I visited Pachuca this weekend, two weeks after the grounding. As I approached her I kept a wary eye on her water line and she seemed to be riding as high in the water as ever. Once inside the cabin I started the electric bilge pump which began sucking air almost immediately.
So as I had expected, the boat is not taking water, and I am confident that the only damage from the recent grounding is to the anti fouling at the bottom of the keel.
Our legendary sailor Jon Sanders ran into his own boat problems during the week. The boat that he was delivering began taking more water than the pumps could deal with in very rough seas. There was a hole in the deck, two skin fittings (which are below the water line) failed, and there must have been another leak elsewhere.
Jon cannot be faulted because he was only delivering the boat and would not be expected to make a full survey of the vessel. Incidentally, I had every skin fitting (aka thru-hull fitting) replaced on Pachuca at great expense before setting off around the world.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-06-28/renowned-sailor-jon-sanders-blames-huge-swell-for-yacht-rescue/6579042
Pachuca
Pachuca in Port Angeles, WA USA
Monday, June 29, 2015
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Grounding Aftermath
There has been some progress in chart issue raised by my recent grounding. The following was the response to my request for the coordinates of the grounding. Having that information enabled the sending of the subsequent message to DOT (WA Department of Transport).
And the following message has been sent to the DOT by one of the members of the FSC Cruising Section. (An NtM is a Notice to Mariners.) (Also, note that "a depth of 1.9m some distance to the west of the grounding location" in the text would still have been OK for my boat, given that the water level was at 0.7m above, datum - yielding an actual depth at that time of 2.6m.)
2. Given that the next edition could be some time away, issue a NtM with the same cautionary note.
And the following message has been sent to the DOT by one of the members of the FSC Cruising Section. (An NtM is a Notice to Mariners.) (Also, note that "a depth of 1.9m some distance to the west of the grounding location" in the text would still have been OK for my boat, given that the water level was at 0.7m above, datum - yielding an actual depth at that time of 2.6m.)
Dear Sir/Madam,
I wish to draw to your attention a region that has been reported as significantly shallower than charted. On Sunday 14th
June the yacht Pachuca went aground on Parmelia Bank between Carnac and
the channel at 32 07.3S, 115 40.7E. The details of the incident are
reported in the yacht blog at http://pachucaroundtheworld.
The
yacht draws between 2.3m and 2.4m so the depth at the grounding
location, after account for tide height and storm surge, was less than
about 1.7m. The chart sounding nearest the location appears to be 4.6
m, with a depth of 1.9m some distance to the west of the grounding
location.
Many
locals know that both Parmelia and Success Banks often change
bathymetry after storms, usually during winter. It is therefore perhaps
unreasonable to expect these areas to be surveyed after every winter
with the severe budget constraints currently being experienced by
government agencies. However, in the interests of safety may I suggest
two (inexpensive) actions:
1. When
the next edition of chart 001 is printed, include an additional caution
to the effect that those two banks often end up shallower after storms,
so extra caution should be exercised if travelling over them.2. Given that the next edition could be some time away, issue a NtM with the same cautionary note.
Cockburn Volunteer Sea Rescue have already issued a similar warning on their Facebook page: “NAVIGATION
WARNING: Please note the charted depth in the area of 32 07.300S, 115
40.700E is inaccurate and can be less than one meter deep depending upon
tide. Mariners are advised to navigate with caution in the area.” source: https://www.facebook.com/
On a related matter, I note that none of the listed corrections to chart 001 http://161.152.28.103:10003/
NOTICES TO MARINERS for Aus754
------------------------------
119* WESTERN AUSTRALIA - Success Bank - Depth.
Fremantle Ports (DHDB 2566728) ( )
Aus754 [1052/2013]
Insert depth, 1.8m, enclosed by contour 32° 04.997 S 115° 42.917 E
Delete depth, 4.1m 32° 04.900 S 115° 42.900 E
Monday, June 15, 2015
Grounding
Last weekend I ran aground hard on the Parmelia Bank, east of Carnac Island.
I had arrange to have a sail with Paul on Sunday because the forecast was for clear weather and a moderate SE wind. I was up at 4 am, picked him up at his place in Chidlow at 6 AM, and we were in Fremantle at 7 AM. The boat was ready to go because a few days earlier I had reassembled the LPG system and the day before topped up the tanks with 45 liters of diesel. We set off for South Passage, between Garden Island to the south and Carnac island to the north in order to get out of Cockburn Sound and sail along the west side of Garden Island.
