We dodged a major bullet this weekend. Could have been very bad!

[MarioG]

We had a weekend of pure happiness and pleasure on our boat despite the windy conditions and rolly bay. But it was almost spoiled in less than 2 minutes!

Returning back to the marina, we crossed the bay in choppy beam seas conditions. Combined with boat traffic wake, it made for a rough ride home. Ironically, my wife and I were discussing our trip home from the keys on memorial weekend a few years ago in which we pretty much plowed through 6 - 8' seas for 8 hrs. during that trip, our RIB slipped off the chocks on top and almost fell off the boat. It happened because of our failure to properly secure the RIB to the deck. Because of that dangerous event we installed U bolts to the deck and strapped the RIB tightly to the deck.

Well, you can't make this S h it up!

This Monday, as we made our turn into the channel of our marina, we rolled to port really aggressively and we heard something go BANG! followed by that "earthquake" like sound of something bad is going to happen! As we rolled hard to port I saw the most amazing thing I have seen on the water to this day! I saw our 13' Boston Whaler SS go swinging out and away from the mother-ship still attached to hoist! Somehow, and by a miracle we continued with our aggressive port list and entered into a turn to starboard (very dangerous!) during all of this the Whaler swung around like a wrecking ball looking for a target! Another miracle happened when the whaler completely missed the boat during it's wild swinging. Then, as we were putting the boat into neutral, the hoist arm, under extreme stress collapsed and broke away cleanly dropping the whaler from the level of the boat deck, landing flat on the surface of the water! As I ran to the cockpit to further asses the situation, the hoist arm fell into the water as the whaler floated away missing it completely!

I handed the control of the boat to my wife whom, as some of you know also runs the boat well. We turned around to retrieve the whaler. Our plan was to get as close as safely possible and try to hook the tender bow line with the poll. After retrieving to whaler, we towed it home.

Once docked in our slip and secured the boat and shut everything down, we started to assess the damage. To our amazement there was no damage to either our YF or the whaler! The only damage is directly to the hoist arm! Except for the U bolts that were pulled out of the deck leaving a 2 inch hole there are no other scratches, or cracks or any other damage! The Whaler is also damage free! Talking about this to my wife, we realized that loud BANG we heard was the SS U bolts holding the tender to the deck shearing off and the "earthquake" sound was the whaler sliding off the boat deck! As I sat down to take this all in, my wife went to the whaler to rinse her off, she called for me to see something. Still attached to the whaler was the lifting cables. on the other end of the cable was the hoist arm laying flat on the bottom! I fished it out of the water and placed it on the swim platform and there it was, the two U bolts sheared at the threads!

My wife and I learned several things from this incident.

1. we realize that we were very lucky. this could have been much worse, including injured people. thankfully, we were alone .

2. pure luck keeped the whaler from destroying itself and from destroying our YF, plain and simple!

3. Thank god my wife kept her cool under pressure and knows how to run the boat. No screaming, we somehow knew what we had to do.

4. Although we had installed what we thought was a better tender tie down system because of our bad experience with tender tie down issues of a few years ago, clearly our set up was not "over built". This issue I will study in depth and rebuild the tie down system in a much more durable way.

5. Boston Whaler is AWESOME!

I write this for all to read in the hopes that we can all take inventory of ourselves and our boats and reflect. This lesson is free for those that wish to learn from it.

Carry on!

Mario

PS. I need a Hoist. See the parts for sale section.

 

[Plan B2]

I'm glad you and the equipment are all safe and relatively unharmed. Is there any possibility that the davit control engaged while under way and pulled the Whaler up, thuse pulling the u-bolts free?

 

[MarioG]

I'm glad you and the equipment are all safe and relatively unharmed. Is there any possibility that the davit control engaged while under way and pulled the Whaler up, thuse pulling the u-bolts free?

No. It was unplugged.

 

[GJH]

Wow! There but for fortune go us all. I recently rebuilt my davit and have a little more to do. My 13' Whaler attaches to the boat in three spots, two off the transom and one on the bow. The eyes on the boat deck are through bolted (single bolt) with 2"x2" backing plates. We have been in some very rough conditions and never had the dinghy budge. Our boat is stabilized. I had attributed this lack of movement, (prior to your post!), to the sheer total weight of the Whaler (almost 1000 lbs, we had it weighed once) and the depth/fit of the chocks it sits in. Another thing I do is keep a small bit of tension on the lift cable, which also restricts movement of dinghy and davit arm to some degree. It would be hard for it to slide around a lot, but obviously not impossible, you must have been extremely heeled over The cables attaching it to the boat deck are not particularly tight. The boat deck is quite thick as I learned when we pulled the davit pole, 1/2" fiberglass top and bottom and about a 1"core.

 

[Pascal]

Scary tale! You are lucky indeed... It was a bit breezy this week end but I can't believe you d roll that much on the bay.

