety. Unlike the aviation community, which thoroughly investigates accidents and disseminates lessons learned, the boating community shrugs its collective shoulders when a mast fails, a boat sinks or a crewman is grievously injured.

Of course, aviation is covered by the FEDs. Boaters – at least small boat(ers) – are barely noticed by the Coast Guard. In fact, if there is no fatality, the Coast Guard does little more than log an incident. So in our game, it’s pretty hard to learn from others’ mistakes. You’ve got to make all your own.

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Uncharacteristic breach by Gray Whale

They’re here … and will be for awhile.

Our shipmate Randy Bush is the first of my friends to spot a gray whale this year – about halfway between Platform Gina and Anacapa Island.

Grays can be hard to spot as their spout is unspectacular and I have NEVER seen one come of the water as in the picture at the left. They generally move along at 3-4 knots in a more or less straight line. Though they don’t show much of their bodies, you can see their characteristic mottled and barnacle encrusted skin. If they sound (dive), don’t expect to see a dorsal fin … at best, there’s a hump.

As with all marine mammals, remain clear by 100 yards or more. Do not close them from astern, nor position yourself directly ahead of their path. If they have to deviate because of your actions, you’re in violation of several federal rules.

They’re on their way south now to romp, play and reproduce in Mexican waters. And they’ve apparently been doing a good job on all those fronts as they are no longer on the endangered list in the northeast Pacific. For more info see GRAY WHALES

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A signal you can't miss - a shot across the bow from a Coast Guard marskman

In some major ports, particularly those shared by civilian cargo carriers and warships, the Coast Guard is tasked with escorting ships to and fro. Apparently the sight of the Orange armed rigid inflatables (RIB) isn’t enough to deter sightseers from closing inside the limit.

So now, just to make things perfectly clear, the CG is experimenting with a less-than-lethal warning tool. It’s a 12-gauge plastic and aluminum shotgun shell that ignites after approximately 100-meters to create a bright flash of light and loud sound.

They’re experimenting with this device in Boston Harbor. If they ever deploy that in our neighborhood, I’ll be sure to stay tuned to #16.

BTW – less-than-lethal? What the hell does that mean? It’s a pyrotechnic shot gun shell that explodes at 100 meters. I don’t think I want my plastic boat anywhere near that.

BTW2 – vessels in proximity to warships are to slow to idle speed within 500 yards and approach no closer than 100 yards. Additionally, many areas are off-limits to civilians such as Port Hueneme.

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Forty-seven foot Motor Life Boat (MLB) underway from Channel Islands Harbor on a Search and Rescue mission

You could be the next one chosen by fate to be at the right place at the right time for a mariner in distress.

I read the Coast Guard news a couple of times a week, and it is a rare story that tells of mariners in trouble near the coast who are rescued solely by the Coast Guard.

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Most reports credit a Good Samaritan with finding, rescuing, towing, fighting fires and dragging folks out of the water.

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It’s usually our fellow boaters who are rescued, but Good Samaritans have rescued a fair number of non-mariners who have somehow found themselves in the water (think fishermen on the jetties.)

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We hear Urgent Marine Broadcasts nearly every weekend telling of unknown mariners in  unknown positions hailing Mayday on Channel #16 and then requesting all vessels to keep a sharp look out and report sightings.

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Two Januaries ago, I was out on a clear crisp day when a fishing vessel called Mayday and added that they were just off Sycamore Canyon, which is close to Pt. Mugu, just a few minutes away from Channel Islands Coast Guard Station.

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Their second transmission was “Glub, glub……”

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All went silent.

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Dennis Dreith, the Bosun, and Dave Lumian of ASA fame were part of the Good Samaritan rescue of a British yacht.

The Coast Guard boats arrived on scene within 20 minutes or so, called off the Mayday and the Urgent Marine Broadcast and reported that a Good Samaritan had rescued the crew.

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The boat had, in fact, gone to the bottom.

Chances are, if you’re in a sailboat, you’re not likely to speed to the location when the Coast Guard actually provides one. More likely, you’ll become a Good Samaritan by surprise, when someone gets in trouble who is quite close and you’re suddenly the on scene commander.

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It’s happened to us twice in the last couple of years. Both were fairly low-key affairs with no calls to the CG.

