Kamikaze Top Hat

[storm petrel]

Check this clip out from a HRYC Top Hat crew(not us). Looks like great fun!

http://youtu.be/d7PJ7ON6bYo

Cheers,
Mark

[bearmcnally]

No !! Just a bunch of silly old fools scaring the pants off a kid ?

Bear

[Ianb]

Not sure about the correct procedure but I would clip the end of the spinnaker pole on to the end of the brace, rather than floating. IMHO gives better control.

[storm petrel]

Yes Bear I agree that if I was the young fellow I might have wondered about the value of pursuing sailing for a future hobby.

Ian, I think they may have let the sheet fly, but still broached (Top Hat rudder is too small sometimes), which dunked and broke the spinnaker pole. Not sure what they were trying to do? Perhaps it was an attempt to convert the kite to a parachute sail. ( I have heard parachute sails are quite stable)

In retrospect, bearing off and trying to keep the spinnaker from swinging from side to side when they saw that big gust coming might have been advisable. But then it is always easy to be cleaver after the 'event'.

[bearmcnally]

No......? These fools did many things wrong ? Pole to far aft, the skipper ? was told about the gust and didn't have a bow peep over his shoulder .he didn't move the pole forward and didn't keep the boat under the rig .Should have pulled the tiller in not out ? just for starters ?

Bear

[Oberon11]

Not even a life jacket on !!!

[storm petrel]

I think the kid had an inflatable life jacket on ( I don't trust those with kids).

Bear, I agree and another contributing factor was probably all that weight they had forward. What were the crew doing on the bow?

[bearmcnally]

Mark ,if I was that lad , I would have pulled the chord hoping it was a life raft ? Seriously why was he sitting there? And you are correct to much weight forward .Crew up front watching to much big boat sailing . Another point ,you never climb over the cabin like that ? when you have no control over what's happening with the yacht ? very silly !!

Bear
long live the Manly Junior

[storm petrel]

Yes climbing over the cabin in these situations is a good way to add to the statistics of people injured/killed by being hit in the head by an untamed boom.