The next yachting disaster

[Psyche 633]

1 hour ago, K4309 said:

This shows a good level of ignorance.

With the Ross boom, it is very easy to remove the risk. i.e. by lowering the cockpit floor a bit. Lowers centre of gravity and everyone is happy. Or, heaven forbid, just shortening the mainsail luff. The fact that so many other race boats can work it out demonstrates it is not hard. Far easier to do it at the design stage, hence the name, 'safety in design'.

With chainsaws, we have found it is really hard to cut firewood with a butter knife. i.e. there is no way even get close to getting the job done without having an exposed chain on a bar. Hence using a chainsaw requires several layers of other controls. Actually thinking about what you are doing. Training. Oh and a sh*t tonne of PPE. This is why every chainsaw has a picture of someone cutting their leg off on it, and a few pictures depicting kick-back and the need to wear a helmet...

The point being that good design removes risks that can easily be removed. If you can't remove the risk, then you need a couple of layers of risk management. The corollary of that is that Ross boat sailors need to be walking around in full body armour with NASCAR spec'ed helmets.

Thanks for the useful example

 

A chainsaw is a great example because they are inherently dangerous and even though people know it, there are about 2500 ACC claims a year from chainsaw injuries. The point being you can only design out so much risk.

Low booms are there for a reason, because the designer wanted to go fast and was willing to trade off safely and comfort for speed. Its debatable if there is a benefit, but someone wanted it like that and the owners were skilled enough to handle it.

Regarding deaths, yachting is very safe; in 2022 Yachting Fatalities

2021

between 2015 and 2020

So from 2015 to now there have been very few fatalities on keel boats

Pretty hard to justify invasive safety protocols based on 6 keel boat deaths in 8 years. I cant find the ACC stats for injuries but it would likely be miniscule compared to the top five causes of water related injuries

Surfing

1. From 1 July 2021 to 30 June 2022 surfing was the leading cause in water-related injuries.  There were 6,136 claims

2. Swimming

In 2021/22 there were 5,187 swimming injury claims 

3. Fishing

Is a leading cause for injury. In 2021/ 22 there were 3,856 fishing related injuries 

4. Swimming – Pool

In 2021/ 22 there were 1,127 swimming related injuries in swimming pools 

5. Water skiing

There were 1,205 water skiing-related injuries in 21 / 22 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Psyche 633]

25 minutes ago, Guest said:

I wouldn't say familiarity breeds contempt, rather a tendency to neglect safeguards. Sometimes guards have to be dispensed with to improve visibility and accuracy of final product and then just don't get reinstalled as brain acknowleges the guard hinderance. eg riving knife guard, fogged safety glasses, sense deprivation of helmets, etc. I have some missing digital extremities, as a result. What is it that that fails to register longer term, on machines and fingers with some of us? Surety pain/trauma would be the ultimate deterrent?

Agree, its all about management, 

 

[CarpeDiem 430]

46 minutes ago, Guest said:

What about a boom brake as opposed preventers?  Am wondering just what the consequences are of a boom held aback in an extreme wind shift arse slew? I have a simple figure 8’r , which never got used in favour of preventers.

Just to avoid shock loading and give crew time / less force to avoid.

Not having used one, but I don't see that these devices would help...  from what I have watched they are for reducing forces on the gear after the boom has swung through the cockpit.  Which is the job of a good mainsheet operator...

If you gybe with the preventer on, and for some reason didn't recover when you saw the main backing (eg autopilot failure) and it continued the upwind turn into the new weather, then I would expect the boat to just round up into the new weather, come to a stand still, hove too - albeit with a fair bit of heel if the conditions were ripe... I wouldn't expect the roundup forces to have a significant effect until you were through to around 145 - 150 TWA... eg, way through the gybe... prior to that I think you could still recover.

The transition from down downhill flat sailing to stopped with a 45degree heel on the opposite tack would probably cause significant beer spillage - and you'd run a serious risk of losing a bottle or two over the side!

Given the price of beer these days, I think any appropriate risk assessment, done with the correct parameters and appropriate inputs, would clearly rule out the use of a gybe preventer in all but the lightest of conditions.

 

 

[harrytom 643]

Oh look there's a bus ,where's my helmet?

 

If YNZ/OSH/ACC ever brought wearing of helmets in on yachts,that will tyhe end of yacht racing in NZ.Now what happens if the volvo fleet stop in over in Auckland?Sorry no helmets keep going?

[Island Time 1,235]

Boom Brakes properly used slow the boom in a gybe, without the main doing so - but it's hard to find a boom brake (IMO the best one is the dutchman boom brake) for larger mainsails - and it loads the boom highly at the kicker fitting...

[K4309 258]

7 hours ago, harrytom said:

Oh look there's a bus ,where's my helmet?

 

If YNZ/OSH/ACC ever brought wearing of helmets in on yachts,that will tyhe end of yacht racing in NZ.Now what happens if the volvo fleet stop in over in Auckland?Sorry no helmets keep going?

The ignorance is high with this one.

The Volvo fleet carry helmets and wear them often.

[Addem 95]

1 hour ago, K4309 said:

The ignorance is high with this one.

The Volvo fleet carry helmets and wear them often.

Whole doing work.on deck at 25 knots in the southern ocean.  

[K4309 258]

12 minutes ago, Addem said:

Whole doing work.on deck at 25 knots in the southern ocean.  

Absolutely.

A fully barred up Open 60 is a completely different proposition to the average Gulf Racer / Cruiser, but that isn't what HT said.

