[Public-List] First time at the Syronelle
Gordon Laco
mainstay at csolve.net
Tue Jun 24 08:07:24 PDT 2014
Thanks Mike - so I have to come to Annapolis to hear your story? That's not
so subtle coercion!
We'll try to make it happen.
G
On 24/06/14 10:58 AM, "Meinhold, Mike J." <MICHAEL.J.MEINHOLD at leidos.com>
wrote:
> Gord
> Thanks for sharing the story and your self-analysis. That's a benefit to us
> all. That's an awful thing to experience, especially imagining how much worse
> it could be. (If you don't know my parallel story I will tell you next year
> with a rum in my hand)
>
> I replaced my spreader "roots" or tangs and can provide them to you for models
> if that helps.
>
> I had a great time at the Syronelle and enjoyed sailing against Surprise and
> socializing with her skipper and crew
>
> Mike
> Rinn Duin 272
>
> Michael J. Meinhold
> Senior Naval Architect, Leidos, Inc.
> 4321 Collington Road, Bowie, MD 21076
> michael.j.meinhold at leidos.com
> 301 352 4734 office 240 350 6974 cell
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Gordon Laco [mailto:mainstay at csolve.net]
> Sent: Tuesday, June 24, 2014 09:38 AM
> To: Alberg 30 Public List -- open to all <public-list at lists.alberg30.org>
> Subject: Re: [Public-List] First time at the Syronelle
>
> It's my own club! I think I'll make an opportunity to go and talk to them
> directly. A friend doing his term on the board was present so I reckon
> there will be something official too. I can't order a flogging alas...
>
> I'll say again - the racing was great and it was wonderful to see some of
> you folks.
>
> Gord
>
>
>
>
> On 24/06/14 9:33 AM, "John Birch" <Sunstone at cogeco.ca> wrote:
>
>> Sorry to read you were so shabbily treated by a few inconsiderates. Suggest
>> you write their Club Board.
>>
>> Touching someone else's mast - 6 dozen of your best boson, and lay into it
>> man.
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Gordon Laco" <mainstay at csolve.net>
>> To: "Alberg 30 Public List -- open to all" <public-list at lists.alberg30.org>
>> Sent: Tuesday, June 24, 2014 9:16 AM
>> Subject: [Public-List] First time at the Syronelle
>>
>>
>> Hello friends -
>>
>> Well our first participation in an Alberg 30 regatta is behind us. Surprise
>> is home at her jetty at Midland Bay Sailing Club now (not quite safely but
>> more of that later).
>>
>> First, let me say on behalf of my crew Clint Nielsen (with the Viking tattoo
>> on his arm) Steve Parm (who can almost reach the spreaders without strain)
>> and Peter Laco (my eldest son) that we all enjoyed ourselves immensely. We
>> had no idea how we¹d measure up as a racing crew in a One Design fleet...
>> We¹ve done well racing PHRF here but we¹d never been up against an Alberg 30
>> in fighting trim, let along a mob of them.
>>
>> It was great to see other boats Olike us¹. Alberg 30¹s are quite capable,
>> shippy looking sailing vessels; the way sailing yachts should look. We kept
>> saying to each other when on various points of sail ³wow, I guess that¹s
>> what we look like². This reminded me of my brother in law¹s comment after
>> visiting Holland, homeland of his parents: ³everybody looked like me; tall,
>> awkward with receding hairlines....²
>>
>> The moments before the first race on Saturday morning were filled with a
>> degree of tension... I had no idea how it would go. We finished fourth but
>> were starting to calm down and do what we do. When we got to the start
>> sequence for the second race, we¹d designated JAZZ as our target to beat and
>> set ourselves to start aggressively with her. The action in the last
>> moments was every bit as exciting as anything I¹ve ever experienced. It¹s
>> great when crossing swords with an expert you can both trust each other
>> not to do something un-ethical or dangerous... So you can push. An
>> opportunity appeared in the last seconds and we started in a very good
>> position. we managed to stride away from the others but with JAZZ in close
>> combat all the way around the course... But she nipped us with apparent ease
>> during the run to the finish. Second in that race was our best finish.
>>
>> The rest of the races were in lighter air, some with a chop that I was used
>> to during the days we lived and raced in Toronto, but I guess I¹d lost the
>> knack of dealing with. We had difficulty keeping SURPRISE moving and my
>> attempts at casting the dice didn¹t pan out. We were very pleased that our
>> worst race, third on Saturday I think, was also one of SAM¹s best, so our
>> team mate dragged us up enough that we finished fourth overall in the final
>> reckoning.
>>
>> Somebody asked me Owhat happened to you guys¹ after the first day all I
>> can say is the chop in the very light air was difficult for me and I think I
>> became frustrated and wasn¹t making good decisions with regard to tactics.
>> During our best race, aside from still being optimistic, there was enough
>> air that we were sailing in the area of 4.5 to to 4.7 knots most of the time
>> we had enough air to keep SURPRISE trudging along and we were able to keep
>> up. A skipper I sailed for and learned a lot from once told me Olight air
>> sailing is what really separates the good from the not so good racing
>> skippers...¹
>>
>> It was a great experience. I told my wife when I got home yesterday that
>> the regatta combined the two elements that make yacht racing fantastic. We
>> had great battles out on the water; with good sportsmanship... And
>> comradeship and cooperation in the evenings. I learned a lot and with
>> luck, may be a more consistent threat to the leaders next time.
