How to handle crew over board?

[Frank C]

I posted earlier that December Sailing magazine (also Sail magazine, Practical Sailor and others) printed a long article on COB recovery. Upon skimming same article again, I note that they have a link for their event at www.COBevent.com. It's worthy reading, but the website shows only a few pictures ... the magazine is definitely more useful for conveying the message. (December's Sailing mag should be at your local West Marine store).

Retrieving an unconscious victim from the water was a daunting task. The following strategies were tried and the results were not entirely satisfactory:

• * Bosun chairs and safety harnesses were attached to the victim by a helper in the water. This was viewed as a marginal procedure because of the considerable difficulty and time it took to carry out this procedure.
  
  * Dropping an already inflated dinghy in the water was a reasonable approach to the unconscious victim scenario but not without its difficulties.
  
  * The Jacobs Ladder was used (It is a specialized device that is three and a half feet wide and several feet long. it is designed to attach to the toe rail and dropped in the water in order to maneuver the body into it. A halyard then lifts the device and body up.( This worked well in the company's video when a rubber dinghy was used but on a sailboat with a much higher freeboard, it did not work well..
  
  * Putting a sail in the water, much like the Jacobs Ladder (one side was affixed to the deck and the other end dropped in the water to allow for the potential of maneuvering a victim in the bight of the sail.) This could only be described as terrible since the victim rolled face down where the potential for drowning was all too clear.

It seems from the quote above that triangular nets, scoops (maybe even sails) used to roll-n-lift an unconscious victim up the freeboard are challenging to use, difficult or painful for the victim and perhaps dangerous in other ways too. Without any doubt after viewing pictures, this could work acceptably only if the outboard corner is hoisted to an outboard block - a block suspended at end of the boom for example.

By far the most effective method of hoisting someone on board still proved to be the Lifesling ...

The testing discovered that bringing the person aboard worked best when a strong block & tackle could be attached at least 10 feet above deck, or an extra halyard could be led to a winch. What delayed retrievals most during the testing was the time it took to rig up a hoisting method ...

In the end, any skipper who goes to the trouble of carrying a Lifesling on the stern should know how to use it ...

Just a personal opinion, but as I've written before, I thnk my adjustable backstay provides the perfectly located solution. It's always rigged & available, provides a multiple of 6 or 8 purchase and hoists the shortest possible distance (to the aft deck). Besides all that, it's adjacent to the only hydraulic hoist on the boat - the outboard motor lift - should one need that extra help.

IMO, trying to lift a COB over the side of a Mac borders on braindead ... but hopefully not to the COB.

[Dan B]

I've got
- The Mustang auto-inflation combo PFD and harness (in case someone goes overboard unconscious.) They also have waterproof whistles attached.
- A MOB manuever checklist velcro'd to the front of the pedestal
- A lifesling
- A heaving line in a cockpit locker
- A crew trained so that each member knows how to do every step on the checklist (since you don't really know which member might go overboard.)
- Standing rules governing the wearing of PFDs: noone goes on deck without a PFD, and never without someone else watching, If you are out of the cabin and the boat is underway a PFD is on, etc.
- Our approach (for simplicity sake in an emergency situation) is to drop sails and recover under power.

[Frank C]

Hoisting a COB to Mac26X Aft Deck

I posted here and elsewhere my opinion that the Mac 26X aft deck is the most logical spot for retrieving a COB. However, I must grant that the only time I've done so was helping a fully alert youth from a capsize on SF Bay. Able, but very cold, she was so ready to exit the water that she was trying to hoist herself to my aft deck before I had released the swim ladder, mounted outboard of my port rudder (rudder was down). I have never practiced COB, and thankfully never needed to retrieve someone who was unconscious, or even weakened.

I grant immediately that there are numerous difficulties with a recovery to the aft deck, and especially with trying to use a spllit, adjustable backstay as a hoist.

• 1. Very narrow clearance to the 26X port aft deck - much better w/rudder down.
  2. Need to chop all power & stop the propeller, losing way & stability.
  3. Masthead is unstayed, loading the backstay might bend or break the mast.
  4. Backstay crane might be too light to take hoisting strain.

I quickly grant too, that the 26M aft-deck presents other problems. But regardless of the risks, I believe the merits of an aft-deck strategy for the 26X are significant - probably the most compelling approach to fully & immediately employing a Lifesling.

• A. A split, adjustable backstay has ample hoisting height.
  B. It is at the strategic location & always rigged.
  C. With appropriate mods it can be ready in an instant, almost zero training.
  D. The required "hoist height" is half (or less) than recovery across a coaming.
  E. Semi-conscious (or better) COBs need an assist (not full-hoist).
  F. As related elsewhere by Maddmike, the hydraulic lift on a 50hp outboard is adjacent & ready for heavy lifting if necessary.

