Diaries of a sailing instructor

Vessel Name: MenorcaCruising
27 May 2013 | Menorca
27 May 2013 | Menorca
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27 May 2013 | Menorca

Springing off a dock

Gusting 35 knots in Mahon harbour and its the last day of the sailing course with only a few things to complete. Alongside docking and springing off, being the majority of it. We had practiced getting alongside a dock where we were getting blown off heavily and now it was time to try getting off a [...]

27 May 2013 | Menorca

Man Overboard

Teaching Man Overboard procedures to students.....always the drill dreaded most on a boat. Probably these days best to call the exercise crew overboard. This drill evokes panic even in a practice situation and briefing everyone first can help to reduce this panic but guaranteed not to eliminate it. Recently [...]

Man Overboard

27 May 2013 | Menorca
Heidi Frith
Teaching Man Overboard procedures to students.....always the drill dreaded most on a boat. Probably these days best to call the exercise crew overboard. This drill evokes panic even in a practice situation and briefing everyone first can help to reduce this panic but guaranteed not to eliminate it.

Recently whilst teaching in Antigua with all female students and following the usual briefing re the importance of keeping the overboard person in sight, alerting all crew, throwing in anything that floats and stopping the boat as quick as possible. Well, I guess I hadn't briefed quite so clearly as one of the girls did decide to deploy the horseshoe buoy with danbuoy, light and drogue attached.

All good practice when whilst recovering the safety gear we lost the boat hook. So now we have a fender floating around, a horseshoe buoy and danbuoy in the water and luckily a floating boathook. Even luckier we had a second boat hook and were able to recover all three successfully.

Lessons learnt, make sure everyone understands it is only a practice session and not to really throw anything in or worse still make a mayday call and have a second boat hook handy.
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