The Sad Demise of an E35-2

My boat is currently on the hard. Looking across the yard, I saw another Ericson. She appeared to be a reasonably well appointed E-35. Upon closer inspection, she had lines protruding from the starboard hull below waterline! Yikes! She also had at least two lines wrapped around her prop shaft. The boat is named "Keelime."

The boatyard manager told me she had gone up on the beach. Today I saw two guys removing an outboard, so I approached them. They said they were friends of the owner. They told me much of the story. The owner/skipper had single handed the boat on a cruise to Mexico and back. It was a recent day which had an exceptionally large swell running. It was fairly late in the day and close to dusk. He had bought the boat only last July or thereabouts, prior to his trip south. The boat got into trouble within 100 yards of her home port, Channel Islands Harbor, after such a long cruise. The skipper was swept overboard and the boat went onto the beach. There are some hard rocks down there, out of sight, BTW. The skipper was swept out to sea. He spent 40 minutes in the cold water (less than 60 degrees) before rescue! I am not sure about the order of those events.

The boat was holed and has been declared a total loss. :0

The owner was ok after recovering from hypothermia, thankfully.

I don't have all the facts and we don't have a first hand account, but some fundamentals can be emphasized here, I think.

1. Guard against fatigue, especially when singlehanded.
2. Never become complacent when you are at the mercy of the Pacific or any other ocean. The Pacific is the largest single object on our planet! Her power is quite immense.
3. Wear a harness and tether attached to a jackline when singlehanded.
4. Make sure to approach a harbor mouth carefully. If there is an ebb tide running against an incoming swell, the waves can grow beyond reason or logic. I have had one or two very scary entrance scenarios myself.
5. Make sure you are not confused by background lights and be sure of your approach to the harbor. Channel Islands Harbor and Port Heuneme are not far apart. Was there confusion?
6. If you loose power, deploy your anchor asap.

I don't say these things to sermonize or criticize but only to remind, myself as much as anyone, to take care out there.

Any chance you can find the serial number?
im putting together a data sheet of all the 35's

mark

Good points, Keith. Thank you.

I always use a harness and jackline when double handing especially with my wife. She is susceptible to panic in stress situations and I worry that she might not be able to come back and pick me up if I do something stupid and go overboard. The boat is perfectly happy to sail along without me!

Single Handing risks

supersailor said:

I always use a harness and jackline when double handing especially with my wife. She is susceptible to panic in stress situations and I worry that she might not be able to come back and pick me up if I do something stupid and go overboard. The boat is perfectly happy to sail along without me!

Click to expand...

Ahem....
The real problem for either one of us is not that that our wives might 'panic' if we fell OB, but, given how many decades we've been married, the additional mile that the boat would cover while they thoughtfully considered a future without us!
Best defense is Not to have a large life insurance policy...

Seriously, it is really better to be extra-special sure that you do not go OB in the first place! In rough conditions we all wear pfd's when out of the cockpit. For open waters I have the static lines rigged, too.

Back to the subject, approaching harbors and "land" in general is the most intense part of sailing short-handed. Often that's when we are all short of rest, and there is a lot of piloting to be done, and details become really important. The few guys that I know that have double-handed to Hawaii have all said the the last 48 hours were by far the hardest. :0

Without thinking it through ahead of time, one year I spent all my WM bonus coupons on their kit of jack lines and tethers. These turned out to be all but useless for a 30-ish foot boat. The stuff is all too long and rigged as directed, would not keep anyone on the boat. I may have enough gorilla genes to haul myself back on board, but that's not the right way to do it...

It's really easy to shorten the jackline straps with a sailmaker's needle, a fid and strong twine. You can also add clips that work on your boat at that time. The West jacklines are perfectly sized for the E-34. I run mine inside the shrouds so it is easier to work at the mast and you don't need to lean outward at the shrouds when going forward on the lee side. Others on the site disagree and run them outside the shrouds. Either way works as long as you are clipped on.

One other item for my list;

Mind your lines. One of the lines wrapped around his prop was floating yellow poly rope. The two guys told me that was his man overboard line. Even though it could float, it eventually got wrapped up on the prop, maybe after the boat was in the surf "Maytag."

Here's more on Jacklines:

http://www.ericsonyachts.org/infoexchange/showthread.php?13222-E29-Jacklines

http://www.ericsonyachts.org/infoexchange/showthread.php?13327-Jacklines-on-E38

Sad demise...

Keith, do you have contact info for the owner or whoever is scrapping the boat?

I generally feel terrible about taking things from a dying boat especially an Ericson, but my boat still needs quite a bit and I can put a positive spin on it -- transfusing parts from one Ericson to help save/restore another.

adam said:

Keith, do you have contact info for the owner or whoever is scrapping the boat?

I generally feel terrible about taking things from a dying boat especially an Ericson, but my boat still needs quite a bit and I can put a positive spin on it -- transfusing parts from one Ericson to help save/restore another.

Click to expand...

Adam,

No, I don't have contact info other than the boatyard and the boatyard was emphatic that the boat and everything on it belongs to the insurance company now and that nothing must be taken or disturbed. I don't know about the disposition of it.

The Boatyard at Channel Islands is where it is (or was....I don't know if it has been moved yet). The manager is Joe at (805) 985-6800
Or email mike@tbyci.com
If you want to give it a try

Thanks Keith.