Dismasted Boat Towed to Port in Sausalito
A Beneteau Oceanis 38 from the Modern Sailing School and Club was given a tow across the Bay on Friday, July 31 after she was dismasted. We spoke with Modern’s chief operating officer, who confirmed the boat was Survivor, which had been on a charter with four “seasoned sailors” aboard.
The incident occurred on San Francisco Bay, west of Angel Island, at around 3:30 p.m. when the forward port shroud came off at the attachment point. “The crew did everything right,” Mark said. “They handled the boat very well.”
Weather conditions were fairly normal for the Bay; winds on the day were in the 15–20 range, “Not more than 20,” Mark said.
A handful of photos including the one above and the one below have been circulating in the sailing community.
Mark tells us the Modern Sailing fleet is put through an annual rig inspection. Survivor is now in port, where investigations are underway to identify the cause of the failure.
There were no injuries reported.
Every so often ,one should check standing rigging connections. I had a starboard shroud with a pin that was halfway out. How it got that way I will never know, but I definitely went over every single connection afterwards and covered each one with rigging tape. Glad to hear no one was hurt.
problem with rigging tape it hides any issue and makes inspection difficult. gave up that program decades ago…
Wow, I charted that boat five days before. Saw nothing regarding any issues in the rigging. Glad everybody is safe.
I know nothing, but the captain is always the responsible party. What I,m saying is we all should learn from this. Take nothing for granted. Glad all is well.
Why the tow?
Downed rigging usually means a helter skelter mess of wire, lines, and cloth– high risk for prop fouling and worse. If you’re otherwise safe, why risk motoring?
This is why I avoid grandiose names. You look really silly when the s*** hits the fan, or the rig hits the deck! Did we learned nothing from Titanic?!
One reason why I use #6 screws with nyloc nuts instead of pins. They never back off or get snagged.
Well, the Boat is indeed aptly named! Glad everybody is safe
Survivor lived up to her name…
Why is the rig still in the water? Adds to difficulty and prevents return to port with engine (after insuring no lines are in the water).
I suspect that the Rig is still in the water due to the weight of it. It would be very difficult to remove the sail from the mast when it is in that condition, and the sail itself would weigh over 100 pounds. Add the weight of the mast and rigging, plus having everything soaking wet, and it was most likely not possible for the crew to bring is all on board. If so, it would then also be very unwise to start the engine as there would be a high probability of fouling the prop. Looks like the skipper did everything correctly in my opinion.
I assume the rig in the water and tow are due to Survivor having in-mast mainsail furling. So it would be difficult to get the mainsail off the mast in the water. So the tow is needed to overcome the drag.
I would like to see the findings of the failure. “ when the forward port shroud came off at the attachment point.” It seems like that would be the lower shroud, but did it “come off” the deck or mast attachment?
Life happens. How old was the rigging? We should wait and see what the investigation finds.
Glad everyone is ok. All sailboats in the bay are pushed to their limits, reefing is a way of life in the bay. If you can sail the San Francisco Bay, you can sail anywhere.
I was on this boat. Managed to grab the main halyard and winch the top of the mast close to the boat. After making sure there were no more lines that could be snagged in the propeller I started the engine and managed to get away from the Angel Island against the current and wind pushing us towards the Island. The Coast Guard followed us closely for half an hour, until the tow boat took over- motoring on our own with both sails in the water was fairly hard and very slow. Kudos to our skipper who called mayday and calmly maintained radio communication with the Coast Guard and the base.
Looks like the root cause was fatigue fracture of the eye bolt mounting the shroud: it cracked at the point contacted by the turnbuckle pin and opened up. I took two pictures of that crack, the break is typical of metal fatigue. I’d like to know the results of the investigation, whether my theory is correct.