I have been looking into different types of wind and anchoring conditions for the many fjords we will no doubt visit while sailing up the West coast of Greenland and into the various types of weather conditions we will encounter while attempting to make the Northwest passage.
What I have found is very interesting! There are certain things to take into consideration when anchoring in fjords at high latitudes. There is a risk of some of the fjords acting as wind acceleration zones where wind is funnelled in at extremely quick speeds or even worse encountering katabatic winds. Katabatic is the generic term for down slope winds flowing from high elevations of mountains, plateaus, and hills down their slopes to the valleys or planes below. Katabatic winds might also reach gale force as an out blowing wind over ice-covered surfaces in Arctic, Antarctica and Greenland, where the wind may be extremely strong and gusty near the coasts and less severe in mountain regions.
Also these fjords tend to be extremely deep requiring us to come very close to shore to anchor in still very deep water. We will need to take lines ashore to ensure we are not slammed up against the fjord walls or swinging uncontrollably in the evenings. For that we will need lots and lots of extra line and chain. Also the untouched ocean floor can often be covered with tons of kelp and sea weed making getting a good hold difficult and resulting in massive balls of seaweed over a meter wide accompanying your anchor back to the sea surface. Apparently in these anchoring conditions the awkward fisherman’s anchor is the anchor of choice.
For running lines ashore a range finder is helpful to decide on anchoring distance and the amount of line one will need. The benefits of running lines ashore is that your boat is more secure against confused winds and is always facing the direction of the exit if ice starts to move in making escape straight forward. Plastic tubing is recommended to prevent ropes from being chafed by the boat, rocks, trees or whatever else you tied up too. One must always have more rope, chain and anchors then expected because if a situation arises it may be necessary to cut your lines and maybe even anchor to make it out safely.
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Posted in Boat, Communication, Posts by Edvin on Feb 26th, 2011
To ground the copper strip for the SSB into the encapsulated iron keel I had to drill two 10 mm holes beside the bilge. I drilled thru almost 4cm of fiberglass before reaching the iron in the keel. I drilled another 4 cm, threaded the hole and inserted two threaded rods. Then I poured epoxy to fill the gap between the plastic and the rod.
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Posted in Boat, Posts by Edvin on Feb 25th, 2011
My Optimus 155 kerosene stove broke down last weekend. The cleaning needle became welded to the jet, I tried to fix it in a hurry but I just ended up with leaking kerosene all over the place. So again I´m realizing that these stoves need patience, concentration and a lots of love to be repaired. I bought a maintenance kit from the chandlerystore and took the burner apart, got everything snug and cleaned the burner with a wirebrush. Unfortunately the copper pipe on the burnerhead was so thin the brush went right through :( time to get some new burners, but than again, better now than halfway through the passage. I will never switch to gas which can be dangerous and after reading Jerks Oldenburgs declaration of love to kerosene stoves I am forever convinced. Check out his site and read more about his adventures in his Monsun 31 Vindela
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Posted in Planning, Posts by Nick, Safety on Feb 20th, 2011
High latitude sailing and heavy weather are close companions. These are conditions that we must be prepared for when doing the voyage we are planning especially when we don’t have the luxury of open Ocean waters around but rather uncharted waters, full of ice surrounded by islands. I have been putting some thought in to this and have decided that we need to be able to hold our position if need be for long periods of time. Tactics for dealing with big winds and seas vary widely, but due to the unique environment and type of boat we have I am focusing on a couple of key tactics that I have used before at sea.
While completing my circumnavigation of the North Atlantic last year I encountered some heavy weather conditions at several points during the voyage. While I consider those encounters still very far from the worst conditions one can experience I learned alot about heavy weather tactics. The first heavy weather encounter occurred on our voyage from Bermuda to the Azores. It only lasted 24hrs and we were within VHF distance of two other 50ft+ yachts that were significantly larger than my 28ft cutter, Moondancer and Barbarossa. All three of use initially tried different tactics in the 35ft seas and 55+ knot winds (according to the other boats wind instruments).
Moondancer towed warps but just couldn’t slow down enough despite throwing everything they had out behind the boat, we had a similar problem planning down waves at 15- 20kts in a stout little cutter that usually averages 5kts. Barbarossa ran with the seas but as the sun started to set the waves were difficult to anticipate and fatigue set in. At that point Barbarossa in the process of completing their second circumnavigation suggested we all heave-to a tactic they had often used. We did so with only a triple reefed main up and after 12hrs hove-to we only moved 1 nautical mile from where we first started the tactic, Barbarossa had similar results. Moondancer lay a haul and had a wave crash on deck ripping open a hatch and drenching the boat before they hove-to with better results.
Later in the voyage off the coast of the Western Sahara and Mauritania in Africa my father and I encountered some more bad weather it lasted 4 days and we had very confused 30-40ft seas and winds between 40-50kts. We heard later several large Oyster yachts sailing out of the Canaries had to turn back and return to port, we even spoke to a passing container ship and he described the sea conditions as “severe”. Again heaving to proved to be invaluable during this period. Video from our trip: watch?v=jr7OVynn0lw
The lessons learned are that when with enough time and space running before a gale or towing warps are good options but when all hell breaks loose and the crew is tired, its dark and you are surrounded by land masses and ice our heavy weather tactic option will be to heave-to and if needed set a Drogue/Para anchor to hold our position.
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Posted in Boat, Insulation, Posts by Edvin on Feb 19th, 2011
My good friend Olof came to help me out with the insulation this weekend. He will aslo be joining us for the Malmö to Greenland voyage if gets the time off from his work.
Today we painted the copper tape for the radio with floor paint to protect it from corrosion before insulating the aft berth. Now all the easy insulation work is done. To be able to continue I need to take apart the galley and aft bulkheads and insulate the ceiling in the aft berth where there is no sandwich laminate. Before the insulation there was a delta (difference of temperature) of 15 degrees C with a 2 kW construction heater. Now with the job partly done the delta is 26 degrees C and I´m thinking it might be enough, mostly because the difficulty of the remaining jobs.
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Lately I have been looking into sailing in ice and have collected some fundamental points. There are several components and equipment to consider when either sailing through and around ice, drifting with ice and anchoring around ice.
Points to keep in mind:
• Icebergs and bergy bits are unpredictable
• Never approach an iceberg closer than twice its height above the water
• A drifting berg will have localized currents that may affect your course
• Do not enter an ice pool, or drive over an ice foot or into an ice tunnel collapse or even rolling of the iceberg can occur
• Grounded icebergs will experience gravitational change with each tidal variation. This make them more unpredictable to calving
• Always leave the engine running when around ice to enable a fast exit
• A collapsing iceberg can cause a huge breaking wave
• Always anticipate that ice can drift into an otherwise safe anchorage. Even at anchorage a watch should be kept and escape routes planned
Equipment:
• Ice poles, grind down some boat hook poles to a point. Make sure they are long enough to push small bergy bits in flows away from the boat
• Grapple hooks and Ice-climbing screws for springs. You can then drift with the pack ice
• A good spotlight and headlamps are very useful
• Ski goggles for bow watch in cold weather
• Light waterproof climbing gear and gloves
• Best binoculars you can afford
Also can anyone suggest good reference books for SAILING in ice? Found plenty on navigating and reading ice charts but no ice sailing bible yet.
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