Trouble for Cruising Sailors

by Nancy Knudsen on 23 May 2007 No premonition warns us.

In company with four other boats we leave Academy Bay on the island of Santa Cruz in Galapagos headed for the Marquesas. Spirits are high.. In the party of five are two Belgian boats (Bauvier and Wakalele) and three Australian boats (Fantasy 1, Mary Constance and Blackwattle).

Before us, prior to the three week sail across 3000 miles of ocean, is the prospect of a couple of days on the Island of Isabella, which we are told is a gem of naturalness and the home of penguins, sea-lions, sea turtles and a wonderful variety of sharks.

As we leave in the soft mist of early morning the placid sea is shining like grey satin, billowing into the distance under a dove grey sky. There are hunting birds all around, pelicans and great frigate birds, dropping like missiles into the water beside Blackwattle - startling us every time.

Later there's a little breeze, and by three o'clock in the afternoon we wind our way into the shallow lava-rock-surrounded anchorage at Puerto Villamil.

There's a swell here, but not too bad, and a small boat with Puerto Villamil written on the side approaches us, welcoming and showing us where to anchor – the small bay is crowded in the navigable areas, and we are glad for the local knowledge.

Tomorrow or the day after we will ride horses in the highlands, climb a volcano and go see the flamingos. Then we'll swim with the penguins and sea turtles, maybe even sharks, though I haven't convinced Skipper Ted Nobbs that that is a sound idea.

In the evening, in preparation for our swim with penguins, we watch DVD 'The March of the Penguins'', and it's half way through, at exactly 8.46pm (I glance at my watch) when I feel the gentlest, oddest bump. Maybe it's the anchor buoy thudding against the hull, maybe I imagined it.

When it repeats, it's firmer, and we both spring up to race onto the darkened deck. ''We're on the bottom.'' Ted says, curiously quiet. After that nobody's speaking or breathing much.

We start the engine and go forward, slowly increasing revs. Nothing happens. The boat doesn't move. The thumps - it's sand, that's good – start coming frequently.

Ted radios Fantasy 1 who is near us. ''Are you floating?'' ''No,'' is the calm answer, ''We're on the bottom.''

We know low tide is sometime soon, but we don't know exactly. The thumping gets harder, every thump shaking the rigging unpleasantly. After a while, the rudder starts to thump as well, sending the steering wheel swinging back and forth in a demented fashion.

These rudder thumps sound much more damaging than when the keel hits, as we can imagine the rudder crunching this way and that as it turns the wheel wildly.

We discuss many scenarios, but we cannot afford to risk further damage, so decide to try to ride it out and wait for high tide.

With every hit, the whole boat vibrates, from the davits to the fore stays. It's the swell that aggravates the situation, lifting the bow, and that crunches the stern of the boat, with the rudder taking the worst of it.

As each swell passes, the keel bumps back onto the hard sandy bottom, sending shudders through the rigging. Behind us we play a torch on the black water and discover that there is a lava rock reef behind us, so we watch the GPS constantly to check that we are not moving.

We cannot afford to take the anchor chain in, as the boat is bucking like a wild bull, and the strain would be too much on the anchor winch. After some movement, the GPS stays constant and we are reassured that we are not getting closer to the reef. We think, finally, the boat is settling on the bottom, as the thumping is getting softer.

After an hour, we hear from another boat, Mary Constance, who report that they too have started bumping on the bottom. Now all three Australian boats are stuck fast but lifting and dropping with the swell, and offers of help start to come from the two still floating Belgian boats, Bauvier and Wakalele.

For Fantasy 1 the nightmare worsens as they can see that they too have a lava rock reef behind them but they are thumping backwards closer and closer.

They finally accept an offer of help from Bart of Bauvier, who races across in his dinghy to discover that Fantasy 1's anchor has taken too much strain with the thumping and snapped off the chain.

No wonder they are going backwards. In the darkness of the night, lit only by a icy sliver of moon, Bart, with the help of Steve from Wakalele, attaches another anchor to the bow, and a stern anchor, and then tries to pull them off the reef with the dinghy.

They make some headway, but the help is too late and the skeg and the rudder are now colliding with lava rocks.

On Mary Constance, the snubber snaps off and is lost in the water, and Mike quickly jury rigs another. The little girls on Mary Constance are alarmed, but settle themselves in the cockpit closer to Mum and Dad, and fall asleep there, crunched in their small corners.

Meanwhile, on Fantasy 1, the two Belgian skippers have managed to get Fantasy 1 into deep water.

Then they leave Fantasy 1 , temporarily safe, and appear at our side. ''Can we give you some help?''

''I don't think there is anything you can do.'' says Ted wearily between the noise-hits of the shuddering rigging, 'I think the tide has turned, as we are bouncing up and down a lot more now.''

''But you are heading too close to the reef.''

''No, our GPS says we are not moving at all.''

''Yes we can see that you are moving. That's why we came over.''

Shocked and puzzled in equal measure, I dive down the companion way to check the GPS. Then I see it for the first time. NO FIX. Our GPS has stopped connecting with the satellites – useless.

Together we work to try to free Blackwattle, and, with the help of a lifting tide meet with some success. In the crowded anchorage, in the dark of night, we also need help to re-anchor.

In small spaces, manoeuvring Blackwattle, with her long-keel and crazy reverse responses, is not the easiest even in broad daylight.

The two Belgian skippers, with some help from black figures in other dinghies who magically appear out of the night from other boats in the anchorage, finally, with lots of shouting into the night and dingy pushing, get us re-anchored.

They then return to re-anchor Fantasy 1, who discover that they have lost all steering.

They can steer neither with a wheel or an autopilot, and they fear the worst.

We all end up anchored probably closer together than any of us have ever been in our sailing careers, but 'deep' is everything. It's all over by 3.00am, the whole drama having taken just six hours.

Post Mortem:

The Damage:
Fantasy 1 has lost part of its skeg and rudder, broken off on the rocks. In this remote place, at the time of writing there has been no solution developed, short of towing her back 1000 miles to Ecuador. They have also lost their best anchor. Karl has an injured thumb.

Mary Constance lost their snubber, fortunate that that was all.

Blackwattle has some minor damage to the keel, but the rudder suffered no apparent damage. However, we have lost our GPS, probably with the shuddering, and will not have the full use of Cmap. We have two other GPS systems on the boat, and will proceed with these. Naturally, we also have paper charts, so it is convenience only that is lost.

The Lesson:

The biggest lesson, sad to have to learn it, is that we obviously should not rely on local assistance. We all five boats made the same mistake, that as we were directed where to anchor, in believing that local knowledge would ensure that even though we swung through 180 degrees, we would still have enough water at low tide.

POST SCRIPT:

With rare ingenuity, Karl, Skipper of Fantasy 1, has contracted with local boat builders to construct a temporary frame around the skeg, enough to get the boat back to some more sophisticated port where the boat