Editorial Andrew Hurst Elephant in the room
As this issue goes to press there are the first genuine signs of some tentative discussions about ending the genocide in Ukraine. We hope and pray this is indeed a significant step and not another feint by the world’s richest man* and his grubby coterie of placemen. In the meantime our thoughts are with every citizen of the independent
Ukraine wherever they may be and our sympathies are with everyone killed or injured in the struggle along with those who are left behind.
Priorities It’s hard to get too worked up this month over minutiae of rating systems (the blesses even turned down the volume over pronouns). Even today, however, amid the wider mayhem and tragedy there
are some macro sailing issues that deserve an airing. One of these is the perennial yet seemingly never advanced issue of keel safety, on yachts of all sizes but particularly those that go offshore. I sit on the odd (sic) sailing committee where the topic regularly
pops up in different guises. Sometimes it’s a local discussion some- times a wider remit touching on Offshore Special Regs and World Sailing structures; I can attest that a lot of otherwise busy, clever, successful and hardworking folk give up a lot of free time to help address this and other matters of ‘boating safety’. Keel debates have moved forward a little in the past 20 years.
Better inspections, undertaken more often, are now accepted as necessary; yet they are expensive and complex to arrange for the average owner and almost impossible to enforce outside elite ocean racing classes at one end and the superyacht fleet at the other. Both immensely well-resourced. On top of these challenges our hardworking volunteers also oper-
ate in too much of a vacuum to make much headway. They are still not allowed access to enough of the empirical post-accident data to justify loud demands for action by underwriters and others. When an aircraft crashes post-accident analysis and information
What a legacy that would be. Those controversial and embar-
rassing, overpriced former World Sailing offices in London would never be spoken of again.
* If you doubt Putin’s wealth, get hold of a copy of Putin’s People… less easy than it was after the teacher’s pet (clue, they play in blue) won his court case about it but, trust me here, it explains everything. Reading it may even make you feel a bit more partisan in the whole sordid and deadly affair.
None taken The quotes you put together in the editorial always show some good old wit. So thank you for that! When it comes to F1 quotes I just came across this in the recently aired season of Drive to Survive on Netflix. It is the 2021 Monaco Grand Prix, it is raceday and Christian Horner (head of Red Bull and now in bed with Alinghi) is commuting to the pits by boat. As the camera moves across the scenery with all the shiny superyachts you hear him say: ‘This is what amazes me about Monaco…’ Cuts to walking up the jetty past a J/70: ‘You’ve got all the money here… and then you’ve got this bloke. How the hell did he get in?’ The 2022 J/70 Worlds will take place in Monaco… so perhaps,
sharing is formidable. Similarly for a train crash or major automobile accident. Even a microlight crashing sees the evidence examined and the conclusions shared. Yet for a devastating keel failure, today in 2022 it remains rare
for all the conclusions to be shared. Litigation, insurance, protecting the designer’s/builder’s/engineer’s/owner’s reputations… we stay stuck with ‘sealing the file’ being the norm. Ultimately it is only underwriters who are in a position to force
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through the transparency that will (not could) save many lives in the future – along with a lot of their own money. But mainly for legal reasons the underwriters will never do it of their own volition. The new management at World Sailing is now making more noise
about this issue which is encouraging. How about making it a goal, maybe the prime goal, of the current administration to bash heads and threaten people where it hurts? Or go the other way with an accreditation scheme. Make playing along attractive enough that insurers see advantage in playing ball.
The Wikipedia edit that tells you all you need to know...
Piper Kerr, a member of the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition, plays the bagpipes for an indifferent penguin, March 1904
Piper Kerr (right), a member of the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition, plays the bagpipes for an indifferent penguin, March 1904
Christian, we’ll have the last laugh. ‘How the hell did they get in?’ Tobias Hoh, an average J/70 sailor from Zurich
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SELF-AWARENESS Mr Putin, let’s speed up to the part where you shoot yourself in a bunker
– Placard seen at a demonstration at the Brandenburg Gate
I am now going back to work as a dress-up Santa Claus
– A leading Moscow fund manager toasts the end of his country’s Capital Markets
MORON OF THE MONTH – A BIG FIELD
They only reached the Endurance because global warming means the ice is now 4-5ft less thick
– BBC science reporter (Endurance sits 10,000ft below the surface)
Sending down cameras will definitely heat the water up so the ship will now rot away… – ‘definitely’ (they often add that, don’t they). Yes, it is indeed another BBC ‘science expert’
change during this war – John Kerry walks it (and leads Moron of the Year by a country mile)
MORE REASSURING The Queen carries on
working with Covid – Times of London headline
Well, Her Majesty is still only 95
– 96 this month... ed
VERDIER’S THAT GOOD Apivia was going 3-4kt faster than us (Charal) upwind
– Christophe Pratt All that we could do was just sit there
and watch... – Pratt
KEY MOMENT?
The last day of sailing at Luna Rossa was the first day the autopilot beat the human
– Chris Draper, AC50 testing in 2015 We were two-boating, me against (Checko) Bruni and the pilot smashed the human, that simple… – Draper We looked at each other and went, ‘Oh my god, this is enormous’ – Draper
Putin had better stay on track fighting climate
LOST GLOSS Insufferable, smug, sanctimonious, naive, guilt-ridden, wet pink orthodoxy of that sunset home of third-rate minds of that third-rate
Seahorse magazine and our associate raceboatsonly brokerage site are both at:
seahorsemagazine.com The editor is contactable by email at:
andrew@seahorse.co.uk
SEAHORSE 11
decade, the Sixties – Lord Norman Tebbit is also out of love with Britain’s national broadcaster
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