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In the first case, a novice jet skier fell off his machine just outside Ventura Harbor. We noticed that he was struggling to get back aboard. We made a close pass and asked if he needed help. He said he didn’t, but we kept an eye on him anyway. Twenty minutes later, we could see that he was still struggling, so we returned and asked him again if he needed help. “Now would be good,” he said.
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We rigged a towline and he attached it to his machine. He had a little trouble getting up our boarding ladder, probably due to hypothermia. But he made it. Had he tumbled back into the water, I had another line ready with a bowline that I could have used to assist him.

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Our second incident requires a good bit of time and several beers to tell with full effect, but the short version is …
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We were anchored at Fry’s on the north shore of Santa Cruz Island. We’d set the bow toward the beach. Our French Plow bow anchor, with about 150 of chain rode, was about 40 yards off the beach and the stern anchor, which is a large Fortress, was in about 30 feet of water with about 200 feet of rope rode.
We were solid and very proud of the slick job we’d done.
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Near sunset, a yacht larger than our 46 foot Jeanneau shows up. She’s flying a Union Jack and has a fairly large crew. This is where the story can get very long – they spent more than an hour trying to get anchored. If it wasn’t their bow anchor that wouldn’t set, it was their stern. They tried to anchor to our starboard, tried forward, tried aft, tried port. Then they tried forward and port and managed to foul their prop with their stern anchor rode.
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Now they were well and truly screwed. It was dark. The Coast Guard and Vessel Assist were at least an hour away and their boat was easing in toward the rocks.
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They hailed us, asking for advice. We were stuck for an answer.

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The first rule for Good Samaritans is don’t get your ass in crack. Don’t do anything that will jeopardize your boat or crew. Don’t become a victim who needs rescuing. Think before you act and have a plan that allows you to escape.
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So here’s what we did. Since we were very solidly anchored, we told them to run a line from a stern cleat to our boat. They cobbled together enough sheets and halyards to reach us. We put their line on our main winch and cranked them away from the rocks, which also set their bow anchor. We kept cranking until we’d pulled them half the distance to us.
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In effect, we were their stern anchor. We kept the line on the winch so we could rapidly adjust if tide, wind or current became a factor and we placed our biggest, sharpest knife adjacent to the winch. If we had to get loose, we wanted to do be able to do it in a hurry.

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We set our anchor-drag alarm for minimum distance and one of us stayed at the winch all night. We’d also established a game plan for the night.
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Should we need to break free. The anchor watch had his whistle close at hand and would signal with multiple blasts that the rest of the crew needed to get on deck. One of us was assigned to drive the boat and mind the winch, another to pay out bow rode and the third to weigh the stern anchor. We discussed all the contingencies, including various wind and weather conditions that would make us alter our plan. For instance,  a strong onshore breeze would have meant weighing the bow anchor first.  Then we split into watches, keeping an eye on our movement – we were only 20 yards from shallow water and a rock wall to starboard – and on our pals.
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Fortunately, the weather remained settled. Just after dawn, the Brits suited up and dove the prop. A huzzah went up, when they pulled the line clear. I’d read about huzzahs, but this was the first I’d ever heard.

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Just before they collected their line from us, they brought us medals, a citation and a note from the Queen.
Actually, it was better than that: They brought us a bottle of very nice gin.
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I don’t think there’s anything in the Good Samaritan’s Handbook that says you can’t accept a gratuity. Is there?

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Capt. Dan is skipper of the Yacht Sancerre and owner of Sail Channel Islands, which offers charters and sailing lessons near the – guess what – Channel Islands of Southern California.

Capt. Dan

Sail Channel Islands

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The Brig Pilgrim is the setting for Richard Henry Dana's tale of California sea adventure in "Two Years Before the Mast."

Two Years Before the Mast

sat unread in the rail in the forepeak of Wiley for a dozen years. I don’t know where that book went. It may have turned to dust over the last decade of sailing, but I got interested in the book again a couple of weeks ago when I found it in the FREE listing in my Kindle.

And so I dived in again. My first attempt at the book got me not much further than page 50, but I’m just about done this time around and have found it fascinating.

It’s certainly an important book to anyone interested in California history and it’s a great place to come up with trivia to amaze and confuse even the MASTER RATER, THE RANGER and the other denizens of Channel Islands Harbor.

