What do you say when you flip your cat?

Great Topic: In my experience the commentary prior to capsize goes like:

Her: Larry we're flying a hull! I don't like this! Are you un-cleated? Is the traveller out?

Me: Don't worry, she's under control. I have everything under control............

1) If girlfriend/wife has catapulted forward off the trap and emitting obscenity filled commentary on your intelligence and sailing ability...
2) If you may have also fallen like a ton of bricks on said wife, girlfriend ......

Stay calm, regain your self respect, get her unhooked and working to right the cat. Then be prepared to buy yourself out of the jam you are in. Prepare to spend the rest of your sailing career with a back seat skipper.(Duct tape may come in handy) Prepare to have this and other incidents rehashed in humiliating detail at parties everytime sailing comes up.

Hey what's that?

OOOPS! 😆

LoL. last time i flipped i didnt really say anything. I just remember thinking.."man i hope thats just the water and sunlight making it look like i just bent the mast". Oh and plus i fell through the sail.. so there was a lot of F this and that afterwards.

Its very different when your crew and not skipper. i find it rather enjoyable to climb up the hull as it stands straight up (on other peoples boats).

"Don't worry, I got it."

Actually, to quote my mind from about 5 hours ago, "damn I hope I don't go through the sail"

haha

recently i was trying to fly a hull upwind, A-cat style, on our gusty lake by getting right in on the tramp, almost under the boom, when a gust suddenly hit

probably should have seen it coming but was more concerned with the finer points of balance than the rapidly approaching dark water surface

anyway, as the gust hit the boat lurched up to around 45degrees and i pushed the tiller hard down to get head to wind and then bolted like a monkey up the tramp to the stay and hung off shouting

down you bitch, down!

and you know what?

she responded

just like an horse that realises that the fun is over and the rider now knows what to do and won't take any more shit

hehehe

my friends says

beginner sailors look at the scenery

intermediate sailors look at the sails

and experienced sailors

look at the water

edited by: erice, Jun 02, 2009 - 03:27 AM

We're good, we're good, oh shit

It's not so much the comments from my crew/wife on when we go over, but the comments every 10 minutes afterward for the next 3-4 hours that I remember.

repeat after me, a knock down is way better then a knock up 😆

Going over near the beach where a few hundred people can see you always brings out some choice words. (last season)
Then they see you standing on the hulls.(this guy is going to have to be rescued) The rope comes out, a minute later one hull is standing way up in the air. Then you hear go, go, go from the crowd, the sail starts peaking out and slowly starts lifting and a big cheer come from the beach as it nears the top then a loud ahhhw comes after the cat goes over to complete the 360.

At this point you really have to move your *** because you are getting close to being blown into the swimming area.

Ah, the joys of cat sailing. Wouldn't trade it for anything!

my brother and i (16 and 13 at the time) were sailing our recently purchased "preowned" hobie for the first time. We had some sailing experince on sunfish and small boats. this is the dialogue of us tipping:
me: we are going pretty fast
brother:my harness hurts. im taking it off (takes it off and holding it in hand)
me: LOOK!!!! WE ARE ON ONE HULL!!!
brother:WHOA! WHAT DO I DO WITH MY HARNESS!
me: i dont know but we are tipping!
(boat flips and brother falls in water confused, still holding harness in one hand)
me: how do we get it back over?
brother: i think that rope thing
me: its rotted and will snap
(we try several methods but decide that the righting line is not going to work when it snapped) we made a "human lever" system that is to complex to exlain to right the boat.
when we got to shore the other cat sailors said they saw us flip and werent ganna help tilll we were in danger. it was a learnign experience

The last time i flipped (on my boat) when there was another person on-board was about8 years ago.

I had let a girl steer (she had recently taken sailing classes with her dad).

As the wind became gusty i suggested we switch back (so i was at the helm).

I told her "please uncleat the main"
She said "huh?"
I again told her "uncleat the main" and pointed to the cleat.
She said "huh?"

And as i reached over to undo the cleat.... whooooosh... we got hit with a gust and over we went...

I told her to swim under the boat and "uncleat the main".

She said "huh"? and i told her what to do....

She swam under the boat.. but didnt undo the cleats (Main and jib).... and i had a real hard time righting the cat.... so much that i needed a power boat to throw me a line and help....

Since she didn't uncleat the main (or jib)... as soon as the boat righted.. the sails filled with air and almost hit the powerboat.

by the time it was all sorted out... she was still in the water, about 1/2 mile away...

Andrew: If you want something done right you have to do it yourself. Glad the boat didn't take off on you.

Andrew..Your story is all too familiar. Its why I never let non sailors drive and why I'm very careful about what conditions we go out in.

Always a good idea to make sure the passengers understand what to do in case of a capsize. Saves a lot of yelling when in the water.

