2 dead in SY Hobart

[Black Panther 1,745]

Booms again. Stand by for some new rules

 

 

[Black Panther 1,745]

 

[Zozza 336]

Absolute tragedy, and my deepest sympathies to the unfortunate sailor's families.  
Are we able to design rigs with booms higher than the average persons height standing in the cockpit - maybe 1.90M+ ?

[khayyam 99]

Not without raising the centre of effort and compromising performance. Which might be worth it, but is why race boats don't.

[K4309 395]

10 minutes ago, khayyam said:

Not without raising the centre of effort and compromising performance. Which might be worth it, but is why race boats don't.

Be fairly easy to add a rating penalty for low booms. If national bodies are serious about safety that is. No performance advantage if you get stung on handicap (in most respects, sure there are those that only want to win on line).

As BP says, there is untold scope for new rules. Minimum height for booms. Carrying helmets onboard, wearing helmets when running downwind in the dark in big waves. Something about preventers (can introduce more issues).

[Island Time 1,288]

Imo this is a leadership failure. All crew should be warned and aware of possibility of a gybe when sailing deep, esp by the lee. No-one should be positioned even close to where they could be hit, regardless of convenience.  Crew safety is paramount, and any helmsman, tactician or skipper should be well aware of any time when this is possible. 

[waikiore 460]

Might pay to wait for the actual facts to come out : ie in the NZ tragedies of recent years the booms did not hit anyone. Mainsheets however and their potential swinging arc are a different matter.

[aardvarkash10 1,084]

1 hour ago, Island Time said:

Imo this is a leadership failure. All crew should be warned and aware of possibility of a gybe when sailing deep, esp by the lee. No-one should be positioned even close to where they could be hit, regardless of convenience.  Crew safety is paramount, and any helmsman, tactician or skipper should be well aware of any time when this is possible. 

Agree, but at night (one at about 10.30pm, the other at 02.00am) in frisky conditions and early in the race while caution is least likely...

Humans are busy being human, and blokes being blokes.

This by way of explanation, not excuse.

[harrytom 688]

as a young guy 45 yrs ago,sailed with a bunch of oldies and running in 20+ knts it was my job to strap the boom to leeward,never had a issue.

[MsKellySails 3]

What percentage of entrants would meet zozza s idea?

[harrytom 688]

6 hours ago, Zozza said:

Absolute tragedy, and my deepest sympathies to the unfortunate sailor's families.  
Are we able to design rigs with booms higher than the average persons height standing in the cockpit - maybe 1.90M+ ?

I can get run over crossing the rd if Im not carefull,where do you stop? Accidents happen in all walks of life. work/sport

[Zozza 336]

1 hour ago, harrytom said:

I can get run over crossing the rd if Im not carefull,where do you stop? Accidents happen in all walks of life. work/sport

Yeah agree, and I am not saying stop sailing in boats with booms lower to the deck - but there has been a spate of these type of accidents, and just wondering if any design rule or something re the boom height - could be implemented.....

[harrytom 688]

58 minutes ago, Zozza said:

Yeah agree, and I am not saying stop sailing in boats with booms lower to the deck - but there has been a spate of these type of accidents, and just wondering if any design rule or something re the boom height - could be implemented.....

Have seen more novice crews standing in coiled jib/kite sheets.Had one young ,not enough turns on winch.Puts hand in to hold.Yep figers turn around winch. simple mistakes but could be costly

[K4309 395]

3 hours ago, harrytom said:

I can get run over crossing the rd if Im not carefull,where do you stop? Accidents happen in all walks of life. work/sport

Yeah, but that is not a great analogy. What is the likelihood of getting hit by a truck while minding your own business on the footpath? You have to make a conscious decision to step onto the road. There is no conscious decision to get whacked by the boom.

A better analogy would be standing on the footpath minding your own business with a massive steel beam that can suddenly swing out and take your head off without warning, at random times.

It is a basic safety in design thing. Just make the gap between the boom and the cockpit sole greater. Sure you can yell 'quack' at your crewmates (duck) every now and then, but it isn't that effective. Yes there are a number of risks in sailing, as in any aspect of life. That is one of the things that attract us to many aspects of sport, the risk and the reward.

I know racing boats aren't cruising boats, but cruising boat designers address these issues very well. Boom above head height in the cockpit. And the mainsheet issue, many boats now put the mainsheet out of the cockpit, generally on the cabin top. I see some of the fancy French racing boats have the mainsheet / traveller at the very aft of the cockpit, as in out of everyone's way. That is another way to deal with it. Doesn't eleminat the risk, but it does reduce it by removing the mainsheet from the main crew work areas of the cockpit. I'm sure the purists will argue that having high booms and travelers on the cabin top is not fast, which has some truth to it, but at the same time you can't win a race if you don't finish with all the crew, so in that regard killing your crew is not fast either. It is all about balance really.

[K4309 395]

Both were initially reported to have died when their respective boats’ boom hit them. But the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia’s David Jacobs late on Friday said Smith was in fact killed when he was hit by the sail’s main sheet.

Hours earlier onboard the Flying Fish Arctos, Quaden was hit by the boat’s boom. The 55-year-old Western Australian man could not be saved despite his teammates performing extensive CPR.

[eruptn 103]

Looking at race tracker you can getting a feeling for any tack/gybe…

[SloopJohnB 326]

7 hours ago, harrytom said:

as a young guy 45 yrs ago,sailed with a bunch of oldies and running in 20+ knts it was my job to strap the boom to leeward,never had a issue.

In the mid 70's on a S&S 50 footer we were running down from the Moko's at night in a good NEly read to gybe around Flat Rock and the boat did a chinses gybe, we were pinned down. The crew were ready in their positions for the gybe with the new sheet grinder up to his neck in water using the lifelines as a ladder, I could could another crew with a knife attaching the boom preventer, yellin at the grinder to duck then a few seconds the main changed sides. That was my closest moment to a fatal accident I been to on a boat. Had to off load a crew member with a broken leg to a launch in the lee of the Hen after another crew had his foot in a coil of the kite sheet which pulled over to land on the legs of the crew whom had them across the cockpit seats.

[Zozza 336]

Looks like one of the fatalities not a boom, but caught on a mainsheet, then whacked head on a winch.
Horrific.

[Y88 5241 27]

Perhaps the idea of paying to race needs to be looked at. This is the 2nd fatality on a paid punters race boat in 3-months. 

it’s a nice idea that punters can pay to say they have done a Hobart etc but at what price

[Guest 129]

I never considered getting launched by mainsheet until it happened when I was solo once. The actual violence and sudden ness of it. Like being king hit or blindsided. Even though the traveller and boom  were centered. I was leaning across the path of ms unlocking main halyard. Benign example  but an example of how anticipatory you need to be. Bruised flesh and confidence only. What if, turned off.