Lost at Sea - John Fisher - Volvo Ocean Race 2017-18

John Fisher - Volvo Race Sailor lost at sea

1,400 miles west of Cape Horn, damaged by a crash gybe, they were 200 miles windward of the nearest competitor.  The nearest commercial ship was 400 miles away. Team Scallywag crew member John Fisher (UK) was swept overboard.  Although he was wearing a survival suit in the 48 F waters, and gale force winds and sea state several hours of searching by his teammates were fruitless.  The boat is again heading east toward Cape Horn where they will be met by race officials and investigators, I presume.

Video update on Scallywag's John Fisher - Volvo Ocean Race 2017-18

John Paul Stevens: Repeal the Second Amendment - The New York Times

John Paul Stevens: Repeal the Second Amendment - The New York Times

Rarely in my lifetime have I seen the type of civic engagement schoolchildren and their supporters demonstrated in Washington and other major cities throughout the country this past Saturday. These demonstrations demand our respect. They reveal the broad public support for legislation to minimize the risk of mass killings of schoolchildren and others in our society.

That support is a clear sign to lawmakers to enact legislation prohibiting civilian ownership of semiautomatic weapons, increasing the minimum age to buy a gun from 18 to 21 years old, and establishing more comprehensive background checks on all purchasers of firearms. But the demonstrators should seek more effective and more lasting reform. They should demand a repeal of the Second Amendment.

Concern that a national standing army might pose a threat to the security of the separate states led to the adoption of that amendment, which provides that “a well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” Today that concern is a relic of the 18th century.

Two Crash gybes - Volvo Ocean Race

A crash  gybe is when the mainsail unexpectedly and violently swings over to the opposite side of the boat.   It most often happens when the wind suddenly shifts to the leeward side, sending the mainsail suddenly to the windward side. 

It's a shock under any circumstances.  But in a VOR 65 (65.6 lwl) it is particularly complicated.  A running (movable) backstay supports the mast from the windward side.  In a strong breeze the canting (swing) bullet keel is extended as far as 45 degrees to the windward side to stabilize the boat.  In a crash gybe (used to be called a Chinese gybe) the boom swings over to the formerly windward side and strikes the running backstay.  That makes it impossible to release the backstay in order to let the sail out and let it flap like a flag.   Only when the crew has set the backstay on the new windward side can the now leeward backstay be loosened.

Complicated enough in a boat lying on its side -perhaps in the dark- but the VOR 65 has a canting (swinging) keel which is now on the wrong side, threatening the boat with capsize, not just a `knockdown'.

Starting at about 9:45 you will see footage of two crash gybes - one in the dark, the other in daylight.  The narrator - staring about 12;30 demonstrates what happened on a model.

Spring Equinox - Friendship

Dragger in a following Sea - Neal Parent

Belfast, Maine photographer Neal Parent   posted today a new color photo of a  trawler in a huge following sea on Georges Banks in the Gulf of Maine.   It looks like his  series of (film) Black& White prints called Fishing the Banks, like this shot - the cover of his 2002 book Focused on the Coast.  [Which, thanks to Marilyn, has been above my desk for many years.] 

The new shot, dated 2015,  is in color and may be digital.  We will be in Belfast Friday.  I'll try to check it out.  And buy it if...

The long, cold leg - Volvo Ocean Race

The long (7,600 NM) Auckland to Brazil leg began today.

Here is 30 seconds of  video of the Southern Ocean roller coaster.

And it's good weather.  The wind IS at your back but...

Trouble at the start - video and routing imagery.

Deadwood

Ben Bajorek is rebuilding his Herreshoff S Boat.  The gray triangular piece is deadwood.  It bears no weight, just fills space.  It occupies the space between the 3,350 lb. lead ballast keel which is bolted to the keelson - the long plank that runs down the center of the hull - and to which frames (ribs) and floors (the orange pieces) are attached.

Six barges floating loose in Hudson River off Irvington

Six construction barges moored at the new Tappan Zee Bridge broke loose in Friday's gale.  At about that time I checked the NOAA data station at Kings Point.  It was gusting to 49 kts. NNE.  That's 57 mph - enough to chafe and fray just about any mooring line.  And it did.  Fortunately they didn't hit any of the anchored fuel barges down river.  - gwc

Six barges floating loose in Hudson River off Irvington

https://npcobserver.com/2018/02/25/translation-communist-partys-proposals-for-amending-the-p-r-c-constitution-2018/

Life on an Island: Silence, Beauty and a Long Wait for the Ferry - The New York Times

Life on an Island: Silence, Beauty and a Long Wait for the Ferry - The New York Times

by Katherine Q. Seelye

MATINICUS, Me. — The snow had begun falling overnight, and fell throughout the day, draping the towering pines and the lobster traps, stacked up on land for the winter, in blankets of white.

Still, Sharon Daley, a nurse from the visiting vessel Sunbeam, which provides medical care to remote islands off the coast of Maine, made her appointed rounds. She forged a path in knee-high rubber boots to the home of Bill Hoadley, who is, at 80, this island’s oldest resident.

She checked his blood pressure, which she pronounced “so good, it’s boring.” She listened to his heart, which was ticking just fine, almost in rhythm with his many clocks. Mr. Hoadley is something of a clock aficionado, and he keeps his timepieces on daylight saving time, which in winter is an hour ahead of everyone else.

Why?

“Because I can,” the impish Mr. Hoadley declared from his nautically themed front parlor.

Being able to do exactly as he pleases — and have health care come to him — are big reasons Mr. Hoadley stays here, 22 miles out in the North Atlantic.***