Match 40s find the surface again + Video

by Oakcliff Sailing on 28 Aug 2014 Oakcliff has lent seven Match 40s to the Knickerbocker Cup for the past four years. On Saturday, Manhasset Bay YC was towing four boats to their club, however two never made it to the race.

When dealing with boats, there are always multiple things that can go wrong and unfortunately many did. Just one of the problems was that with open transoms, it is essential for Match 40s to have the scuppers open while sailing and under tow. This weekend, Manhasset Bay Yacht Club learned what happens when the scuppers are not open. During the tow, Match 40 number six very slowly filled with water due to closed scuppers. Making matters worse, as number six sank, number three drifted in and got her bow caught under number six's spreaders. The two boats became inseparable and both boats sank.

Sunday was an incredibly long day of salvage. With two Tow BoatUS teams, plus our people we attached over 10,000 pounds of float bags to raise them to the surface. See the video to see the speed that they come up once they get out of the mud.



We then slowly towed the swamped boats to the shallow water in front of Webb Institute and used four crash pumps while we were also standing in the cockpits using anything we could to slow the water coming in as we pumped the water out. We began at 9am and finished at 1am, cold and exhausted. Monday's day off was canceled and we are all hands on deck to repair the boats in time for our Grade 2 International. Thank God we have a good team here that can pull together and pull off miracles. If Dawn had the funding, she would give the team big bonuses!