Russian Ship Lands on Cornish Coast

[Alan de Enfield]

12 minutes ago, howardang said:

Congratulations- you have passed Second Mates orals! 

 

Howard

Mind you - the incident should not have happened, if the Skipper read the weather he would have deployed two anchors from the start and left the engines running.

[howardang]

15 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Mind you - the incident should not have happened, if the Skipper read the weather he would have deployed two anchors from the start and left the engines running.

You may well be right, and anchoring on a lee shore (although Falmouth Bay is a popular anchorage,) is not necessarily a good idea, but I don't know enough about the incident or the reason why he chose to anchor there to enable me to comment quite so dogmatically. The true facts (rather than supposition) will no doubt come out in the MAIB report in due course.

 

Howard

[Horace42]

2 hours ago, howardang said:

Congratulations- you have passed Second Mates orals! 

 

Howard

...isn't that a bit like the old story of the test where the captain asked the novice seaman what he would do in the hypothetical case of a 30 knot wind blowing the ship onto the rocks. 'Drop anchor Sir' - and not the answer the Captain wanted to hear.  'OK, what would you do if the wind was 50 knots?'.... 'I'd drop another anchor Sir.'

Alright then, what if the wind was 80 knots? .......... 'I'd drop another anchor Sir'.... 'a 100 knots then!'......'I'd drop another anchor Sir'

'For goodness sake, seaman, where are you getting all these anchors from...!   '...the same place as you get the wind, Sir...!

 

   

[Horace42]

2 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

1) Dropped the 2nd anchor

2) Retrieved anchor and motored out to sea

 

We have had an anchor drag a number of times - the alarm goes off, (I set the radius of the anchor alarm at the length of chain deployed to allow for swinging). If the alarm sounds you know you have moved so start the engines, retrieve the anchor, drop the anchor again and try to re-set it.

If it doesn't work repeat.

If it doesn't work head out to open water under power.

You've probably guessed I have little knowledge of this sort of situation - I asked the question because I imagined the force on a boat enough to drag an anchor would be more than the engines could cope with - and the boat would still drift aground.... but perhaps more to do with how well the anchor holds.

[howardang]

6 hours ago, Horace42 said:

You've probably guessed I have little knowledge of this sort of situation - I asked the question because I imagined the force on a boat enough to drag an anchor would be more than the engines could cope with - and the boat would still drift aground.... but perhaps more to do with how well the anchor holds.

Not commenting on this specific case, but engines are often used to ease the weight on an anchor cable, and certainly on ships the other options include deploying a second anchor, and/or paying out more chain. Anchoring on a lee shore i.e. in a bay for example where there is a strong onshore wind, would need extra thought about the wisdom of anchoring there. 

 

Howard

[Alan de Enfield]

7 hours ago, Horace42 said:

You've probably guessed I have little knowledge of this sort of situation - I asked the question because I imagined the force on a boat enough to drag an anchor would be more than the engines could cope with - and the boat would still drift aground.... but perhaps more to do with how well the anchor holds.

There is an art to correctly deploying an anchor - be it on a 600 ft cargo ship or a 50 foot narrowboat.

It is something that needs both a suitable anchor and experience / practice, even then (as is show, the skipper does not always get it 'right'

 

I try to get this message over when someone asks the forum for anchoring advice - whilst with canals you can just drift to the side, or even 'get out and walk', Rivers can be a totally different scenario. Having seen one NB go over a weir and another, after engine failure,struggle to anchor above a weir, and the problems I had (in my NB) getting to him and getting a rope on for a tow I think many folk underestimate the power of a flowing river.

 

If interested ( I know it'll be of little interest to most Canal users) have a look at the attached article.

 

 

 

 

Surviving A Storm At Anchor.pdf

Edited December 19, 2018 by Alan de Enfield

[Bee]

2 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

There is an art to correctly deploying an anchor - be it on a 600 ft cargo ship or a 50 foot narrowboat.

It is something that needs both a suitable anchor and experience / practice, even then (as is show, the skipper does not always get it 'right'

 

I try to get this message over when someone asks the forum for anchoring advice - whilst with canals you can just drift to the side, or even 'get out and walk', Rivers can be a totally different scenario. Having seen one NB go over a weir and another, after engine failure,struggle to anchor above a weir, and the problems I had (in my NB) getting to him and getting a rope on for a tow I think many folk underestimate the power of a flowing river.

You are right. An anchor is a piddling little thing to expect to hold 20+ tons of boat with a 4 knot current an a bit of wind as well. I reckon a 20 ton anchor would be about right. Thing is with anchors is that they need to dig in and if the bottom is rubbish they don't and they need a lot of chain laying on the bottom as well. Ideally you need to have a plan before you drop the thing, My anchor is really for emergency use but in an emergency I probably won't have a plan except to cross my fingers.

[13-10]

Have just been reading a bit of background on the Kuzma Minin

 

Since May it had been stuck in Holland with unpaid bills, the crew have not been paid in months and were living off of handouts from the locals.The Mumansk Shipping Company who own the ship are under investigation in Russia.

 

A ship owned by a bankrupt company with a demoralised crew isn't a particularly good combination

[matty40s]

The crew are apparently stood on the front deck playing with Drone controllers. ....

[13-10]

2 minutes ago, matty40s said:

The crew are apparently stood on the front deck playing with Drone controllers. ....

And the captain is apparently doing a Novichok stock take whilst reading about Salisbury Cathedral on Wikipedia

[Ray T]

Will your anchor hold in the storms of life, When the clouds unfold their wings of strife? When the strong tides lift, and the cables strain, Will your anchor drift or firm remain?   In this case obviously not.    Apologies to Priscilla Jane Owens.   Boat children with Mrs Fielding aboard Salvo at Sutton's.

Edited December 21, 2018 by Ray T

[Mike Todd]

According to local press reports (Beeb?) publicly available data tracking the ship demonstrated that the crew made several attempts to rectify the situation, probably as soon as their alarm went off, but the conditions turned too difficult for them to succeed and they ended up drifting ever closer to the beach. Luckily they seem to have had no cargo and were fairly shallow draft as a result - whether that impacted the power from the prop I don't know but I have read in other reports that it can be a factor. In any event, they could not have been much closer to the full range of support and rescue services! Despite the public drama - made for easy news reporting - I doubt whether they actually came close to any real danger for the crew - hopefully they will now get at least as good pastoral support from the good folk in Falmouth. (At least they will get to understand the wholesomeness of 'proper' Cornish pasties - at least whilst the protected status remains - will they get away before the end of March?)

[bizzard]

They don't want to get lodgings at the beturbaned Mrs Butress's B&B at 13 Pengilly street Falmouth, she serves up old stale rubbery cornflakes for breakfast.

[Horace42]

29 minutes ago, bizzard said:

They don't want to get lodgings at the beturbaned Mrs Butress's B&B at 13 Pengilly street Falmouth, she serves up old stale rubbery cornflakes for breakfast.

...isn't she the landlady with a glass navel?...... a womb with a view !