Nasty Squall
I took Flying Circus out for the Thursday night beer can race last night. First time I've ever done it in Flying Circus. I usually don't have time for Thursday nights, especially since the races are essentially meaningless, except to have fun. But this week I invited two guys from work to come along. One had no sailing experience and the other a couple of races as crew on a lake in upstate NY. The other purpose to be fulfilled was to have my sailmaker on board to have a look at the sails we bought last Fall and offer some trim suggestions.
The event started off in a warm, light WSW breeze. The course was around Clapboard Island, in front of the yacht club. About a third of the way around I looked to the west where a huge wall of dark gray clouds had sprung up. "That doesn't look so promising", I told my guests. "We're probably going to get wet before this is all over".
I kept an eye on the clouds. For a while they seemed to be slipping NE of us. They were clearly having an effect on our winds, sucking them up so that all we had left was a barely detectable remnant of the seabreeze. Then I began to see an occasional stroke of lightning and the storm seemed to be moving closer. "We're going in", I said.
So the sails came down and the outboard when on and we started motoring in past Clapboard, while folding the sails and de-rigging the boats. Some boats followed us immediately in taking down their sails. A few others persisted in sailing the race. About half way into and three-quarters of a mile from the mooring and just as we got the sails tucked away down below the squall hit. It started with little cats paws blasting the water and then a gray wall of rain and wind rolled right over us, building for about 2 or 3 minutes until the maximum gust hit us. With the 3.5 hp outboard wide open we were only holding position, not really going anywhere. The rain felt like hail it was being driven so hard by the wind.
I guessed at the time that the heaviest gust was around 40 and later heard from someone else that one boat's wind instruments measured a peak of 45 knots. That's some pretty good breeze and definitely nothing you want to have sails up in when in a small boat. Looking behind though, a few boats did have their sails up. I can't tell you how glad I was to not be them.
I think the worst of the storm passed north of us. We had no lightening in the immediate area and the darkest clouds were north. The guys from work, despite having their casual race cut short by a ferocious squall and getting soaked to the skin, decided they had a good time and want to come out again.
We returned to the club and repaired to the dining room, whereupon my family returned from Freeport where AJ had been in an Opti regatta. All were in high spirits. AJ was 11th for the day out of 34 boats and had raced to a 2nd in one of the five races. He was quite proud of himself. "Peach" had won a pair of dinghy boots in a raffle and was tramping around the club showing them off to everyone.
All in all, a fine night in a too short Summer. Monhegan party tonight and Red Sox game on Sunday. More on that later . . .
The event started off in a warm, light WSW breeze. The course was around Clapboard Island, in front of the yacht club. About a third of the way around I looked to the west where a huge wall of dark gray clouds had sprung up. "That doesn't look so promising", I told my guests. "We're probably going to get wet before this is all over".
I kept an eye on the clouds. For a while they seemed to be slipping NE of us. They were clearly having an effect on our winds, sucking them up so that all we had left was a barely detectable remnant of the seabreeze. Then I began to see an occasional stroke of lightning and the storm seemed to be moving closer. "We're going in", I said.
So the sails came down and the outboard when on and we started motoring in past Clapboard, while folding the sails and de-rigging the boats. Some boats followed us immediately in taking down their sails. A few others persisted in sailing the race. About half way into and three-quarters of a mile from the mooring and just as we got the sails tucked away down below the squall hit. It started with little cats paws blasting the water and then a gray wall of rain and wind rolled right over us, building for about 2 or 3 minutes until the maximum gust hit us. With the 3.5 hp outboard wide open we were only holding position, not really going anywhere. The rain felt like hail it was being driven so hard by the wind.
I guessed at the time that the heaviest gust was around 40 and later heard from someone else that one boat's wind instruments measured a peak of 45 knots. That's some pretty good breeze and definitely nothing you want to have sails up in when in a small boat. Looking behind though, a few boats did have their sails up. I can't tell you how glad I was to not be them.
I think the worst of the storm passed north of us. We had no lightening in the immediate area and the darkest clouds were north. The guys from work, despite having their casual race cut short by a ferocious squall and getting soaked to the skin, decided they had a good time and want to come out again.
We returned to the club and repaired to the dining room, whereupon my family returned from Freeport where AJ had been in an Opti regatta. All were in high spirits. AJ was 11th for the day out of 34 boats and had raced to a 2nd in one of the five races. He was quite proud of himself. "Peach" had won a pair of dinghy boots in a raffle and was tramping around the club showing them off to everyone.
All in all, a fine night in a too short Summer. Monhegan party tonight and Red Sox game on Sunday. More on that later . . .
posted by bearaway at 2:20 PM
1 Comments:
Sounds like those guys from work have the makings of serious sailors.
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