>>
>> So Sunday afternoon came. With John Kitchener¹s and other¹s help we lowered
>> the mast onto SURPRISE¹s deck and motored away to the commercial marina for
>> hauling out Monday morning. On the way across Toronto Bay we crossed paths
>> with an Alberg 30 named MADRIGAL III which I recall racing against when I
>> crewed in SURYA, an A30 which won the Syronelle when I was a boy back in the
>> early O70¹s. I thoroughly approved of her colour scheme and told her
>> skipper, who turns out to have owned her since she was new (same colour as
>> SURPRISE).
>>
>> I slept by myself in the boat and by mid morning Monday we were on the boat
>> transporter and rolling up to Midland. Two hours later we were in the water
>> in Georgian Bay again. Last night we motored over our Club¹s mast crane and
>> that¹s where things began to go wrong.
>>
>> The yacht transporter had brought our mast over to the club so we wouldn¹t
>> have to carry it off the boat very kind of him. Upon arrival we found a
>> bit of a disturbance going on... An old member with a drinking issue was in
>> the fourth hour of trying to raise his mast and was in an altercation with a
>> responsible member who was trying to intervene to resolve their tangled rig
>> and get them out from under the crane and clear the dock. When we arrived
>> with SURPRISE on the tractor trailer rig, the difficult member accosted me
>> shouting Oyou can¹t launch that boat here!¹ I thought he was kidding so
>> said with a laugh Osure we can, it¹s only 10,000 lbs, I¹ll use the high jib²
>> (normally only used for masts) Then I realized what was going on and tried
>> to explain I was only dropping off the mast... He wasn¹t listening. We put
>> our mast on horses and left.
>>
>> I went by an hour later to see if the crane was available and found the
>> difficult member gone, and another yacht I¹d never seen raising her
>> mast...and my mast (complete with new genoa on the furler) thrown on the
>> ground; my horses under their mast. I asked if they¹d done that, they said
>> yes. I said Olet¹s put it back up again please¹...they complied with poor
>> grace.
>>
>> I went home for supper and when I came back found the mast on the ground
>> again with the masthead only on a block of wood. Not very nice. Feeling
>> cranky, but with the help of friends we began the process of stepping a
>> simple job. We had the mast over the boat horizontally about five feet up
>> (the jetty is high) and were beginning to raise it. Then a remarkable thing
>> happened. The knot I¹d tied for the crane hook sling line, which I thought
>> was a bowline, began slipping and apparently in slow motion snaked itself
>> out and we dropped the mast diagonally across SURPRISE.
>>
>> I was holding the heel of the mast and received quite a wallop as the heel
>> bucked upwards when the mast landed on the cabin top and the head went down
>> into the water. We all stood still for an instant... What an embarrassing
>> and potentially very dangerous incident. Damage? Only slight luckily. The
>> mainsail, bundled on the boom and laying on deck, took most of the landing
>> impact. The portside lifeline, somewhat slack without the shrouds spreading
>> it, took the rest. Mysteriously the starboard spreader was broken off at
>> the tangs, which were bent. I didn¹t see this happen but reckon that the
>> sling line must have snaked around the shroud/spreader and for an instant
>> bore the weight of the mast before breaking and letting the mast complete
>> it¹s fall. If that is what happened, I reckon the spreader contributed to
>> the relatively soft landing the mast made across the cabin top.
>>
>> Looking back on the mast raising operation, I considered the cascade of
>> events that led to the accident. The RCN trained me to watch for such
>> things as part of the Bridge Resource Management regime of thinking the Navy
>> uses; regardless, I didn¹t see any of the signs. They taught us that one
>> can be on the road to trouble long before one is aware that the cascade has
>> started
>>
>> I was tired. I was upset by the drama happening at the mast crane when I
>> arrived at the club. I was further upset by the behaviour of the people who
>> put my mast on the ground (new members it turns out probably didn¹t know
>> any better) The result? I tied a bad knot. I remember checking it but
>> obviously didn¹t really look at it and feel it as I normally do. That is
>> the only explanation I can offer for the sling line releasing. I don¹t
>> believe it is possible for a bowline to snake through itself as we all saw
>> that one do. I tied it with a long tail, so we all had time to see it go.
>>
>> We¹re lucky the mast wasn¹t higher...we¹re lucky we didn¹t have the mast
>> vertical with people on the boat kneeling to shoot the pins in to secure the
>> shrouds and stays when it came down. I am very lucky nobody got hurt, I
>> would have been responsible for what might have been a tragedy. I am lucky
>> the damage isn¹t worse.
>>
>> So, the ending not withstanding, it was a terrific weekend. I¹m sorry the
>> explanation of the accident seems to have overshadowed the good stuff but
>> I¹m still getting used to the idea that it really happened!!!
>>
>> Gord
>> Surprise 426
>> (yes, I will race with you folks again.... Can¹t wait)
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