Posted on 10/30/2012 5:21:24 AM PDT by I still care
ELIZABETH CITY, N.C. — The Coast Guard says a woman who was rescued in the Atlantic after abandoning ship in rough weather churned up by Hurricane Sandy has died.
Coast Guard Petty Officer 3rd Class David Weydert says 42-year-old Claudene Christian was unresponsive when she was pulled from the water Monday evening and was later pronounced dead at a hospital.
Fourteen other crew members were rescued from the HMS Bounty, a replica 18th-century sailing vessel that was originally built for the 1962 film "Mutiny on the Bounty" and was featured in several other films over the years.
The Coast Guard is still searching for the ship's captain.
The final hours of the HMS Bounty were as dramatic as the Hollywood adventure films she starred in, with the crew abandoning ship in life rafts as their stately craft slowly went down in the immense waves churned up by Hurricane Sandy off the North Carolina coast.
(Excerpt) Read more at t.news.msn.com ...
A ship may or may not be safer at sea, but the crew is definitely safer in the hotel bar . . .
I saw an article - the route seemed to run parallel to the NC Coast, and then was off course to the east for it’s final “blip”. I wish I could show you the map, but can’t find it now.
Yesterday they were saying the ship was still afloat but without a means of propulsion. Not sure if it actually “sank” yet.
Ships always go to sea when a storm is approaching. Most of the navy fleet left last thurs-fri.
Off the coast of NC
Bounty was well suited to weather the storm she faced. Square rigged wooden vessels endured high seas and winds for centuries. While many were lost, it was almost always a result of being driven on a lee shore and breaking up on the beach or on rocks. So long as she has water under her keel and maneuvering room, she should have been fine.
However, she wasn’t a truly historic vessel, she had a diesel engine and probably relied on her engine rather than sails to maneuver. I cannot tell from the picture, but it looks like she did not have any sail set (she would have staysails only and perhaps a foretopsail). I could make out a yardarm and it does not appear to even have sails bent. If she had no sails bent, then when her engine failed she was doomed. Her crew was inadequate to get sail aloft, man the pumps (did she even have chain pumps) and do other things that a square rigger must do to weather a storm.
I suspect that she lost her ability to steer, came athwart a wave, broached to, and shipped water through her hatches.
Heartbreaking photo.
Most stupid thing in the world sailing that ship into those seas.
Many places he could have put in to.
Claudene was a USC Trojan Song Girl, and a sweet one at that. RIP.
That’s fine if you have a good crew. You can tie the ship to the dock with steel instead of rope. I don’t think we have enough people who can sail a ship like that in bad seas. It was a bad move.
Doesn’t matter what you tie a ship with, it will still get bashed against the pier and if the water level changes a lot, the the lines get too tight and cause a list that can result in taking on water.
I cannot see any good sensible excuse why they were out at sea off the coast of North Carolina during a hurricane that was tracking for a week or more
If she had driven up into a hurricane hole in the mangroves or canals of the coast, she could still be alive
an aircraft carrier or destroyer or heavy cargo ship is safer at sea, but this was a top heavy mockup of a square rigger wooden sailing ship, many of whose bones litter the graveyards of the Atlantic along our coast
“Pride of Baltimore” lost some years ago, though not from a forecast hurricane
Tragic miscalculation by the Captain, RIP
reliant on modern technology (electronic pumps) which failed
There are plenty of sheltered harbors on the north shore of Long Island she could have taken the lee of the storm in. Cold Spring and Hempstead harbors are two examples. Even if a suitable mooring was not available she could have anchored and motored against the wind. Perhaps she wasn’t outfitted for anchoring? She could still have motored upwind in a sheltered bay.
Not knowing the captain’s history or CG certificate, it is patently false to say a ship is better at sea. With the projected sea conditions and clear NWS and NOAA mariner’s warnings, the decision to go to sea may have been “calculated” based on something other than nautical facts and weather data. It will be interesting to learn where they were headed, because if it wasn’t South, hugging the coast..well.
In any case it is not true that a ship is safer at sea than in port (that phrase may have originated with ship’s captains trying to keep their sailors out of trouble in port).
To wit, from Navy Times— most of the major elements of the Naval Station Norfolk put to sea Friday 26 Oct.:
http://www.navytimes.com/news/2012/10/navy-norfolk-ships-to-sea-hurricane-sandy-102612
Read somewhere that she lost steering.
yes, I doubt that line was referring to weather
Thanks. I assumed that she had electric pumps, but there are of little use if power fails. What I do not know is if she had period chain pumps. These are hand pumps, but would have been a big problem with crew of only 16, people have to be relieved frequently when manning hand pumps and they may not have been able to stay ahead of the water.
I suspect that when she lost propulsion power, she turned parallel to the waves and was turned over on her beam ends. If the hatches were not tightly battened down, she would have shipped considerable water and may have become unmanageable. Looking closely at the picture of her foundered, the yardarms appear to be bare poles, no sails. I suspect that she left port with only lower masts and topmasts, no topgallant or royal masts and no square sails bent to the yardarms. Sad to see, not too many of these replica square riggers around.
In order to maintain steering, the ship must have headway. In square riggers, this is provided by staysails (triangular sails that run parallel to the long axis of the ship) and perhaps a foretopsail (a square sail on the forward mast that runs perpendicular to the long axis of the ship). However, the picture appears to show bare poles, i.e. the sails were not fixed to the yardarms. If true, that means that they were relying entirely on diesel engine power to keep her underway and power the pumps. Once they lost that, they couldn't keep the bow pointed into the waves.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.