Educate the Crew
It doesn’t matter if you’re an old salt, or just have a few voyages under your keel, you probably figured out, early on, that things can go south on a boat very quickly. A friend recounted a recent incident. He was out behind one of the Gloucester beaches tied to a mooring ball. As the tide started to go out and the boat began to swing uncomfortably close to the beach, he decided to take up another spot. He started the engine and climbed to the front deck to pull the line from the mooring ball. Everything was going smoothly with his two guests observing the procedure from the cockpit. Suddenly the chafing gear on the line snagged on the mooring ball shackle and in spite of his best efforts, he couldn’t free it. In the meantime, the boat started drifting back towards the beach, with an especially long “painter” connecting it to the ball.
Sensing that he needed to act fast and couldn’t tend the line on the deck and steer the boat from the cockpit at the same time, he asked one of his guests if he knew how to shift the boat gently into forward gear and move the boat away from the beach. This would reduce the tension on the line, allowing it to be freed from the mooring ball shackle without trouble. His guest stated his familiarity with boat controls, took the helm, and shifted the boat into forward gear. For a few seconds, the process seemed to work, but quickly it became evident that the line, which was laying over my friend’s leg was not coming free from the ball and was cutting into his leg. He called out to his guest to shift into neutral, which his guest quickly confirmed; but the boat kept moving forward, further constricting my friend’s leg to the deck. My friend called out a second time and was able to get the substitute helmsman to shift back into neutral, and the cutting action stopped. Moments later, with the line safely off his leg, my friend was able to free the line and move out of danger.
What happened? Well, the underlying root cause of this dangerous situation was that my friend had not taken the time to properly instruct his guest on the basics of driving the boat. If line had been wrapped around his leg, he could have had some severe damage or been pulled overboard, instead of just suffering aggressive rope burns. The situation turned from routine to emergency in seconds, just due to some simple overlooked initial communication. Don’t let this happen to you. The next time you head out on the water, take a few minutes to clue in some of your key passengers. The injury you prevent, may be your own.
