Mo' safety for Nick

[tcm]

I already put a version of this on the blog, but here's an adjusted version....

I used to go boating and I had a nice lifejacket with a lifeline attached. All fine.

In 2000-summink, personal epirb things became available, smallish about 4inches x 2 inches x 1inch. Four hundred quid at the time, but these meant that if you fall overboard you operate the thing to send out a distress signal to a satellite, and rescue bods at MRCC can see them. We could ringem up on satfone and ask exactly where the MOB is located. I eventually bought five of these McMurdo Fastfind and some of the later ones are the GPS type.

Another time wandering around a chandlery I found personal strobe beacons. Ooh. These have a velcro wrist strap and are incredibly bright – visible more than three miles away. I have five of these now, and everyone has to wear one all night and in late afternoons – if they fall off and switch these on we’ll be able to see them in the water and just go gettem.

PLBs recently halved in price and more than halved in size, so I bought two of the new small ones.

For the ARC in 2009 I upgraded the lifejackets so that we had 275N lifejackets for everyone, and rigged them with 3-point lifelines so you can be clipped on permanently.

Dee has her own 190N Crewsaver lifejacket which she bought later and it looks more snazzy and compact . So this year I bought a similar one, Spinlock, with integral hood and everything. I’ll be fine wearing that lifejacket all the time, and anyway, when on watch we’re just waiting for something to happen. Not having the lifejacket on is a bit like a lifeguard at the swimming pool wearing a business suit. He’s not ready to do something straightaway, and the first thing he would have to do is get his swimming things on, like the first thing anyone on watch would have to do is go get their lifejacket. So best have the lifejacket on anyway, really, at night. I sold some of the earlier lifejackets, and we still have four x 275N lifejackets with 3-point lifelines, hoods, whistles, lights, everything.

But if someone did fall overboard, we have to notice it. Supposing we’re all asleep? So I bought a Raymarine add-on proximity-sensoring kit which means everyone has a Raytag and if anyone gets more than 20metres or so from the boat, an alarm goes off. Actually the alarm goes off too much, like if people go to the foredeck. So although I have 6 raytag things, we’ll only use one or two of them and only at night or when the lone watchkeeper is gonna stay in the cockpit.

Meanwhile I bought some handheld vhfs. Waterproof, but they didn’t float when I dropped one of them in the sea. So I now have two quite small waterproof ICOM vhf units which float and light up if they get wet in the water. So I suppose the lone watchkeeper could have a vhf on their lifejacket too.

Once we find a MOB in the sea, the problems aren’t necessarily over – we have to gettem back on board. Actually near them ona big boat is iffy - beter to near ish and let them approach, if possible. So I got a long floating line for a MOB to grab. But I discovered (when Fred went wakeboarding in the middle of the Atlantic) that this line degrades in sunlight, and it broke even tho only three years old. I found some white plastic material and Dee got the sewing machine out to make a protective rail-mounted sleeve for a new floating line – 80metres this time, with a small white polystyrene buoy on the end. The helm just drives around the MOB as with a ski-rope. With a coil of rope it can get tangled and often not uncoil properly . So the rope is bundled (not coiled) into a bag so the helm simply flings the bag over the side and the line comes out.

The ARC also require two horseshoe floats, each rigged with whistles and lights and one of them hooked to a Danbuoy – a tall float with a light on top that you can see over the waves. Every ARC boat has this, but I rig the stuff on Mojomo to be externally mounted outside the guardrails and launchable with a single rope-pull.

The standard Danbuoy lights are rubbish – some are just push-in – so I re-engineered ours to be fixed more securely, and all the stuff is kept out of sunlight if we aren’t on a big trip. A surprising number of ARC boats set off with the Danbuoy not extended. So if they need to use it they have to ponce about extending it, and the light at the end may very likely get whacked/smashed or dislodged in the process, and the users(s) aren’t able to watch the MOB. A key thing with MOB is to keep your eyes on the target and never look away. So everything has to be doable without looking away from the target. If someone falls off in daylight, we won’t get all the gear in the water – just point and keep constantly shouting out their location to the helm using calls like “300metres at 4oclock” .

This year 2011 saw the launch of personal AIS devices. AIS means no need to call up MRCC for a position. We can see the target on the charplotter in the same way as we can se a big ship. So it’s fine if they aren’t far away, and there’s still someone on the boat. Otherwise they’d use the epirb. The Mcmurdo R10 is for a lifejacket, but the S10 is more rugged and wrist-mounted. So I got two of these.

