Thursday 21 April 2011

Serious Story, with a Funny Follow-on

A sailing couple nearly died of carbon monoxide poisoning caused by fumes from their generator, when they were anchored off Brightlingsea. I know that there's a danger of death from fish and chip fumes when anchored off Southend, and yes, the message is serious. Reminded me to check my carbon monoxide alarm.

Anyway, what really cracked me up was the comments that readers left - typical small town points scoring. What a laugh - I didn't know that people from Kent had webbed feet. Full story here:

http://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/8982483.Sailing_couple_nearly_die_of_carbon_monoxide_poisoning_during/?ref=rss

Tuesday 19 April 2011

Extreme Capsizes...this is something else....

...and really entertaining!

Saturday 16 April 2011

And Here They Go, Auckland to Hawaii...

A  good picture of them with sails hoisted, and the full story. I wonder that the local authorities let them go, having heard how keen the NZ authorities are on yachts' seaworthiness and equipment...

http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/manukau-courier/4887140/Sailing-the-Pacific#share

Thursday 14 April 2011

Sunday 3 April 2011

World's Largest Sailing Ship

I caught this item on the blogosphere. 141 meters overall, green credentials - wood build, wood interior, built for a Turkish company. She dwarfs Maltese Falcon, and appears to be a four-masted topsail schooner with a gaff mainsail...assuming the aftmost saile on this monster schooner is still known as the mainsail. And, the masts are all the same height (just as on Blue Hound, but the comparison stops there...)

Maltese Falcon has the so-called Falcon rig (an evolution of the Dynarig) with sail engineering that will take her very well to windward. From the pictures, this new one looks like she could be handy to windward (ish), as schooners go. There's always a problem - the after sails have to be sheeted harder to maintin the flow, and the more masts you have then the harder it gets...

She's a bit too big for me I think ...The full story is at Jameslist