HURRICANE STORM PREP: Before and After

In early September I was facing a serious dilemma. Hurricane Hermaine was heading up the coast. This meant I would have to try and prep BIANKA in advance of the storm. But, I also had booked passage on a Cruise ship leaving New York and heading to Bermuda during the same week the storm was expected to hit. Due to a number of SNAFU's and personal travel plans I had decided to give up on sailing this season and just hung out of BIANKA at the mooring. This decision was fortuitous because I did not have a need to put the sail on the boat. This made storm preparation a little easier since I did not have to remove and store BIANKA's 540 square feet of sail to reduce windage.

I did have to do a few other things to give me some piece of mind in case the Hurricane hit the area. One thing I needed to do is remove the 33 pound Bruce anchor off the bow roller.

 The flukes of which can cut easily cut through the mooring line like a knife and set the boat adrift. It's not a difficult job but, it is awkward handling the anchor while leaning over the bowsprite. An extra line helps make sure you won't accidentally drop the anchor while handling it. I was also glad I had previously coated the shackle pin threads with Tef Gel . This made for a quick and easy removal of the shackle holding the anchor to the chain. I wish the neighboring boats would do the same but, I have not seen anyone else come out and start to prep their boats.

Once the anchor was removed and the mooring pennant lines set in the bow rollers. I used several large Ty Wraps through holes in the rollers:

These will prevent the mooring lines from popping off the  rollers and start chaffing as the bow pitches up and down in a storm. This could possibly set the boat adrift.

I also made up some spare mooring lines I planned to add to the existing mooring line as extra insurance. I got the last two 3/8" thimbles at the local West Marine and sliced them into some Tenex line I had on board:

I used a hot knife to cut out the bad section of the line before installing the thimble:

 The hot knife really helps to make quick neat cuts in some of these new high tech lines.

I also used some Parachute cord to secure the BIANKA"S Solar Bimini. The bimini had survived the 95 MPH winds of super storm Sandy but a little more security never hurts when expecting a blow:

My plans to add two additional lines to the mooring did not work out since the attachment point on the mooring ring did not allow room for two shackles so I was only able to add one line:

This was better than nothing. Though it would have been better to find this out before a storm approaches. I may see if the boatyard can increase the size of the mooring ring next year so I can fit two additional storm shackles instead of just one.

A LESSON LEARNED: Hermaine did not hit the area full strength which I was glad to learn of while on the cruise ship. There were some strong gusts but, nothing near Hurricane strength. However, after I returned and was rowing out to the boat for the first time since returning from the cruise. I saw that my spare storm mooring line was dangling in the water. I thought at first it had broken even though it was rated at over 5,000 pounds. When I inspected it this is what I found:

Apparently, I had secured the shackle pin to the thimble with a Ty Wrap to but, I had forgotten to do the same to the shackle that attached to the mooring ring. As a result of the pitching up and down the pin loosened up and eventually fell out make my spare storm mooring line useless. When this happened is anyone's guess. But, it is a lesson learned to make an inspection list before leaving the boat when prepping for a storm.

REMOVING A FROZEN ANCHOR SHACKLE AND SWIVEL

I recently mentioned the anchor swivel's pin that was approaching a "yikes" moment. Since I had a spare on board I looked to replace it. It had been attached for as long as I have owned the boat and normally should have been a five minute replacement job. Except for one thing the pin of the shackle that attached the swivel to the anchor was seized and no amount of PB Blaster, wrenches and even  micro torch supplied heat could move that shackle pin. Looks like that five minute job just got a little longer since I was going to have to cut this shackle off too in order to replace the swivel. But, what to use? It's a tight space around where the anchor and shackle lay. A hacksaw would be awkward to use in the confined space take quite a bit of time even if I had a new blade which I did not. Enter the Dremel 200-1/15 Two-Speed Rotary Tool Kit with a pack of heavy duty cutting disks. I am able to power the Dremel a number of ways on board. One is with my on onboard Honda EU 2000 generator which is really over kill for the power requirements of the Dremel Tool. Another is with the AIMS 1500 Watt 48 volt Inverter I installed last year. Though for most jobs I just use the 200 watt 12 volt Powerstar Inverter that I bought back in the 1980's. It not a pure sinewave inverter but, it powers the Dremel Tool quite nicely for all sorts of quick projects.  The Dremel made short work of cutting through the swivel that was attached to the seized anchor shackle as shown here:

Once the old swivel was out of the way I could start to work on the seized anchor shackle.  I probably should have used a  Dremel 1-1/4-Inch Reinforced Cut-Off Wheel but, even the Dremel 420 Heavy Duty Cut-Off Wheels  I used did the job. Though I did have one or two disks break in the process. They still cut through the swivel and shackel quite easily despite not being reinforced. I was impressed.

After removing the swivel I tackled the stuck shackle pin. Rather try and cut through the crown which would have required two cuts to remove the shackle. I decided to see if I could just cut through the one lug of the shackle where the pin screwed into. Perhaps just cutting away enough of the lug would allow the pin to be removed:

I was careful not to cut into the anchor shank. After a few partial cuts of the shackle lug I was able to easily unscrew the shackle pin:

Which still looked pretty good but, the corrosion that held it in place was pretty tenacious so it needed to be replaced along with the swivel.  I used some  Tef-Gel on the replacement shackle threads to help insure that I will not have to cut the shackle next time I have to remove it:

With the old swivel and anchor shackle replaced I could now sleep easier when BIANKA is at anchor:

SHACKLE UPGRADES

In addition to the 200 feet of new galvanized anchor chain I also ordered two special shackles from 1st Chain supply. Normally, the weak link (no pun intended) in the anchor system is the shackles used to connect the chain to various thimbles and swivels. The problem is the shackles that one finds in the Marine store that fit inside the chain links have working loads less than the chain they connect to. The ones that are as strong as the chain have pins that are two big to fit inside the chain links.
There are two solutions to this problem. You can order the chain with oversize links at each end. but, order lead times are much longer (four to six weeks). The other solution is to use special alloy shackles that are as strong or stronger as the chain links they connect to. That is what I did. 1st Chain Supply has these alloy shackles available on their website they are in stock and I was able to order them when I ordered the chain. As I usually do before I connected them to the chain I coated the threads with Tef Gel to makes sure I will be able to take them off when I want to in the future.

MOORING IN AMERICA

There was good news and bad news this week about BIANKA's upcoming sailing season. In the mail from the town came the approved 2012 mooring permit. So BIANKA has a home port to come back to when not out cruising.  It's a sure sign that start of the season is in sight. There was more good signs as I pulled into the boatyard yesterday:

The good sign was that the moorings were starting to be lined up and the boatyard was getting ready to be put them out in the harbor. Some had new chain. Some had new pennant lines.  Some just needed a new coat out anti fouling paint.

Then came the bad news. My town requires that the moorings be inspected every season before they are dropped out of sight onto the harbor bottom. I think it is good idea and also makes sure that only secure and reliable moorings are dotting the harbor. Which may have been why there was so few boats lost or damaged in the harbor when Hurricane Irene came to visit showing us her bad side.  As I was getting out the car one of the guys working the boatyard came up to me and said I need to show something on your mooring. This is what he showed me:

Yeah, it's looking a little worn at the bottom shackle attachment point on one side where the chain connects to the mooring. BIANKA having survived Hurricane Irene might not be so lucky next time with the mooring  looking like this. Some of this damage might have been a result of riding the Hurricane too. So it looks like a new 300 plus pound mooring is in BIANKA's future along with some unexpected expense for Capt. Mike. Though it's still cheap insurance if another storm like Irene should head this way.