Yes, we have a chartplotter, and a spare chartplotter head unit, and a radar, and a spare radar scanner too. There is AIS C at the top of the mast which links to the charplotter, and AIS B (ie with transponder) all rail-mounted (so it still works if the mast comes down) and connected to computer using Nimble Navigator software. Having independent AIS C and B means that we can always check that we are sending out a signal. It also solves the problem of the crappy Raymarine software going apeshit when there aren’t any targets – some programmer bod assumed that this meant the thing had broken when in fact there’s often a time when there are no ships within range, and the alarm goes off. Worse, when there’s just one distant ship which comes into range and out again, the raymarine rubbishy software alarm goes off all the time. But not on Mojomo cos we’re also monitoring our own signal.

I used to number the lifejackets and plb's so everyone had "theirs" but i found that people took them down to their cabins, and didn't bringem back up. So now we plonk all the stuff just inside from cockpit. So anyway, a person on watch on Mo (such as Nick) can wear 275Lifejacket, clip a vhf to the belt, have wrist-mounted strobelight, wristmounted AIS locator, PLB in their pocket, and Raytag alarm. And be clipped on. With AIS and radar, I reckon this is about as “covered” as is possible … at the moment. I suppose i don't want to in a position where, well, yeah, I *could* have had an xyz gizmo, but they're expensive, so um, that's partly why we couldn't find wassisname after he fell overboard ...

And yes, I have had an MOB in the Atlantic, altho only during the daytime – they slipped whilst picking up seawater in a bucket, and we just turned round and picked them up. I didn't blog it cos the ARC would have gone erm overboard with publicity we didn't want - i just wrote that this guy "brilliantly retrieved a bucket" and he was more embarassed than frightened. Oh, and there was Fred when his sk-rope broke last time across – calm sea and again, we just went back and picked him up too. Altho not extreme conditions, both these made me think “but what if…” even more, and hence all this never-ending accumulation of safety stuff I suppose.

[Nick]

.
Just to let you know I wasn't worried anyway but it's nice to know you are likely to be rescued pretty much before before you actually hit the water

I reckon clipping on at night is the big thing, keep people on the boat. How do you find the Spinlock? Some peeps say the thigh straps are a hassle.

[stevepick]

Nick

I have a spinlock, wear it all the time at sea, often only remember I have it on walking up to a pub, or chilling at anchor with a G&T in my hand. I think the straps can bother some folk - but spinlocks come in multiple sizes so making sure it fits is important ( they are also very adjustable ). If you have ever spent any time in a climbing harness you wont notice you are wearing one.

Hopefully I will bump into you guys in Las Palmas, I am sailing on Cruinneag . Just going through kit lists now.


Steve

[tcm]

Only just bought the Spinlock so can't comment yet...

Mojomo is a catamaran so November we get chucked off to Vela Latina, still part of same marina complex but the smaller basin just immediately south of main marina.

Warning: Mojomo Dock Party is on Thursday 17th November 8pm till early...

[ParaHandy]

so all this gear's ok fer a four-eyed midget, but all we got wus a T shirt with the fekking boat's name on ...













(snigger!)

[Nick]

so all this gear's ok fer a four-eyed midget, but all we got wus a T shirt with the fekking boat's name on ...

Yer expendable, obviously

[ubergeekian]

So anyway, a person on watch on Mo (such as Nick) can wear 275Lifejacket, clip a vhf to the belt, have wrist-mounted strobelight, wristmounted AIS locator, PLB in their pocket, and Raytag alarm. ...

And yes, I have had an MOB in the Atlantic

Overbalanced under the weight of gadgets?

[Mark]

So anyway, a person on watch on Mo (such as Nick) can wear 275Lifejacket, clip a vhf to the belt, have wrist-mounted strobelight, wristmounted AIS locator, PLB in their pocket, and Raytag alarm. ...

And yes, I have had an MOB in the Atlantic

Overbalanced under the weight of gadgets?

Sounds pretty safe to me, by the time you've put that lot on it's someone else's watch.

[tcm]

So anyway, a person on watch on Mo (such as Nick) can wear 275Lifejacket, clip a vhf to the belt, have wrist-mounted strobelight, wristmounted AIS locator, PLB in their pocket, and Raytag alarm. ...

And yes, I have had an MOB in the Atlantic

Overbalanced under the weight of gadgets?

actually neither of them wearing any gadgets at all - one of the got caught by the rope of a bucket whilst collecting seawater, and another MOB was due to his erm, ski-rope breaking.

[jim.r]

Technically a water skier's rope breaking does not create a MOB cos the water skier is already overboard unless you've got a very big boat with a very large pool! Hope that helps

[tcm]

Technically a water skier's rope breaking does not create a MOB cos the water skier is already overboard unless you've got a very big boat with a very large pool! Hope that helps

Excellent news. I also jumped in a few times, on purpose, i spose they count, really?

[jim.r]

Depends if yer a man or a eedjeet (i was going to say mouse but realised that started with "M" as well in the Nick of time!). If the former definitely MOD as motive is irrelevant, if the later then its a right SOD ..