Coaming Alternative (w/aft-led Jib Halyard): I honestly believe that there's only one viable alternative to enable hoisting a COB over the side ... that's using a Lifesling across the port coaming, with jib halyard for the hoist. Even then, the halyard must be long enough, led to a winch, and the halyard must be guided to prevent pulling the COB too far forward (to the shrouds). I think the most practical approach for a coaming-lift would be:

• i) to "guy" the boom at 45* off port (fixing a dockline from boom-end to stb aft cleat),
  ii) to clip a short pennant (3') from boom bail to COB harness (or maybe the Lifesling line ??)
  iii) to shackle the jib halyard to the boom-end,
  iv) then wrap the (aft-led) halyard at the port winch for the lift,
  v) and finally lift the boom by cranking the winch.

The greatest disadvantage - this requires considerable ad-hoc rigging, meaning that it's never at-the-ready. But ... the jib halyard is positioned to provide more mast strength than the main halyard. The distance from end-boom to boom bail increases the lifting purchase, and finally, the guyline naturally guides the boom & COB inboard, across the cockpit coaming, as the halyard lifts the boom.
FWIW ...

[Tony D-26X_SusieQ]

Again I haven't tried it however I don't think that using either halyard on a Mac would prove very effective for hoisting a 200lb dead weight onto the deck. I invision that as you pull harder on the halyard the Mac will just roll over rather than the COB rising from the water. My mind goes to the segment of the sales video where a man standing on a doc is holding the Mac on its side by holding on to the top of the mast. The split backstay seems more viable if you have one. I suspect that there are less than a dozen Mac owners that do. If we are going to look at modifications to the boat for a solution then the solutions are rather limitless depending on how much you have to spend but that only is a solution if you make the mods before the person goes in the water and you have to get them out in 30 minutes or less. Planning ahead is truly the best course of action but the reality is that most people don't and need a solution that can be implimented with what they have at hand. The net plan can be implimented with a spare sail or a blanket or several similar items that might be on board. It might be uncomfortable but probably a lot more preferable than freezing to death.

[DLT]

I think I'll spend some time next season working on the motor tilt recovery method...

[Tony D-26X_SusieQ]

Good point Moe.

[Frank C]

The jib halyard has TWO clear advantages over the main halyard. The mast is much stronger where it's mounted. Further, the jib block is (effectively) pinned to the mast with the same through-bolt that pins the forestay - vastly stronger than the main's cheek block.

The only real dilemma is HOW to lift with the jib halyard. Unless the jib halyard has been led aft, how can you quickly improvise a fair (horizontal) lead to the winch?

My main halyard is led aft, but not the jib halyard. I suppose one could just insert the vang tackle between an aft cleat and the halyard's bitter end. But, you gain only a two-foot hoist from a vang that's 8 feet long.

[Catigale]

What I don't trust is the main halyard's cheap little cheek block held on by threads tapped into the aluminum mas

It is a 5 minute job (working at my slow pace) to replace with proper nut and bolt backed with washer hardware on my 2002 mast

Bend the washer to conform to the shape to the mast

Check for tightness at beginning of season, and whenever mast is down

[Chip Hindes]

I invision that as you pull harder on the halyard the Mac will just roll over rather than the COB rising from the water. My mind goes to the segment of the sales video where a man standing on a doc is holding the Mac on its side by holding on to the top of the mast.

You need to try to understand the fundamental concept of leverage or torque being equal to the force (weight) times the moment or lever arm. The force in these two cases is the same, but the moment arm; effectively, the horizontal distance between the center of gravity of the person and the cg of the boat.

With the boat already on its side, the moment arm is the full length of the mast plus the distance from the deck to the boat cg, somewhere around 30 feet. With the boat nominally upright, the moment arm is equal to just over half the beam, say five feet. So it takes rougly 30/5 or six times the weight to pull the boat over on its side from its upright position, as it does to hold it on its side once its there.

These two examples are essentially static, but they do illustrate that as the boat rolls to the side, the stability diminishes rapidly. So for instance in a seaway with the boat already rolling side to side, you'd have to be careful.

To the original example, if this were a problem, the boat would roll on its side the first time a 300 pounder stepped on the gunnel to climb aboard from the dock. I'm 225 lbs, and to demonstrate stability on my X, I have stood on the small ledge of the hull joint/rubrail outside the chainplates, leaning out as far as I can while holding onto the shrouds at full arm's length. The boat rolls no more than 8-10 degrees. This is with ballast. Without it would be a different story, but I'm still pretty confident I could do it without anything more serious than a few more degrees of roll.

Back to the original problem; as you're winching you might want to send any movable ballast (i.e., remaining crew) to the opposite side. In fact, it occurs to me that if you could lead your halyard fairly to the opposite side winch, you could partially balance the unstability as you winched the COB aboard, though of course then you won't be able to assist.

I'm sorry guys; it may seem like a really smart and cool application of the available technology, but the concept that anyone other than a totally uninjured, totally responsive, cooperative and reasonably fit COB could be brought aboard using the motor tilt cylinder? I think not. Dragging somebody across the stern, through the narrow space between the motor and sides, over the rudders, past the boarding ladder without further injury? Problematic at best. Seems to me the only reasonable approach is to assume you will have to lift them at least as high as the gunnels or over the stern, not through it. Given this as the starting point, over the gunnels seems better.