Were the u-bolts bolted thru the boat deck? Hw many were there?

 

[Artzco]

Thanks and great advice Mario. My 3 tie downs were not through bolted and I added metal backing plates purely to avoiding tossing or wind uplift.

Glad there was no significant damage and you two are ok.

 

[Angela]

That scenario is exactly why Ed wouldn't let me leave the davit line attached to the dinghy when we crossed. He said that if the thing is going to come loose from the deck somehow, he wants it to fall away from the boat (loose) quickly and not be flying around like a tethered wrecking ball injuring people and wrecking the boat. We heel over quite a bit just lifting the thing - add that with the momentum of an ocean wave and the force of it swinging wildly, and that could be disasterous. Hearing Mario's story confirms Ed's decision for me. I did through bolt my davit chocks with robust backing plates. It's not pretty from the underside, but for the purpose served, I don't care. Still, it's just a cored deck and I would not be totally shocked to see the entire deck plate rip right through in the right (wrong) sea conditions.

I'm so happy to hear that only the davit was lost and that the Honeymoon isn't over. I'm not sure what I would have done in that situation - whether I would have been as calm and cool as Yaisy - just don't know. I used to panic a lot, but over the years, I've gotten better, so says Ed. He was pleasantly surprised when I didn't freak out when the stuffing box fell apart letting water come gushing in. Seven years ago, I lost my mind when a shower hose gave up and was circulating bilge water - it looked to me like were sinking. Oh, how far I've come. LOL Now, seeing the Hober whirling around the boat on a steel cable...all bets are off.

 

[GJH]

Maybe I am missing something here (always a distinct possibility), but with the very short leash by which my Whaler is attached to the davit in the almost incomprehensible occasion that all three tie downs were to fail, there really isn't much of anything for the thing to crash into, assuming the davit does not collapse as in Mario's case. Just some dodger board, that's all. And it would take the boat almost going upside down to get it out of the chocks. Still, Mario's post inspires me to finish my refurbishment by welding in more reinforcement to the mounting poll.

 

[MarioG]

Pascal,
There were two u bolts through bolted on the boat deck. It had fender washers as backing. As far as the roll, it was more like a whipping type, fast roll combined with a big wake and wind. it wasn't until the whaler went flying did the rolling moment really get pronounced. adding to it was the turn to starboard. Pure bad timing... remember, all accidents are a combination of several small, bad things combining at the right place at the right time.

Angela, Ed is correct. having the tender fall away would be the best thing in your scenario. The reason why I keep the cable attached is to keep some of the stress off the boat deck. In retrospect the proper way to avoid this again is to properly anchor the tender to the boat deck with well designed tiedowns and rigging AND pin the hoist so it cannot turn inadvertantly.

 

[MarioG]

Maybe I am missing something here (always a distinct possibility), but with the very short leash by which my Whaler is attached to the davit in the almost incomprehensible occasion that all three tie downs were to fail, there really isn't much of anything for the thing to crash into, assuming the davit does not collapse as in Mario's case. Just some dodger board, that's all. And it would take the boat almost going upside down to get it out of the chocks. Still, Mario's post inspires me to finish my refurbishment by welding in more reinforcement to the mounting poll.

George, I WILL be beefing up the next davit and the tender anchoring plates! as far as where the wrecking ball tender could have gone, it could have ended up inside the salon! chilling, sobering thought...

 

[Angela]

What I really want is one of those submergable swim platforms with a set of Hober chocks on them. That would solve a lot of issues, and probably create one or two eventually, but I'd risk that.

 

[bigbill]

mario, remember when you beef up your thru bolts to remove as much coring as possible from where the bolts go thru. the coring will crush and the bolts will not stay tight. make that area solid, then drill for the bolts. how old were the bolts? maybe some crevice corrosion on the bolts?

 

[magnawake]

Thanks for the lesson. I flip my dink up on the swim platform, however, I have thought about installing a hoist on the roof and the thought of something like this happening never crossed my mind. Man !!! what a story.

 

[Pascal]

I have used a swim platform lift a few times and hate it... First the tender is always in the way when docked, docking, swimming etc... Bt most importantly it s not that easy to line it on the chocks in anything but calm conditions and it can two people to control it. If you are anchored in a spot with current and the boat lay at an odd angle because of the wind, it s even worst... I ll stick to a davit and top side storage which I can easily handle alone.

And in choppy waters, you get a lot of pressure on the tender as the spray and chop can hit the outboard at speed

 

[bobk]

On my 48, the rear tie downs are SS eye nuts threaded onto the bolts for the hard top supports. Seems like a solid solution. I would never have considered leaving the lift cable attached. I lower the boom and snap it to a pad eye with a loop of shock cord and prevent athwart ship motion with a snug line to the the forward dink pad eye. Works well.

Bobk