Many of you may recognize the yacht name “Something Wicked”. It belongs to Puerto Vallarta Yacht club members Kevin and Sandy Reath. You may also know of Mike Danielson, Crew Director, VYC. This is Mike’s story about their recent Victoria to Maui race and how they went from being in solid first place to reach Maui, to being in an emergency situation and arriving in San Francisco.
By Mike Danielson: So here’s how it went… but first, from the Crew of “Something Wicked” to the Members of VYC and especially to Commodore John Moore…… Thank you for your support in our getting home!Quick recap… SW was racing the Victoria to
Maui race this past month and kicking some %$^!..
Driving her like she was stolen!
Four days out after the start of the Victoria to Maui race we were beginning a transition towards the lower ridge of the Pacific High and found the weak point where we were in about 20-25knots of pressure and everyone else was in 15! The only problem was it was really messy seas… The 4A full-size was up and it was like driving through a Tope field with VW Bugs being thrown at you from the right. Boat speed was always 10-12knots with top surfs to 14. Getting into the dark after 2200 crew change dark was really dark… no Moon, cloudy, no horizon…. And you couldn’t see the VW’s coming. After a few good crashes we shifted to the 4A small with a sock on it and continued…. Actually our VMG was better because we were not fighting with Mother Nature as much…. Never the less we continued to drive SW like she was stolen! (That’s a Nickrism)
The morning of the fifth day I took over the morning drive at 0600. About 0700 everyone was still up and we were finishing breakfast. The conditions were wet drizzle, soft clouds and a noticeable temperature change for the warmer with breeze about 25+ and the seas were noticeably bigger… no more VWbugs but the odd Bus made up for them and kept you thinking. There was a developing rhythm and being that we could see where we were going and the boat felt good we decided that after breakfast we would shift back to the 4A Full-size….. Time to ride!
0720! “Show me on the Doll where the bad man touched you”
We had not changed sails yet … I was sailing a little to the right looking at an oncoming Bus and planning to bank left off it and the following wave like I had been doing for the last hour… when…, as I was building pressure into the turn, I felt a catch… Slip… Catch… then a huge release in the Helm! “Blow the
Main!”
(Someone is always on the Main) At that point the boat rounded-up and auto-tacked through the wind, Chute and all! “Game Over…Rudder’s gone!” I said as we sat Hove-to with the Kite pasted in the rig and Jybe crash net. “What do you mean it’s gone?” Kevin said and all looked on for a reason why we were soaked and backwards …”The Rudder has left the building and is floating right over there”… Behind us off our Port quarter about 30ft away was our Rudder floating…not part… The whole thing except the rudder post.
From Hero to Zero!Yup that’s it….. It was getting good and when we looked at where we where it was in solid 1st place! Our race became a self rescue… Everyone went at it by two’s EM Rudder set-up, check below aft for water and hull damage, Radio com to Coast Guard with Lat/Lon and condition, Overboard gear in check, Rig survey, lines clear and engine on…all with in minutes…This is one of the best teams ever…!I came back to the cockpit from the rig review and it was the oddest feeling. We were sitting hove to with the boat riding stable in the waves, in balance … surreal… Then I noticed how loud it was in 25+… We had been into reaction mode for 15min. and had not yet reflected… Once the emergency rudder was installed and the engine was in gear to go slow, we went to dealing with the sails… “Eyes open everyone…We don’t know how the boat is going to react.”Everyone was in position like we were still racing when coming into a mark. Vern and I were on the bow pulling the sock down over our “Rasta Chicken” chute while Nick was directing Gary and Kevin with the rudder control lines Sandy was in the pit running halyards…. Through the maneuver everyone was doing four things with two hands at an Octopus Ballet. Chute socked and out of the rig, we then went to getting down the Main while trying to re-balance a course with the EM rudder and the motor against the unbalanced sea. Take your Pill!… It’s bitter but it’ll help!….Drink it with Red Bull… We’re not doneGood seasick meds are important…. Now! … As we took a breather the boat was all over the place… Everyone was still in it … attitude was good. We all took some medicine and talked for a moment…. “Awesome everyone…..But we need to suck it up while we’re still pumped …” Next came the Trysail and Storm Jib. We got those up and trimmed in no time and at this point we started steering the boat with the sails and the EM rudder just off center. The boat auto tacked a few times … The rudder was just not big enough.