As we passed along the east of Carnac Island over the Parmelia Bank I kept an eye on our position and SE track mindful of the rocks to the south of the island. We were making about 5 kts under full mainsail and half of the jib rolled out, with a 12 kt breeze off our port beam.
The shallow water alarm went off and before I could react we were bumping along the bottom under sail. By the time we dropped the sails we were well into the shallows with the boat regularly rising up then bumping back on to the bottom in the gentle swell. Fortunately the Parmelia Bank is of sand and weed, so I was not too concerned about structural damage to the hull, but nevertheless it was very unpleasant to experience that incessant thumping of my boat onto the bottom,
I had two problems with the situation. First, I could not tell the best direction to take for the deeper water. Even if I did know the best direction, the boat did not respond well to the propeller, whether forward or aft. I churned up a lot of sand but got little movement and worse, had no control of the direction of movement.
Had we been isolated I would have checked the tide and confirmed my suspicion that it was falling and would not reach its next high for almost 24 hours, launched the inflatable, surveyed the area for the closest deep water, rowed out and dropped the anchor then kedged our way out by winching the boat along the anchor chain using the engine to help us along, with the boom out to the lee side to try to get the boat to heel over and reduce its draft. But we were in Cockburn Sound.
I got on the VHF radio and hailed VN6DI on channel 73. In 20 minutes a boat from Cockbun Sea Reacue was at our side. They surveyed the best way out (pretty much the way we had come in), tossed a heavy harness which we passed on each side of the head stay and made fast to my strongest cleat, and dragged us for several minutes through the bank into deeper water.
While waiting for the rescue boat I had been wondering how I could have been so careless in my navigation. After the crisis was over I would have to carefully analyze what had gone wrong. Then one of the men in the rescue boat mentioned that the water in this area was shallower than indicated in the chart. That was very interesting.
The incident knocked the stuffing out of me regarding sailing, and in any event I judged it too risky to venture out into the open sea west of Garden Island without being completely sure that the boat had not been damaged. But as we approached Fremantle I started feeling better and we spent another 3 hours doing a very pleasant sail to the north along the coast then back south into the marina.
Back at the club ran into one of the two men that had been sent out by the club in a RIB to assist us and he told me that in winter the Parmelia Bank increases in height and it can get as shallow as 1 meter. My reaction was along the lines of 'What??? Isn't the chart supposed to show the guaranteed minimum at the LAT (Lowest Astronomical Tide)? Nobody has ever told me about this!" The man told me that they used to actually surf over that bank in one of the club's wood hull boats. His last words to me were that it can happen to anybody. I replied that I might head back to Cape Horn, which seemed safer than Cockburn Sound.
Looking back, I can see the trap that I got into. First of all, I relied on the chart. But because I had not done any winter sailing in that area and had not hung around the club enough to get the vital information by word of mouth the stage had been set for the second (the first was with my 27-ft sloop Angie) and by far the worst grounding.
The first image shows a closeup of the area of the grounding. In that tide I should have been able to clear anything above 2 meters on the chart.
The second image shows South Pass, with Carnac Island to the north and the larger Garden Island to the south. To the right is the shipping channel. The two circled leads mark the deepest route through the pass. Sail boats can normally pass between the line of those leads and the rocks just south of Carnac Island.
I had arrange to have a sail with Paul on Sunday because the forecast was for clear weather and a moderate SE wind. I was up at 4 am, picked him up at his place in Chidlow at 6 AM, and we were in Fremantle at 7 AM. The boat was ready to go because a few days earlier I had reassembled the LPG system and the day before topped up the tanks with 45 liters of diesel. We set off for South Passage, between Garden Island to the south and Carnac island to the north in order to get out of Cockburn Sound and sail along the west side of Garden Island.
As we passed along the east of Carnac Island over the Parmelia Bank I kept an eye on our position and SE track mindful of the rocks to the south of the island. We were making about 5 kts under full mainsail and half of the jib rolled out, with a 12 kt breeze off our port beam.
The shallow water alarm went off and before I could react we were bumping along the bottom under sail. By the time we dropped the sails we were well into the shallows with the boat regularly rising up then bumping back on to the bottom in the gentle swell. Fortunately the Parmelia Bank is of sand and weed, so I was not too concerned about structural damage to the hull, but nevertheless it was very unpleasant to experience that incessant thumping of my boat onto the bottom,
I had two problems with the situation. First, I could not tell the best direction to take for the deeper water. Even if I did know the best direction, the boat did not respond well to the propeller, whether forward or aft. I churned up a lot of sand but got little movement and worse, had no control of the direction of movement.