I can’t quite get my memory around this one, but I’m trying to memorize these lines. Don’t know when I’ll launch them, but there will be an appropriate time, possibly involving beer, to do that. Here it is – I think you have to yell this in a commanding tone, so I’ll be practicing that – the commanding tone – on the dogs:

Set up the lee rigging, fish the spritsail yard, lash the galley, and bring  tackles upon the martingale. Bowse it;  bowse it to windward, lads.

Other than lads and set up, I haven’t a clue what any of that means. But I do know what it means to face the Southeast storm that he talks about. Repeatedly.

After “doubling” The Horn, you’d think that weather wouldn’t be much of a bother to these seamen, but when they were in the Santa Barbara Channel in the fall they prepared for it every time they anchored. In fact, when anchoring in Santa Barbara, they’d set the hook three miles offshore at this time of year.

What’s more, they’d rig the anchor so that it could be jettisoned when the wind kicked up and backed to the Southeast.

My Santa Ana strategy is not quite so conservative. I am ready, however, to leave a stern anchor behind on a buoy if needs be. Nor do I snug in to a far western wall when in Pelican, Alberts or Willows as I would in summer. Plus we make more frequent weather checks than we do at other times of year, going on deck to check for eastern breeze, east or south swell or dry decks.

In an emergency, we’re ready to jettison both anchors, but unlike Pilgrim, we have a power windlass. But the biggest difference is that Pilgrim was a square rigger, capable of getting not much closer than about 70 degrees of apparent wind. They’d have to backwind headsails to fill the mains and topsails, so they needed plenty of room to the lee to make that maneuver. We, happily, have a mighty Yanmar, which we fire up at the first sign of easterly wind.

We were surprised (twice) by unforecast Santa Anas last year. Until then, we had great confidence in NOAA. If they don’t mention Santa Anas, you’re not necessarily safe. If they do forecast a Santa Ana …. they’re not often wrong. In either case, have a plan, brief your crew and check the weather throughout the night.

Click to learn about the replica Brig Pilgrim

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http://www.sailchannelislands.com

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Checkout our listing in Thumbtack Captained sailing charters to the Channel Islands and while you’re there, please write a review.

Captained sailing charters to the Channel Islands

by Capt. Dan & The Bosun

Come aboard our luxury sailing yacht and cruise to the Channel Islands of southern California. Go for a couple of hours … or several days. Or take lessons with Capt. Dan.

Questions? Comments? Requests? Get in touch.

Contact Now

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Coast Guard multi-mission helicopter

Sir: Installed Rescue 21 equipment at Sector LA/LB is in a system testing phase. By November of this year, the Coast Guard will likely conditionally accept the system and commence the shutdown of the older National Distress Response System (NDRS). In 2011, upon final acceptance of the Rescue 21 system, all obsolete or redundant NDRS equipment will be powered down.

BETTER RESPONSE: IT’S ALMOST HERE.

So, if you’ve got a VHF radio – you’ll benefit from Rescue 21 – but if you’ve got a VHF with a red DSC (Digital Selective Calling) button, you’ll have much better protection.

If you haven’t already done done so, you need to hook your VHF radio to the GPS and register your boat with the Coast Guard by getting an MMSI number. Those proceduers will enable DSC.

Here’s what the Coast Guard has to say about DSC:

Digital Selective Calling

No new equipment is needed for you to benefit from Rescue 21. The new system will increase the Coast Guard’s ability to respond to distress calls in the coastal zone. However, you can help us improve response time by using a marine-band VHF-radio equipped with digital selective calling (DSC).

If properly registered with a Maritime Mobile Service Identity (MMSI) number and interfaced with GPS, the DSC radio signal transmits vital vessel information, position, and the nature of distress (if entered) at the push of a button. In an emergency, with one push of a button, your DSC radio will send an automated digital distress alert containing your MMSI number and position to other DSC-equipped vessels and rescue facilities. DSC will provide a quicker and more accurate response by the Coast Guard. For more information on Digital Selective Calling check out the video, Can You Hear Me?
Get your MMSI Number

The Boat U.S. and Sea Tow MMSI Programs have been certified by both the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the Coast Guard. To obtain and register your MMSI number, the Coast Guard recommends logging onto http://www.boatus.com/mmsi/ or http://www.seatow.com/boating_safety/mmsi/mmsiRegister.asp and following the instructions.

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