The PoleGrowing up as a Sea Scout in Newport Beach, I had been one of the luckiest kids. I got exposed to offshore seamanship training very young. One of the little tricks I learned was about loosing rudders … and we actually practiced it. We didn’t just review the instructions. There was no need to drag a sail under the boat to slow any leaking, since we were without any hull damage. What we did do was to rig the spinnaker pole across the transom… making a bridle that used 40+ ft of line attached to a small man overboard drogue.
With adjustment of the bridle side-to-side, we where able to put the EMR center and put the load to one side on the Drogue in order to stabilize our steering against the sail trim…. Once in position we were finally stable and literally trimming the Mainsheet 6 in… sometimes… We were headed for San Francisco doing 6 kn under trysail and storm jib …no motor!
Take a nap…. With your boots onWe got a bit quiet … Adrenaline is some powerful stuff, but the crash is tough. That is now obvious to everyone in reflection mode. After getting the drogue going, Nick took watch and I went to review Navigation and Communications with Vern ….. “Hey Kev”… “I just realized John is in SF,” Kevin looked at me over his cup with a little smirk grin. “What are you up to now?” I knew John Moore was in SF on the
Oakland side and he had his yacht Breaking Wind…. I new that if I could contact John he would be the best person to help us arrive into SF and deal with the details…. “The Devil is there and we’re out here.”
Houston we have a problem!We had all the communication toys and they were now more important than ever. We had communicated with Coast Guard via e-mail and radio, checked in with VM race committee. Now we had John Moore on the scene as well. John quickly got back to us with Sevendsens at the ready for our arrival. He had the issues regarding our temporary immigration of 5 Canadians to SF under control and a good check-in with Coast Guard backing us up. The plan was to meet John off St. Francis YC after entering the gate then have him escort us to the yard. “It’s going to be 4 days to SF. We’ll see you then.” On our roll call at 1300 to VM the confirmation that we were winning came through followed by sentiments of support from all yachts.PAC Cup……. What if?Now this is how twisted we are….. “Hey Kevin, what if we can get a new rudder in time for the Pacific cup race to Oahu? …. We’ve got 3 weeks after arrival.” I love this guy…The smirk came out again: “Why not… I’ve spent so much money already and Sandy still hasn’t gotten to Hawaii.” The team rallied: “WE’RE IN!” So off went the note to John to work with the PAC Cup guys to get us a spot. That became something to ponder for the transit over the next few days.On final approach…. Call the Ball!John had us well on our way to PAC-Cup and everything was set for our arrival to SF come the morning of day 4. Our Coast Guard contacts had finally got themselves into our contact routine and the total communication was basically no more than a position check and log-in. Coming over the top of Drakes Bay, we started interacting with Traffic SF over the radio to figure out how much ship traffic there would be, and to alert Traffic SF to our dilemma. Once we established the ETA with everyone concerned it was time to see if we could steer the boat in flat water with the EM rudder…. Our issue: the Drogue was going to be less effective to steer the boat in the expected 2.5+knot flood tide….. Oh and I further need to point out that going under the Gate was going to be about 2200….Yup…Dark!… So we test the rudder…Zip…Boat does an instant 360! “Well, we’re going in on the Drogue!” We began discussing the line up we would have in the dark and where the ”Ball” light range would be as well as the danger points because of current.
