[PCW] Seaworthyness stability

[Robert Deering]

Nice writeup Gary.  

Here in Juneau we had a 34' power cat sink a few years ago.  High-end
custom-built aluminum cat, one with a hysucat hydrofoil between the hulls
and jet drives.  I must admit I had lust in my heart for that boat.

Boat was operated as a charter fisher.  At the end of the season the charter
boys had one last party and rafted their boats up in some remote cove.  The
skipper has a little (OK, a lot) too much to drink.  On the way back home he
set his autopilot (linked to his GPS) to take him back to the Juneau harbor.
Then he went on the back deck to clean some fish that he'd caught.

Now ignore the fact that there's this 34' boat running 30+ knots with no one
at the helm or on lookout - glad I wasn't on the water then!  It's the end
of the season, September, and the days are starting to get a bit shorter.
We start to take 20 hours of daylight for granted here in the summer, but by
September it actually gets dark by 8:00, something that catches people off
guard.  

Well, our illustrious, drunken skipper is caught off guard as well.  And it
REALLY catches him off guard when his autopilot dutifully returns him to the
harbor, at 30+ knots.  Fortunately, or unfortunately perhaps, between him
and about 250 boats inside the harbor was a floating concrete breakwater,
which had more than enough inertia to abruptly change his velocity from 30+
knots to zero.

The boat skids partially up on top of the breakwater, ripping a sizable hole
in the port bow in the process.  Looked like a big shark had taken a bite
out of it.  The skipper, in his befuddled state, throws the boat into
reverse and manages to back off of the breakwater.  That was his first (make
that umpteenth) mistake.  The hole of course lets a lot of water into the
hull.  I'm a little fuzzy here, but there were reports that a hatch in the
crash bulkhead was left open, allowing the hull to flood.  When I inspected
it I didn't see any hatch, or crash bulkhead for that matter, so can't say.
What I did note was that there was unimpeded access for the water to flow
between the two hulls in an interstitial space near the bows - there was no
longitudinal bulkhead.

So anyway, the port hull floods, as does the stbd hull, due I believe to
that interstitial space.  No watertight chambers to provide positive
buoyancy, and glug glug glug to the bottom she goes.

The sinking of such a beautiful boat was very sad.  The young lady who was
onboard with this idiot was put into a coma when she went through the
windshield - she survived but bears lasting effects.  (That was more than
sad.)  Subsequent investigation revealed that he didn't have charter license
or a whole bunch of other required qualifications.  (That was criminal.)
Rich daddy from back east got him the best legal defense available, but he
still ended up doing a couple years time. (I have my opinion of what THAT
was!)  The boat was raised and two years later is operating again (not by
him).  I do not know if additional bulkheads or floatation were added.

I see this mishap being primarily human-caused (obviously), but after humans
had done their worst here, the design of the boat didn't provide enough
safety net.  One lesson from this story is that even fancy, high tech boats
designed by renowned designers and built by reputable boat yards can have
hidden "defects" that make themselves apparent at the worst possible time.

Bob Deering
Juneau Alaska