Castlebay adventures
Posted: Tue Jul 24, 2012 2:44 pm
I arrived here last Friday in search of a good place to sit through the storm forecast for the weekend.
The wind was expected from the SW so I thought a 15 ton visitors mooring tucked in the corner of Castlebay would do nicely.
Wrong.
The wind came up from the SE and settled in the SSE from about 9.00 on Saturday evening until about lunchtime Sunday when it finally swung into the SW. Castlebay has a long fetch from the south and little shelter from that wind.
By about 0200 Sunday the wind was really howling and quite big breaking waves were rolling in.
A Rival 32 seemed to be dragging her mooring onto the very close lee shore, I think she hit the rocks at one point. She managed to get off but did not seem to be able to free herself from the mooing. Every time she made progress away from the shore her bow got dragged round, but she did manage to avoid the rocks.
The Noewegian 26ft sloop was not so lucky. When I first saw her, about the time the Rival was careering around she was being pushed to the shore. The two young men aboard were stuggling to drop an anchor. It seems her motor was out of order. She very quickly hit the rocks, horrible banging noise, heeling over a bit, the two guys hauling on the anchor chain but not getting off the rocks.
All this was going on within 100 metres of me.
The Norwegians put out a Mayday, the Rival put out a Mayday.
A local lifeboat man coming back from the pub saw what was going on and alerted the cox'n before the coastguard paged him. The cox'n thought it took about 15 minutes from the alert to when they cast off. If you know Castlebay then you will realise that the chaos was about 150 metres from the Clansman's linkspan and the LB lies on the other side off the pier.
Nevertheless it was a long a scary wait till the lifeboat and its inflatable arrived.
The big boat attended to the Norwegians first: a throwing line and then a towing line, all the time the yacht was grinding on the rocks: the lifeboat was having difficulty holding her position between the Clansman and the moorings, the wind was blowing her off. When they started the tow, with the LB going astern they came to a stop because of the Norwegians' anchor, they got going again, then the lifeboat had to drop the tow to get her line again. Eventually they pulled the sloop out. Great seamanship. They took the casualty to their berth on the pier. Neither of the Norwegians were hurt, the boat is still afloat but with rudder prop and keel damage.
All this time the Rival was still going round in circles between me and the shore. Her motor was running, her steering was working but she was being thrown all over the place: I'm still not sure why they didn't cut free the mooring. Eventually the RNLI inflatable returned and at their urging and after crashing into me they did cut the mooring and off they went. They spent the night alongside the LB but returned to a mooring the next day. I think they plan to dry out alongside a jetty in Vatersay to check for damage.
At one point the local harbourmaster came on the VHF warning that all the moorings were on the same ground chain(?) and that if one had moved the others might. Very scary. It was windy. The air was full of fine spray and it was bumpy. When I was on the foredeck checking the mooring the waves were going over the sharp end. At the bottom of the tide I was about two boat lengths from the rocks, 50ft. Not enough time and space to start her from cold to drive off the rocks. I spent the night with the engine ticking over and the chartplotters anchor alarm on its finest setting. I also packed a grab bag in case I had to make a hasty departure as the boat was driven ashore. (Clean Y fronts, phone and visa card)
Two other yachts sat through it, a Westerly Storm 33 and a Moody 33. None of us managed to get off the boats until the Monday afternoon. A lady from the Storm 33 took the ferry home this morning, it's skipper told me he had decided to put a card in the Post Office window, "yacht for sale, one hundred pounds. buyer collects"
I think we are really fortunate that nobody was hurt. Not the best 48 hours of my life, maybe it's time to take up stamp collecting.
My real worry though is about the coming weekend, Mrs Ocklepoint is flying in for what we hope is to be a gentle boaty break and Barrafest. She does not do "roughing it", she does not do being stuck on a mooring in a cramped 26 ft boat for 48 hours and she does not do bumpy trips in the inflatable to dark windy moorings. She did offer a couple of months ago to book a BnB for us but I assured her she would have a lovely time on the boat in idyllic Castlebay. Oh dear. I spent this morning trying to get a room for the weekend. Not a chance. Maybe its time for the grab bag
The wind was expected from the SW so I thought a 15 ton visitors mooring tucked in the corner of Castlebay would do nicely.