Had we been isolated I would have checked the tide and confirmed my suspicion that it was falling and would not reach its next high for almost 24 hours, launched the inflatable, surveyed the area for the closest deep water, rowed out and dropped the anchor then kedged our way out by winching the boat along the anchor chain using the engine to help us along, with the boom out to the lee side to try to get the boat to heel over and reduce its draft. But we were in Cockburn Sound.
I got on the VHF radio and hailed VN6DI on channel 73. In 20 minutes a boat from Cockbun Sea Reacue was at our side. They surveyed the best way out (pretty much the way we had come in), tossed a heavy harness which we passed on each side of the head stay and made fast to my strongest cleat, and dragged us for several minutes through the bank into deeper water.
While waiting for the rescue boat I had been wondering how I could have been so careless in my navigation. After the crisis was over I would have to carefully analyze what had gone wrong. Then one of the men in the rescue boat mentioned that the water in this area was shallower than indicated in the chart. That was very interesting.
The incident knocked the stuffing out of me regarding sailing, and in any event I judged it too risky to venture out into the open sea west of Garden Island without being completely sure that the boat had not been damaged. But as we approached Fremantle I started feeling better and we spent another 3 hours doing a very pleasant sail to the north along the coast then back south into the marina.
Back at the club ran into one of the two men that had been sent out by the club in a RIB to assist us and he told me that in winter the Parmelia Bank increases in height and it can get as shallow as 1 meter. My reaction was along the lines of 'What??? Isn't the chart supposed to show the guaranteed minimum at the LAT (Lowest Astronomical Tide)? Nobody has ever told me about this!" The man told me that they used to actually surf over that bank in one of the club's wood hull boats. His last words to me were that it can happen to anybody. I replied that I might head back to Cape Horn, which seemed safer than Cockburn Sound.
Looking back, I can see the trap that I got into. First of all, I relied on the chart. But because I had not done any winter sailing in that area and had not hung around the club enough to get the vital information by word of mouth the stage had been set for the second (the first was with my 27-ft sloop Angie) and by far the worst grounding.
 |
| Red Circle Marks Approximate Location of Grounding |
 |
| South Passage between Carnac and Garden Islands |
The first image shows a closeup of the area of the grounding. In that tide I should have been able to clear anything above 2 meters on the chart.
The second image shows South Pass, with Carnac Island to the north and the larger Garden Island to the south. To the right is the shipping channel. The two circled leads mark the deepest route through the pass. Sail boats can normally pass between the line of those leads and the rocks just south of Carnac Island.
Saturday, June 6, 2015
Gas System Finallyt Working, and Short Sail
I reported last January that the boat's refurbished LPG gas system was up and running OK. Unfortunately during the Bunbury Cruise I discovered that the gas cutoff solenoid was not working properly, ie it always allowed gas to pass through regardless of the state of the gas detector. This meant that the boat had no emergency gas cutoff. This surprised me because the solenoid had been working OK before the refurbishment and I could still hear it clacking on and off according to the dictates of the detector. I can best describe the problem with reference to the following photograph of the final setup with the new solenoid.
The gas flows from right to left. The LPG cylinder to supply gas to the boat will be set by the green selector valve. The gas will then pass through the black solenoid switch with the brass cutoff valve above, then through the two-stage pressure reducer and on to the galley.
In the old setup the solenoid cutoff was positioned to the left (ie downstream) of the pressure reducer. When assembling the new system I realized that this made no sense because if the pressure reducer developed a leak from, say, a ruptured diaphragm, the gas detector would cut off would not stop the leak. The sensible thing was to put the solenoid one step forward, between the pressure reducer and the selector switch. I did this but the surprising result was that the solenoid was never able to cut off the gas and it took several visits to Gas Components in Canning Vale to solve the mystery.
The boat's original gas cutoff had not been designed to deal with the relatively high pressures at the cylinder. In order to make it work the original installers had placed the cutoff downstream of the pressure reducer where the pressure was low. Yes, this worked but was totally illegal and highly dangerous. A gas leak from the reducer could very easily have led to a buildup of gas in the bilge, then up into the cabin. A flick of the bilge pump switch or a spark from trying to start the stove could have blown the boat to smithereens. The company sourced the appropriate cutoff from their Queensland branch at about 4 times the cost of the low pressure version.