I have a 30' safety line on board which gets deployed immediately and I tell passengers to never ever let go of the boat.

It makes me crazy also to see folks going out without floatation vests (always) and wetsuits. (in early summer/late fall)

i am more glad i was able to prevent my h16 from slamming into the powerboat that just helped me. i paid 1200 for my boat.. and certain i couldn't afford to repair the powerboat...

I almost hope you left her out there. 😀

The last time I tipped I looked at my friend and said "oops" with a big grin on my face, he wasn't smiling though. I hadn't flipped my current boat before and wanted to flip it before it happened with my wife on board. She thinks it is better to keep the boat upright for some reason, so I wanted to give it a try before having her need to help me do it.

andrewscott wrote: i am more glad i was able to prevent my h16 from slamming into the powerboat that just helped me. i paid 1200 for my boat.. and certain i couldn't afford to repair the powerboat...

I had stink boat help me right last summer. I told them not to cleat off the line because my boat is going to take off. They pulled the boat over and immediately took off with me hanging on the side. I look back the family looked terrified as it was pulling their boat backwards. Finally got everything under control.

As for not letting go my girlfriend ended up about 100-150 yds away. She couldn't fight the current/wind to stay by my boat. Luckily another cat picked her up. Even with a bright orange life jacket in the middle of a sunny day she was very hard to spot.

She said: Let's not flip this anymore.

Flipped bow over stern on a rogue wave in Lake Michigan surf. Last words before the wave hit were 'this isn't going to be good'. I had a rookie with me at the time and he was concerned that I lost my hat.

Luckily the total damage was limited to:
- 2 battens
- 1 daggerboard
- 1 hat
- 1 pair of sunglasses (Raybans ... you never lose the $10 glasses)

Worst of all was that it ended the day of sailing and the wind was blowing over 20.

We stood our Supercat 20 on its bow when we hit a tugboat wake under full power and one hull out of the water, the boat came to an abrupt stop. Two of us did the Peter Pan, one left holding on to the tiller, and one fell head first down through the rigging. Ended up with a bent tiller and 50 stitches in my fathers ear. Power boat picked 2 up and headed to shore for medical assistance, while 2 of us righted the boat.

Nothing like being in the water and watching the mast coming at you, with your friends trap wire wrapped around your neck. Boat took off while tipped over, 120sqft of trampoline (sail area).

wow super cat 20.. impressive boat. someone around my neighborhood has one. we were both out one day and they werent even trying that hard. dagger boards werent in, didnt bother to be out on the wire...still catching up to me rather quick.

Yeah the SC20 is a different kind of boat. They are getting old to keep up with the new technology boats but still a blast to sail with that 12 feet beam. In the right conditions can't think of a better boat to single hand. Trapped out flying a hull six feet out of the water is a riot. I never thought we could come close to a pitchpole on it, but we proved that idea wrong.

We have a 21'+ SC on our beach and the owner told me last summer that SC's actually are quite prone to pitch poll. Kinda surprised me.

There was a ARC22 on the beach just North of Gilson Beach last year, I only saw it out a couple times, but it sure looked like a nice boat, and fast.

Since I sail solo most of the time, when I flip my cat usually wimper, and say "help".

I actually wouldnt mind flipping over too much if it wasnt for the people that happen to be watching calling 911. I know it must look like a big deal. I should paint the words "this is normal" on the bottoms of the hulls.

thtsjon4u wrote: I actually wouldnt mind flipping over too much if it wasnt for the people that happen to be watching calling 911. I know it must look like a big deal. I should paint the words "this is normal" on the bottoms of the hulls.

That's so funny, and true.

I was down at Pensacola Beach last year for the Midwinters and during one of the races the Coast Guard showed up in a very impressive boat looking for the "sinking sailboat" that had been reported by a passing stinkpot. They stayed around for a long time before being convinced that no one was in peril.

last fall, there was a break in the storms,of what looked like a couple of hours on the doppler. well i had had a couple of adult sodas, and grabbed a couple of teenage sons of a freind of mine. ten minutes after getting started i knew we was going over. (BOYS DONT LAND ON ANYTHING) then we was in the drink. to bad the water was only 12 or 14 ft deep. muck bottom lake, mast STUCK waaaay bad in the muck. wind coming right against the tramp driving the mast in deeper. we swam to shore and came bact the next day to get her. she was still in the same spot thank goodness. but like above a landwalker called 911. i just said you called em you deal with em. AAHHHHHH good times!

Oh yeah, getting the mast stuck in the mud is a bitch 😀
An especially bad instance for me was sailing a mono and having the boat stuck upside down overnight and had a diver come the next morning to help dig the mast out of the muck. The bottom (or top I guess) 5 feet of mast and sail was caked in mud. The afternoon was not enjoyable cleaning the mess up.