[Public-List] First time at the Syronelle

Tue Jun 24 07:58:34 PDT 2014

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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