This is another lesson in not accepting everything on a professionally built boat at face value. There was a similar trap in the irresponsible wiring to the windlass battery that caused that major electrical fire in the Sea of Cortez that could very easily led to the loss of the boat with Brenda and I in the water.
The last two photos show the final setup, with the selector switch easy to reach and the solenoid cutoff and its wiring safely tucked away.
Last week Paul and I went for a sail. We got off to an early start and were looking forward to a full day of sailing. We sailed into a stiff northerly breeze and a rising sea where Paul got good training on reefing and what can go wrong in heavy weather when the skipper makes mistakes.
The anchor jumped off the roller in the pounding sea and we were forced to ship it with great difficulty then lash it to a bollard near the mast. We also had unnecessary leaks because I had forgotten to tighten down the forward hatch and blank off the vent above the head. At noon we brought down the mainsail and gybed the boat to return to the marina under headsail only. I got lazy and tried to make the gybe with the headsail still 25% rolled out and managed to get a nasty sail wrap so that we could roll the sail neither in or out. We got out of that jam the hard way by untying the sheets and winding them back from around the sail., but as a result we ran out of furling line well before the sail was fully rolled up. We made do by doing a rough job of holding the excess sail to the forestay and were able to sort out the problem at the marina.
This was all due to lack of practice on my part. The only sails I've made on Pachuca since the end of the circumnavigation 2 years ago have been on the annual Bunbury Cruise, made at the optimal time of year.
Anyway, it was good training for Paul and a good reminder to me about preparing the boat for rough weather.
 |
| Final Setup with New Solenoid |
The gas flows from right to left. The LPG cylinder to supply gas to the boat will be set by the green selector valve. The gas will then pass through the black solenoid switch with the brass cutoff valve above, then through the two-stage pressure reducer and on to the galley.
In the old setup the solenoid cutoff was positioned to the left (ie downstream) of the pressure reducer. When assembling the new system I realized that this made no sense because if the pressure reducer developed a leak from, say, a ruptured diaphragm, the gas detector would cut off would not stop the leak. The sensible thing was to put the solenoid one step forward, between the pressure reducer and the selector switch. I did this but the surprising result was that the solenoid was never able to cut off the gas and it took several visits to Gas Components in Canning Vale to solve the mystery.
The boat's original gas cutoff had not been designed to deal with the relatively high pressures at the cylinder. In order to make it work the original installers had placed the cutoff downstream of the pressure reducer where the pressure was low. Yes, this worked but was totally illegal and highly dangerous. A gas leak from the reducer could very easily have led to a buildup of gas in the bilge, then up into the cabin. A flick of the bilge pump switch or a spark from trying to start the stove could have blown the boat to smithereens. The company sourced the appropriate cutoff from their Queensland branch at about 4 times the cost of the low pressure version.
This is another lesson in not accepting everything on a professionally built boat at face value. There was a similar trap in the irresponsible wiring to the windlass battery that caused that major electrical fire in the Sea of Cortez that could very easily led to the loss of the boat with Brenda and I in the water.
The last two photos show the final setup, with the selector switch easy to reach and the solenoid cutoff and its wiring safely tucked away.
Last week Paul and I went for a sail. We got off to an early start and were looking forward to a full day of sailing. We sailed into a stiff northerly breeze and a rising sea where Paul got good training on reefing and what can go wrong in heavy weather when the skipper makes mistakes.
The anchor jumped off the roller in the pounding sea and we were forced to ship it with great difficulty then lash it to a bollard near the mast. We also had unnecessary leaks because I had forgotten to tighten down the forward hatch and blank off the vent above the head. At noon we brought down the mainsail and gybed the boat to return to the marina under headsail only. I got lazy and tried to make the gybe with the headsail still 25% rolled out and managed to get a nasty sail wrap so that we could roll the sail neither in or out. We got out of that jam the hard way by untying the sheets and winding them back from around the sail., but as a result we ran out of furling line well before the sail was fully rolled up. We made do by doing a rough job of holding the excess sail to the forestay and were able to sort out the problem at the marina.
This was all due to lack of practice on my part. The only sails I've made on Pachuca since the end of the circumnavigation 2 years ago have been on the annual Bunbury Cruise, made at the optimal time of year.
Anyway, it was good training for Paul and a good reminder to me about preparing the boat for rough weather.
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