Everyone was on deck and in position going under the Gate. Even the Coast Guard decided to show off and do a fly-by with a helo…No idea what that was worth. I was on Communications and Navigation being that I know the bay and that the illegal Canadians, except Nick, didn’t. Nick directed Helm and I called the Ball, which is the guide range for traffic under the Gate. We went under the gate between Mid and South Tower as directed by Traffic SF and as communicated with a big cruise ship coming out. “Cool…We’re in!….YES!”
“Breaking Wind, We’re through… what is your position?”The South Tower is not your Friend
“OH…AHHH!.”…360! We got picked up in the Eddy current inside the South tower and lost all drag pressure in the steering drogue… we were now headed for the beach at Crissy Field! Nick and Gary got working on the EMR steering … Vern and Kevin got the Anchor up on deck.
“Breaking Wind …Breaking Wind… John… Something Wicked”…”
“Go Mike…,” John. “Where are you?”
“Coming up pier 39 …You?”
“John, we have zero helm… we picked up the eddy current from the South Tower and it’s taking us to the beach!.. Anchor is ready if we don’t get steerage we may need you to side up with us.”
Once again the team pulled it out… Nick and Gary got super focused moving the EMR an inch at a time, Sandy or Kevin adjusted the drogue. Kevin was the coolest … he kept things calm… and in perspective. I was calling Navigation and reading current and once John was on the scene we started communicating about where we were going and what he felt for current. A River Runs Through It
If you’ve never been to SF, let me tell you that although the bay is huge, it is like being in a river when the tide is moving. We continued down the Pier 39 waterfront negotiating the flood, kinda going sideways half the time. The plan was to continue to the Bay Bridge and cross over on the west side of Treasure Island, under the bridge, then cross channel for the entrance to the Oakland Estuary…. Yup, here we go again… Under the bay bridge current was running 4knots and we were literally going under it sideways. We made it through and into the slack eddy of the
Island… Wow was that nuts!
“So John.. What’s what here?” I looked across the channel at all the lights of the old Alameda Air Station and the commercial port container docks. It looked like an industrial amusement park for longshoremen.
Oh and There is Pizza
“Follow me.” John pulled ahead so that we could follow. As we entered the estuary channel it became obvious that
Gary is the master of the EMR stuff… Literally Nick would call for a 3degree correction and
Gary would have it…….Up the calm channel we went in awe of the huge container ship that reminded us of our entry to the Gate. Coast Guard came on the radio …obvious to us that they were tracking the boat .. At this point all the communications had been simple.
“Welcome to Alameda,” the voice said.
“Thanks!” As the marinas came into view, John came along side…
“You know we’ve got Pizza and Beer!”….. John explained where we were in relationship to the Yard so we decided to stall out and side tie up right then. It must have looked really odd from shore as we are rafted up mid channel at 0120 in the morning, yakking with enthusiasm about the impending dock arrival and the Pizza.
Hooked up, John maneuvered us down a slim channel and into the long dock at Svendsens…. “Magic!” I swear we’re sick in the head… all of us… The first thing everyone on board did, once tied-up, was start cleaning up……….
“Oh …. Guys,” John called. “Pizza, remember?” John Moore is the coolest! He and two friends came out and brought us in… That’s our Commodore! We sat and chatted about the ordeal in an air of disbelief as if to mentally pinch ourselves that we’re really here and all this happened. We began to fall into crash mode after our Pizza and Corona fest…
John took that as a cue. “What time tomorrow Mike?”
behaviors to observe is the breach. With just a few strokes of their flukes, humpbacks can gain enough momentum to hurl their 30 ton, 45 foot bodies into the air, then crash back down with a thunderous splash! Theories abound as to why whales breach, from acoustic signaling to removal of barnacles to joyous play.
used in aggressive encounters,… 
If you were in the area of a Marlin, it wasn’t hard to get a Marlin on the surface to take a casted Goggle Eye. But when it came to Yellowfin Tuna, they were jumping all over the place, that is, if you were… 