Wrong.
The wind came up from the SE and settled in the SSE from about 9.00 on Saturday evening until about lunchtime Sunday when it finally swung into the SW. Castlebay has a long fetch from the south and little shelter from that wind.
By about 0200 Sunday the wind was really howling and quite big breaking waves were rolling in.
A Rival 32 seemed to be dragging her mooring onto the very close lee shore, I think she hit the rocks at one point. She managed to get off but did not seem to be able to free herself from the mooing. Every time she made progress away from the shore her bow got dragged round, but she did manage to avoid the rocks.
The Noewegian 26ft sloop was not so lucky. When I first saw her, about the time the Rival was careering around she was being pushed to the shore. The two young men aboard were stuggling to drop an anchor. It seems her motor was out of order. She very quickly hit the rocks, horrible banging noise, heeling over a bit, the two guys hauling on the anchor chain but not getting off the rocks.
All this was going on within 100 metres of me.
The Norwegians put out a Mayday, the Rival put out a Mayday.
A local lifeboat man coming back from the pub saw what was going on and alerted the cox'n before the coastguard paged him. The cox'n thought it took about 15 minutes from the alert to when they cast off. If you know Castlebay then you will realise that the chaos was about 150 metres from the Clansman's linkspan and the LB lies on the other side off the pier.
Nevertheless it was a long a scary wait till the lifeboat and its inflatable arrived.
The big boat attended to the Norwegians first: a throwing line and then a towing line, all the time the yacht was grinding on the rocks: the lifeboat was having difficulty holding her position between the Clansman and the moorings, the wind was blowing her off. When they started the tow, with the LB going astern they came to a stop because of the Norwegians' anchor, they got going again, then the lifeboat had to drop the tow to get her line again. Eventually they pulled the sloop out. Great seamanship. They took the casualty to their berth on the pier. Neither of the Norwegians were hurt, the boat is still afloat but with rudder prop and keel damage.
All this time the Rival was still going round in circles between me and the shore. Her motor was running, her steering was working but she was being thrown all over the place: I'm still not sure why they didn't cut free the mooring. Eventually the RNLI inflatable returned and at their urging and after crashing into me they did cut the mooring and off they went. They spent the night alongside the LB but returned to a mooring the next day. I think they plan to dry out alongside a jetty in Vatersay to check for damage.
At one point the local harbourmaster came on the VHF warning that all the moorings were on the same ground chain(?) and that if one had moved the others might. Very scary. It was windy. The air was full of fine spray and it was bumpy. When I was on the foredeck checking the mooring the waves were going over the sharp end. At the bottom of the tide I was about two boat lengths from the rocks, 50ft. Not enough time and space to start her from cold to drive off the rocks. I spent the night with the engine ticking over and the chartplotters anchor alarm on its finest setting. I also packed a grab bag in case I had to make a hasty departure as the boat was driven ashore. (Clean Y fronts, phone and visa card)
Two other yachts sat through it, a Westerly Storm 33 and a Moody 33. None of us managed to get off the boats until the Monday afternoon. A lady from the Storm 33 took the ferry home this morning, it's skipper told me he had decided to put a card in the Post Office window, "yacht for sale, one hundred pounds. buyer collects"
I think we are really fortunate that nobody was hurt. Not the best 48 hours of my life, maybe it's time to take up stamp collecting.
My real worry though is about the coming weekend, Mrs Ocklepoint is flying in for what we hope is to be a gentle boaty break and Barrafest. She does not do "roughing it", she does not do being stuck on a mooring in a cramped 26 ft boat for 48 hours and she does not do bumpy trips in the inflatable to dark windy moorings. She did offer a couple of months ago to book a BnB for us but I assured her she would have a lovely time on the boat in idyllic Castlebay. Oh dear. I spent this morning trying to get a room for the weekend. Not a chance. Maybe its time for the grab bag
