October 11, 2019 – And now, part 5…
e. Incompetent Boaters
Of course every boater is a beginner at some point, and everyone has to go through the process of learning the necessary skills. There are so many ways to do this, including taking sailing courses or having a friend teach you, studying books and U Tube demonstrations, and finding some wide open space in which to practice.
Like learning any new skill, one of the most valuable qualities one can have is the willingness to ask for help or guidance when it’s needed. But there are those who’d rather skip over that step, who want to buy a boat and just go for it, often assuming that joining a rally will magically make up for any skills they lack. These people can be highly entertaining to watch when they’re not endangering other boats, but the humor dies off quickly when they suddenly become a problem.
We had a potentially deadly encounter with a new boat owner in Nelson. We were tied up in our slip, Rich working in the cockpit and me below. I could hear someone throttling an engine up and down outside, but that happens sometimes as boaters back out of a slip and have to deal with currents in the water, no biggie. Rich would later tell me this boater was doing OK having backed out of his slip and down the channel, but suddenly he got spooked and decided to head back towards his slip, maybe thinking he’d rather be turned around and heading forward. Whatever the issue was, this guy ended up losing control; then slamming the gear shift between forward and reverse without throttling down, going back and forth at high speeds and getting deeper into trouble by the second.
I looked outside just in time to see this boat backing towards us at high speed, Rich yelling at him to stop. My inclination was to run out and try to fend off, but it was too late. The boat slammed into us, badly damaging our wind vane and taking out a chunk of our fiberglass. In the process this man had also hit another boat and brushed our friend, Suzanne’s, boat. Having slowed after bouncing off us, he regained control and headed down the slipway with no intention of stopping. Rich ran down the dock and made him pull over at the dock’s end and give us his information.
We were lucky; had our paddle not been up, our windvane would have been crushed and may have been driven into the back of our boat. As it was we’d have to buy a new paddle and sacrificial arm plus get our fiberglass repaired, some expense but not as bad as it could have been. Below, photos of our damaged windvane and fiberglass.
What’s scary is to think what would have happened had it been me in the cockpit as I might have been dumb enough to try to stick a cushion between the boats (a trick I use when I feel there’s any danger of having our boat come in contact with another). The impact probably would have knocked me over hard and most likely I would have been injured. Rich was smart, he yelled but didn’t try to physically intervene to save our boat. Boat parts can be replaced; people parts not so much.
In the end it turned out in spite of giving us information; this guy had just bought the boat and was not, in fact, insured. He had a schedule (no surprise here) and wanted to get his newly purchased boat to Auckland in spite of a terrible weather forecast. The harbor officials had already been informed of his radically unsafe voyage plan, but there was nothing they could legally do to stop him.
After giving us his info (in retrospect, we’re lucky he gave us his real phone number as he didn’t intend to compensate us) and looking at our damage, he headed off again. Meanwhile we looked at the other boat he’d hit and couldn’t tell how bad its damage was, but the marina was informing that boat’s owner and advising him to come down and take a look. Our friend only had minor damage, not enough to bother chasing after the guy.
The weather that night was bad, and as we listened to the wind howl, we could not imagine this boater was faring well as he headed through the treacherous waters off the North Island’s west coast. The next morning we heard an amazing story from our neighbor. During the night he’d been on the phone with a buddy who happened to work for New Zealand’s rescue service. While they were talking, his friend got a call that a boat was in distress and needed rescue. Our neighbor said, “The boat wouldn’t happen to be named Mr. X*, would it?” His friend was shocked—how could our neighbor possibly know that? That must have been an amusing conversation!
(*Mr. X is a made-up name since he eventually, albeit with reluctance, compensated us. Thus, I’ll keep the boat’s name anonymous.)
To make a long story short, Mr. X’s engine had cut out and since he was unable to sail the boat, he needed to be towed back to safety and ended up in an anchorage not far from Nelson. Later, he was towed back into our marina and now had to face the damage he’d done to the other boats. He promised our friend a bottle of whiskey for her trouble, and Rich presented him with a demand letter which gave him an estimate of our damages.
After quickly getting his engine repaired, this guy headed north again and never did buy our friend her whiskey nor, I’m sure, compensated the other boat he’d hit. He had no intention of reimbursing us, either, and the amount fell under the deductible on our own insurance. Thankfully, we have the world’s best insurance agent who tracked this guy down and got him to pay for our damages. (Our amazing insurance agent is Bill from The Marina Shop in Opua. He’s been very, very good to us and the rest of the cruising community.)
So, for all the dangers we’ve faced while cruising, this one, which took place in a marina slip, was probably the most dangerous, or at least right up there with the night we had to anchor out in a lightning storm. We were lucky in many ways that it wasn’t worse.
We had another encounter with incompetent boaters in Vanuatu, but thankfully they were far enough away that they provided more of a show than a real worry. First off, this big catamaran (not surprisingly part of a rally) came into the anchorage we shared with a few other boats. He ended up running up onto a reef and getting stuck. Another boater rushed over in his dinghy, and someone actually went into the water to help. Meanwhile, we had another boat arrive who proceeded to circle round and round the anchorage, even, for mysterious reasons, circling around backwards. He was unable to find a spot it seemed, and acting very strangely about it.
The big cat, meanwhile, managed to get off the reef and then anchored in front of the friend who’d come to his aid. He then backed right down on his friend’s boat, and from what we could see, even hit him! His friend was yelling and waving his arms in a “WTF?” motion. The big cat re-anchored, still too close and once again backed right at his friend. The friend, in self defense, actually gave up his spot and anchored elsewhere (probably now a former friend). The strangely-acting boat was still circling when we went below to shower; so we don’t know what became of them. In all, this was an example of why rallies get a bad name with non-rally cruisers. They crowd into anchorages all at once, and inevitably some of them have no clue what they’re doing, a particularly bad thing in a busy anchorage.
So while the general public perceives storms and pirates as being the biggest danger in the cruising lifestyle, it’s generally the ordinary-looking neighbor who poses the biggest threat. Often this is because of bad anchoring, bad decisions, or general incompetence, but there is one more category that causes trouble which often isn’t the fault of the instigating boat. This will be the subject of my next post. For now, I’ll wrap this post up with the three photos below.–Cyndi
Where Does the Most Danger Lie?
Of the scenarios below, only the ocean photo looks menacing, but in fact the first two scenarios have proven to be the most dangerous for us so far.
The above photo was taken from our boat in Nelson’s marina. Across from us you can see a boat with For Sale signs. This was the boat that ended up slamming into us.
This peaceful anchorage at Surunda Bay, Vanuatu, is where a group of rally boats arrived and created havoc. Thankfully we were anchored near shore and out of harm’s way, but friends of ours had trouble with a boat anchoring on top of them (a scenario I didn’t mention in the story above).
A stormy ocean; a source of much discomfort but not a lot of danger as of yet–knock on wood. (This beautiful photo, taken by Barth Bailey, is available on the internet. Thank you Barth Bailey, whoever you are.)
Other posts in the series:
Real Cruising Danger #1: Other Boaters (Part 1)
Real Cruising Danger #1: Other Boaters (Part 2)
Real Cruising Danger #1: Other Boaters (Part 3)
Real Cruising Danger #1: Other Boaters (Part 4)
Real Cruising Danger #1: Other Boaters (Part 5) (this post)
Real Cruising Danger #2: The Sheep Mentality