He said the Volvo race wouldn't be able to stop in Auckland if YNZ passed a rule requiring wearing of helmets. The ignorance is that the Volvo guys can do risk assessments properly, have worked out they can't do 700nm a day if they are concussed, and more to the point, if they are trying to do 700nm/day, there is a reasonable chance they will get thrown around enough to need a helmet. And the fact they are already carrying and using helmets.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating for mandates for helmets. It's just the reasons and examples not to even think about helmets in this thread are twaddlebollocks.

I haven't seen anyone mention the prospect of new rules around helmets, but clearly there is a great deal of apprehension around the topic. I can only assume people are pre-empting outcomes of investigations around the tragedy in the Coastal?

[K4309 258]

Helmet on a Volvo boat.

[harrytom 643]

2 hours ago, K4309 said:

The ignorance is high with this one.

The Volvo fleet carry helmets and wear them often.

Ok My god, it was tongue n cheek. You want to wear helmet dont let me stop you.. 

[Clipper 343]

In summary, lessons from the wise K4309:

HT is ignorant

i speak nonsense

Boats should all have booms higher than carpe diems head (dont worry about the square metres of sail area being lost)

 

[Psyche 633]

9 hours ago, K4309 said:

Helmet on a Volvo boat.

I'm guessing the helm is wearing one as protection from spray and wind since nobody else has one.

[chariot 243]

I have never owned a boat where to boom was at or below head hight, but then they were older and slower. Our Davidson 35 was well above head hight, that's why it dropped onto the top of my head.

[K4309 258]

2 hours ago, Clipper said:

In summary, lessons from the wise K4309:

HT is ignorant

i speak nonsense

Boats should all have booms higher than carpe diems head (dont worry about the square metres of sail area being lost)

 

Good to see you can form a cohesive and compelling arguement, focusing on the topic at hand, using facts and examples to support your point.

Just having a pop at the poster makes it look like you have nothing worth saying.

[K4309 258]

2 hours ago, Psyche said:

I'm guessing the helm is wearing one as protection from spray and wind since nobody else has one.

The point is that the Volvo carry helmets and use them when they feel the need.

We went down that path cause HT said the Volvo wouldn't be able to stop in Auckland if YNZ mandated wearing helmets. Just pointing out that arguement is nonsense.

If you have a look around, keelboat racing is the only sailing sport that doesn't use helmets now. Dinghies, Volvo, America's Cup, Wind/Wing-foiling, kiting all use helmets. Keelboat racing is the odd one out.

Extending HT's point that if helmets are mandated it will be the death of sailing. I'd argue that if keelboat sailing is so slow and pedestrian that you don't need a helmet everyone is getting bored with it and getting into faster, easier and more exciting sports, that also happen to need a helmet. You can get a windfoil set up for less than the cost of a new mainsail, which enables a load more excitement and satisfaction with a fraction of the rules, overheads and ball-ache. That will be what leads to the death of sailing.

[CarpeDiem 430]

2 hours ago, Psyche said:

I'm guessing the helm is wearing one as protection from spray and wind since nobody else has one.

Yes, on the VOR boats, these are actually called "spray helmets". 

You will mainly see them being worn by the trimmer and the helm. But usually just the helm.

They let the helm continue to drive the boat while consistently taking a face full of water. 

[Psyche 633]

7 hours ago, K4309 said:

The point is that the Volvo carry helmets and use them when they feel the need.

We went down that path cause HT said the Volvo wouldn't be able to stop in Auckland if YNZ mandated wearing helmets. Just pointing out that arguement is nonsense.

If you have a look around, keelboat racing is the only sailing sport that doesn't use helmets now. Dinghies, Volvo, America's Cup, Wind/Wing-foiling, kiting all use helmets. Keelboat racing is the odd one out.

Extending HT's point that if helmets are mandated it will be the death of sailing. I'd argue that if keelboat sailing is so slow and pedestrian that you don't need a helmet everyone is getting bored with it and getting into faster, easier and more exciting sports, that also happen to need a helmet. You can get a windfoil set up for less than the cost of a new mainsail, which enables a load more excitement and satisfaction with a fraction of the rules, overheads and ball-ache. That will be what leads to the death of sailing.

Not sure you've got your facts right there, high speed sailing maybe, but everywhere else- no. As for the decline of keelboat racing, thats part of a trend right across our society. Teams sports are trending down and solo sports are up; heres a comment from sport NZ re adult trends last year

Move to more individualised and flexible activities
• An increase in the proportion of adults who agree ‘I choose physical activity that suits my mood
at the time’, from 55 percent in 2019 to 63 percent in 2021.
• An increase in the proportion who agree ‘I prefer to do physical activity that is more flexible and
less structured’, from 64 percent to 67 percent.
• A decrease in the proportion of adults engaging in competitive sports and activities, 11 percent
of adults in 2021.
• An increase in more individualised, flexible forms of physical activity including walking and
individual workouts.

 

 

 

[DrWatson 375]

Makes sense here. The boom is low and if you douse the sail the whole lot incl yard drop into the boat. No need to ruin a family Sunday afternoon with screaming kids and a trip to the hospital.

 

further, in the early 2000s I was the tallest crew member and in wed night races I did bow on a 727. I kept an old bike helmet on board and used it. More than once it allowed a screwup to be nothing more than cussing out the cockpit. although sometimes that cussing want only coming from the foredeck - I think it’s fair to cuss the skipper out after he clacks the boom into your head while he’s trying to pump the battens though without giving notice to the crew. 
 

I understood that on the Volvo boats it’s more to reduce head injuries from high speed crashes and from flying fish…