Are you professional enough to post on "gCaptain"?

Actually they do. The statistics I’m thinking of are quite outdated so the ratio may be different, but a decade or so back a study determined that more firefighters were injured and killed just getting to the emergency.

So they made new procedures to try and reduce that number.

Yeah, those inconvenient procedures again…

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I think it’s time to trigger a thread derailment on this thread. I’ll start: https://www.ocimf.org/media/8922/57daa432-c180-41b8-b855-55d7d084a85e.pdf

https://www.steamshipmutual.com/publications/Articles/Lifeboats0407.asp

You keep repeating this over and over but that won’t make it true. The evidence says you are wrong in your recollection of “reasonable waves”.

If you had the experience and knowledge required to be Master on a super tanker you’d have more sense than you do now and no, you wouldn’t follow your current suggestion.

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I thought you said there weren’t white caps?

Yep, that’s what you said.

You know what that makes you? A liar. Now fuck off.

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There may have been a better way to do the rescue, but you remain so fixated on the idea of the lifeboat being used in spite of multiple answers to the contrary.

http://www.gard.no/web/updates/content/51968/a-20-year-anniversary-the-loss-of-lives-in-lifeboats-with-on-load-release-hooks

http://sea-news.az/2017/05/01/why-are-lifeboats-killing-seafarers/

And I offer Doug’s original posting with his weather / wave report of years ago… As well as his original thoughts:
"Well, as the insurance check is “in the mail” I think I can let everyone know what happened, in greater detail, without concern for possible complications.

We left Boston on July 15th, and about a week out, the oil cooler malfunctioned allowing ocean water to mix with the engine oil. I changed the oil to remove as much of the water as possible, and did shut the thru hull for the ocean water to the engine.

The plan at that point was to continue to sail to our intended first target of the Azores, and attempt to replace the cooler there.

On July 26th, 2 Main (ketch rigged Gulfstar 50), starboard stays broke at the chainplate connections, just under the deck, then pulled through the deck leaving some holes on the deck.

Before I devised my own plan for dealing with this, I contacted both our insurance company and the coast guard to find out what our options might be, for towing, or assistance. I quickly learned it would cost $250K to be towed home.

So, I realized I could temporarily attach the stays using some line and make a connection from the end of the stays to the starboard jib sheet travelors; not deploy the main sail, and shorten the jib by furling it somewhat. If I turned back to Boston, with such greatly reduced sails, the SW wind would only stress the port stays, and we could slowly sail home.

The next morning, July 27th, we discovered a lot of water in the bilge.

Well, my First Mate / Mrs. Sabbag, basically threw in the towel at that development. And I couldn’t (though I should have in retrospect) overcome her insistence on abandoning the vessel.

Considering what happened next, I really should NOT have CALLED THE COAST GUARD for assistance.

Per the mutual assistance program AMVER, a 900 foot oil tanker arrived, in only a few hours(!) and as I was afraid of, the **** really hit the fan.

You do not bring a 50 foot sailboat alongside a 900 foot oil tanker in 10 to 15 foot seas, unless you do not care about what will happen.

The tanker, (after trying to grab our deployed sea anchor with a grappling hook, but missed it because they were too far forward of the 500 foot line), decided ON THEIR OWN to intersect the sea anchor rode / line, which brought the Triumph alongside the starboard side of the tanker and the sea anchor alongside their port side. With the tanker still underway, the sea anchor was moving aft thereby pulling the Triumph forward.

Well, what happened next was unbelievable. The Triumph was pulled into their anchor / anchor housing, which effectively crushed the Triumph, smashing her from the bow toward the stern, as the 10 - 15 foot waves smashed us up into the metal. We had been standing on deck, and had to run to the stern to avoid the falling main mast, and all the flying debris and the smashing anchor! It was a scene from a horror movie.

From there it only got worse.

I wrapped a line from the tanker around my wife and pushed her overboard. They pulled her up to their deck in fairly short order.

But, when I (erroneously) went over board with one of the lines in my hands, it ended up requiring over 3 hours for me to get on deck.

I learned to vomit underwater in order to get rid of the water I was takin into my stomach, in order to regain bouyancy, and I “went down” numerous times only to (I learned later), amaze the tanker crew by coming back up.

By the time I barely managed to make it to a life bouy, I was losing strength from hypothermia, the repeated sinking / vomiting, and all the screaming I had been doing.

It is quite a sick feeling to be almost 1000 miles out to sea and realize nobody is going to jump in to get you / there is no helicopter with a basket and a USCG trained savior, and the only vessel around is as frightening up close as she could run me over like any piece of flotsam.

I was quite sure I was dead, but amazingly I am not.

If you are ever in a pickle, FIX IT YOURSELF, DO NOT ASK FOR ASSISTANCE, and tell your “crew” to suck it up.

ONLY, when you are in your life pod, after your boat has sunk, should you call for assistance unless you are prepared for what happens when a 50 footer meets a 900 footer.

Now, we are shopping for a newer boat, and have our sights on an AMEL."

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It’s cowboy idiots like you that helped (and forced) people to develop tools to do the job safer and not get so many people killed or maimed.

Sorry if I offended any cowboys or idiots

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Don’t you have a presidential campaign to go and run or something? I’d have thought that would’ve kept you too busy for this little forum.

It looks closer to 6-8 but pictures reduce apparent sea height so it was probably closer to 10. It was definitely too rough to launch, and especially not recover, a lifeboat safely. But you wouldn’t know anything about that as you have ZERO experience launching lifeboats.

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You’re obviously not looking at the same picture I am…

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https://www.fairfaxpool.com/swimlessons.html