Opposite: a couple of broken stanchions, a few scratches, plus both engines stayed dry… pretty remarkable when a boat this big goes over at high speed. Fujin was built at Gold Coast Yachts in the US Virgin Islands – they clearly did an excellent job. The boat was righted in just 12-feet of water using Saba’s modest dockside crane, hence the use of buoyancy bags on the transoms to keep the boat clear of the sea floor. Crew fatigue was generally agreed to be the root cause of the capsize
leeward shroud parted and the second half of the roll was very fast!
Lessons learnt that would have helped avoid the capsize 1. Sail within your capabilities. Looking back on it we should have sailed the run more conservatively to reduce crew fatigue or we should at least have sailed more conservatively once we realised that we were fatigued. 2. Keep the navigational surprises to a minimum. Diamond Rock should have been a waypoint on our route so that we came up to it gradually knowing it was there rather than finding ourselves close to it, needing to react quickly. 3. Try to keep communication flowing on the boat. There is a tendency for the crew to get quiet once fatigue sets in and communication helps focus. 4. Beware of unsteady conditions. We were sailing in an area of unsteady wind where we were likely to get big shifts and puffs and we should have been operating
WE JUST SCREWED UP – Jonathan McKee Despite our flip Fujin is fast and tremendous fun to sail. But, as with all multihulls and especially cats, the potential for capsize is always present in strong winds. We had a number of factors that led to the capsize (crew fatigue, very dark night, poorly communicated navigational overlay to course, extreme wind variability at that location), but the type of boat is extremely safe to sail when properly operated. We just screwed up. Jonathan McKee is an Olympic gold medallist, multiple world champion and a vastly experienced racing coach
with a more twisted sailplan until we were into steadier conditions.
Lessons learnt after the capsize 1. Put the grab bag where it can be accessed when the boat is inverted. The
grab bag was in the pit and it was forgot- ten on the initial swim out from under the wet deck. Once we were out from under the boat it was clearly not a good idea to go back after it (the night was pitch black). 2. Think twice about having hydrostatic inflators on the PFDs. We had a number of PFDs trigger during the day’s sailing – which is a nuisance. However, having them inflate by default when one is trying to work one’s way out from under a boat and there are a lot of lines and so on to get caught in seems dangerous. Committing to manually inflated PFDs means you would drown if you were unconscious so a jack- line arrangement that prevents long falls in a capsize becomes more important. 3. If you are sailing at night it would be nice to have some sort of emergency light- ing for when the boat is inverted. Quite a few of us lost our headlamps in the initial capsize but one of the crew had the wits to switch on all of the yacht’s lights when we initially flipped. Trying to get oriented and free of lines without light would have been a serious challenge. A mercury switch on the lighting circuit would be one way to go. 4. Put gravity-operated check valves on the fuel tank vents. Once the boat was inverted fuel started leaking out of the vents. Besides polluting, getting diesel in the eyes and mouth made the experience even tougher. 5. Everyone should have their own knife, preferably on a lanyard. 6. Personal AIS transmitters are great – it was amazing how quickly people were alerted that something was going on even though we didn’t have the grab bag. q
SEAHORSE 37
INGRID ABERY
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