Safety in all things

I just wanted to share a scare I had last Sunday My #3 son And I stepped the mast and rigged our H-16 in good time. I untied the Boat from the trailer not somthig I normaly do until the wheels are wet. The ramp was steeper than I thought. I launched the boat like a Submarine Thank the wind gods it was in the water and not up the ramp had to wade out waste high to retrive my cat it scared me of how dumb I could be. I scatched the botom of the hulls cheap price for a good leason sailed for 4 hours the hulls were dry but my waiste was not.

Todd

We camp at several nearby campgrounds that have marinas or launch ramps. Sampson State Park is a good one. We usually start Saturday mornings with a Bloody Mary and some early amusement waiting for things like yours to happen at the boat launch But the REAL fun starts at dusk when the same people return from a day of drinking...I mean fishing... and the boat loading antics start

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The fact that this windy world is largely covered in water obviously means that man was meant to sail.

My favorite summer activity is watching people try to pull out a bayliner (motorboat, aka stinkpot) at low tide with something like a volkswagon golf. Never fails that they back the trailer off the end of the ramp and I have to pull them up with my jeep. Kinda off topic, but amusing none the less

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Marcus
H16
Narragansett Bay, RI

Sitting on my sisters 36' sailboat an watching a guy back his 30' powerboat down the ramp with the wrong hitch ball size. The trailer and boat became disconnected from the truck and both were in 8' of water when all was said and done.

The best one was when I was on my way to work on a early saturday morning. I pulled up to the stop light and in the other lane was a 20' power boat sitting on the tar, no cars or trailers around.

And on a personal note, when I was 12 my father put his 26' power boat on the back of the Ford Galaxy 500, breaking the storage trailer, Deep Vee'ing the trunk, ripping the vynal top and shutting down the road until he could find a boat trailer to borrow. Two very large wreckers came to get it off the car and onto the other trailer. He then drove 200 yards and put the boat into the lake. I remember my mother having a few drinks that day.

The old trailer off the end of the ramp is a more than common occurance here in Delaware too. Beer+All day in the sun+Low tide = slightly messed up judgement. What the heck humor at GoBoater's expence.

I've got a good one. There is this guy at my marina who is a little... off. One day he decided that the way out of the marina was up the trailer ramp, no trailer there though. He drives it up about 4 feet up onto the ramp, until the keel hit. I have never laughed so hard in my life.

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"I'm just tryin' to keep everything in balance, Woodrow. You do more work than you got to, so it's my obligation to do less." Augustus 'Gus' McCrae

I worked at the local marina as "parking lot manager/ dock boy" for several summers so needless to say i have witnessed lots of dumb ramp moments the most common of these errors is forgetting drain plugs; however when i was little we were standing around on one of our friends sport fishers and got a call to go to the local wildlife ramp to help a guy get his boat out of the water. when we got there we found out that the guy had backed his trailer into the water, tied up his boat and gone to park his truck, when he got back on the boat to go for a ride he noticed it was unusually sluggish and got about a half mile down the waterway before he noticed that the boat was still attached to the trailer so i had the privilege of watching my dad and several other men fight the weight of the boat and the angle of the ramp trying to reattach the trailer to the truck.

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The pessimist complains about the wind, the optimist expects it to change, the realist adjusts the sails.

Back to Hobie stuff, guys. Anyone ever launched a cat, and forgotten to untie the Cat Trax? Sure makes for a sluggish sail. I refuse to tell you how I know.

cheers

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2015 H16, with spin,
SOLD 1989 Hobie SX18 Sail # 1947 "In Theory..."
'Only two things are infinite, the universe, and human stupidity. But I'm not sure about the former.'

Look at me I am bringing back another old topic but I have a great story about something like this.

This summer while working at a marina on Grand Lake, near Grove OK I saw alot of stupid people doing stupid and damaging stuff to their boat but his one tops them all.

It had been a long day of pumping gas and I had spent three hours in the engine room of a giant yatch, needless to say I was in a bad mood because the wind was blowing close to 20mph and my boat was sitting on my trailor just begging to go out. So there I am, there are four boats at the pumps and I am trying to make sure that no one bumps another boat and this guy pulls in all pissed off. He and his family of 7 have been out all day trying to ski but no one has been able to get up, he blames me saying that the gas must have had some water in it because the boat was being really sluggish.

I went through the normal steps to check the gas with no results, remember I am already tired and am really not paying that much attention to the guy and his boat, he is yelling the whole time about his ruined vacation and stuff like that. I knew there would be no tip coming from his boat so I was helping some of the regulars.

