Is the wheel supposed t o spin like that?
2002-07-11

Zen question of the day... Can you lose something you never really had?

I think you can...

Well I was late for work this morning. The alarm didn't go off, or maybe I didn't set it. Results of the excess of grapes from last night? They were truely needed on several levels so the clock and my system are forgiven.

Well I did leave early, got the last slip for the boat and got it all ready. It was going to be our night, you could just feel it. The diver had cleaned the bottom, I cleaned out the forward end of the boat to make it lighter. It felt like a good a good night. I even had time to shower, check the email and take a short nap.

Well, most of the crew was there right on time and we had a few extra bodies for a change and it was going to blow. Time to show our stuff. I really felt good, not nervous at all, just focused.

The wind was blowing 20 plus and we went with the medium head sail. It was a good choice. The boat sailed like it was on rails. We had a AWESOME start, at the line, at favored end at the gun going full speed. Life was good. We were easily out in front

We had to tack for the mark. No big deal, but when I went to turn the wheel I heard this big bang, then nothing. The Evil 42 was beaing down on us and I couldn't steer. The cable to the rudder had exploded. Not good. I had the crew shift the sails and that pushed us away from the first danger. then I gave the command to drop the sails. The crew, who didn't know about the steering looked at me like i was nuts. We were ahead, drop the sails? I yelled again. This time they all jumped and we soon had the sails down and time to work things out. I had somebody call Mirage. They were near by and told them to stand by just in case. The reason they were around is that they had hit Sarah... Not a good thing.

I dug through the locker and found the emergency tiller. Luckily it fit, well sort of. The emergency tiller is a pipe with a fitting on the end. It is about two feet long and sits about 3 inches above the deck. It is under the helmsmans seat so there is only a small space to work with. Oh yeah you have to steer kneeling down so you can't see. Nice... Mirage asked if we wanted a tow, but I thought we had it under control and we did sort of. It was a slow, painful and tiring trip back to the mooring. We did make it though, and as the adrenaline washed out, so did my energy. We put the boat away and the drinks started to flow. We ended up being the last ones in. Like I said it was necessary.

People must have talked because before the night was over several people complemented me on handling the situation well. Hell I was just reacting. We were lucky on the timing too. Other than Evil 42, we were never in any danger. if the cable had blown at the start, we would have been like a 16,000 pound pinball, wrecking all in it's path. Oh well. I called my boat guy first thing. More money to be spent.

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