The way that I learned about the problem was actually really funny. One of our most regular customers dropped a pair of 300 dollar sunglasses into the lake in about 15 feet of water. Being that I have done some free diving in the keys down to 40 feet I figured that I could easliy find his glasses in a few dives since the entire bottom of our harbor was gravel. Sure enough I found the glasses first dive and on my way up I hit my head on something. After moving to the side and surfacing I realized it was the mad guys boat but it had been a metal bar. This lead to more research and I found out that he had been out about six hours with his trailor still attached. After telling him this he got even more angry for me not seeing this the first time he came in. I didn't know what to say but I offered to help him. He declined and drove off, I later saw the boat out without the trailor so I guess he got it off.

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Nacra 5.2 "Elsies"
Hobie 14T, "Blazin" I guess I am keeping her!

wow. are people really that dumb. this is incredible. when i park my car after tieing up the boat, i generally notice if the trailer is there (or not, in these people's cases). I mean, i understand leaving things like catrax on. that is just because youre ttrying to get it in the water. Its not a giant bulky metal object.

siiigh. mankind is doomed.

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Peter Scranton
'14 Tandem Island "Awesome"
'03 Windrider Rave "Menage a Trois"

I know what you mean about mankind, I think that the Hobie community will eventually live out all the other people in the world. Sailing a hobie takes a certain amount of intelligence.

So if even if some of us make stupid mistakes like leaving the cattrax on or sailing in winds that we all know are to strong we will eventaully rule the world.

Okay so maybe not but wouldn't that be great.

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Nacra 5.2 "Elsies"
Hobie 14T, "Blazin" I guess I am keeping her!

Hobie ramp moments:

Watching someome put up the mast with NONE of the stays attached!!!!
Screaming at them to stop, before they attached the forestay, and BAD things happened. Went over and started talking to them, and they had just gotten the thinig at a garage sale that day..

So my friend and I attached their side stays for them, and they stepped the mast. On further inspection of the boat, noticed they had no stern plugs and no current registration.. Ummmm Yeah!

So still putting my boat away, they come over and ask me if it is normal for the sail to not stay in the track. Well, I scratch my head, I have heard of it popping out of the comp tip, but never the aluminum. I look over and they are trying to hoist the jib up the mast. UMMM SCAREY!!!

I point out they are using the wrong sail, and go back to putting the boat away, my friend says I should go over there and help them rig. I tell him "NUUU UHHHH, I'm not going to be responsible for them killing themselves or someone else if they manage to get that thing afloat!"

Yes I know, "I'm mean, and totally not part of the Hobie Culture!"
But I do have common sense!

Okay, so maybe I am wrong about the Hobie community taking over the world. But I am not sure if they can be included with the rest of us. They had just got the boat.

Now, on to other funny stories. I went out today even though it was cloudy and the wind wasn't supposed to get the big. To my surprise it did, a front was coming through and we got some huge gust and about 1 hours worth of 20-25 mph wind. plus some gusts that the weather bug said were near 45.

When I got out there were about 15 other boats out and everyone was having a great time, then the front hit, all the boats started racing toward their harbors or bank but me being a genius decided to stay out. I actually didn't flip and had a blast but what really got me is on the way in. On a reach two 20-25 foot monohulls rolled over. I had never seen this before, I didn't even know it was possible for them to roll without some serious waves or something. Both of them came back up fairly quickly but both had filled their cabins with water. Does that happen often? I cruised by to make sure that everyone was okay and they were so I went on my way. After I had put my boat on the trailor I stopped at a burger joint and talked to one of the captains that flipped. He has been sailing long time and said that one of the huge gust just caught him off guard while he was trying to show off.

I was glad I was on my Hobie, no Cabin to fill with water, just me to launch over the bows on a pitchpoll.

HERE TO HOBIES!!!

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Nacra 5.2 "Elsies"
Hobie 14T, "Blazin" I guess I am keeping her!

Yes Monohulls can roll over,

All's it takes is a strong enough gust, that pushes them over to the point that overcomes the keels righting momement. (It's called a knockdown).

Most production boats are actually tested, where they will be completely rolled over to make sure their keels can right the boat again.

The danger in the open seas is if they get knocked down then hit by a wave they will be completely turned over (turned tutle). If the boat has the hatches battened down, there is a good chance even then they will be hit by another swell and rolled back over.

In either case, forget the hatch's and you'r in very serious trouble.