The folks around Clear Lake?

[Zeida]

Erika, I use firehose as chafing protection. Send me an address where I can mail you some, since I have lots of it. The line that you see coming off my port bow chock and crosses over to the stbd. side goes to the middle dock cleat to prevent the boat from going forward and hitting the dock. Many boats here had big hull damage during Wilma in 2005 from hitting the concrete floating docks when the wind turned and came from astern... I have double and triple lines almost everywhere.

We are on relatively new floating docks here, quite sturdy. We are instructed to "marry the boats to the docks", as hard as we can.
The pictures you see here are from Gustav... by the time we all thought IKE was coming to us, all the canvas and anchor were removed. The genny from the furler and the folded bimini in the back. The main remains on my boom, dropped to the cockpit floor and tied down real tight. All the lines were pulled in tight against the floating dock. Right after Wilma, I installed new sets of big bronze cleats (from Spartan) front and aft, with solid thick pieces of aluminum as backing plates, so I had more places to secure the boat from. During Wilma we had a surge of almost 6 ft. and you can still see the mark on the concrete piling as to how high our docks -and boats attached to them- were going up and down. Regards,

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[Ocean Girl]

Your fire hose looks new and of a small diameter. I can get fire hose from a a fireman friend but it is of 4-6 inch size (whatever the standard is). That larger diameter kind is very cumbersome to work with. Sending you a pm, Thanks for the feed back.

[Tod M]

Martin just recently restored Turtle, a Pacific Seacraft 25. She was damaged when the whole marina's docks floated up and off their pilings. Link to a news video interview in his post. Martin is the one not carrying the shotgun:

http://bbs.trailersailor.com/forums/tra ... ead/655945

Also, here is John Votaw's assessment about his boat Cannibal surviving the storm:

http://bbs.trailersailor.com/forums/tra ... ead=655371

[Troy Scott]

John R from Flirida:

YES! I absolutely agree. And, the folks who don't prepare cause all of our insurance rates to increase exponentially. Sometimes you can't get any company to even quote for months after a storm.

[Ocean Girl]

I got the stats from an online news report and added the slip capacity:

Blue Dolphin Marina - (240 slips) 95 percent undamaged

Boardwalk Marina -(424 slips) 80 percent undamaged

Clear Lake Marine Center - (162 slips) 90 percent damage

Clear Lake Shores Marina - (slips ? small marina) 70 percent damage

Hilton Marina - (83 slips) 90 percent marina wiped out; 15 percent of boats undamaged

Lakewood Yacht Club -( 406 slips) 80 percent damaged/destroyed on west side; 90 percent undamaged on east side; 60-, 70- and 80-foot boats sank

Portofino Marina - (214 slips) 80 percent undamaged

Seabrook Ship Yard - (850 slips) marina 50 percent damaged; shipyard 80 percent damaged

South Shore Harbor Marina - ( 1004 slips) most boats undamaged; some torn sails

Waterford Harbor Marina - (418 slips) minimal damage

Watergate Marina - (1142 slips) 60 percent damaged; many boats sank

[Troy Scott]

Oceangirl,

I'm sorry to hear of so many boats destroyed. I'm sure there are a lot of long faces around there. We've never met, but I'm happy to hear your boat is OK! Unfortunately, I'm sure all of our insurance rates will be going up.

Gosh, Galveston is a mess. I used to go fishing out of there with my grandfather when I was a kid.

[Ocean Girl]

Troy, thanks for the message. One of the surprising benefits of having a Cape Dory (will own soon) is this wonderful group of CD people.

Speaking of insurance, I read that insurance (new policy) is impossible to get post hurricane and that the insurance companies pull out of hurricane ravaged areas. Has anyone actually had this happen to them? This doesn't make sense to me, I would think that now that the disaster has happened they would want to pull in as much revenue as possible with new policies. Obviously I don't have the thought process of an ins co.
Erika

[Jerry Albright]

I have had Insurance with Allstate for 30 years, I insure my house, 2 cars and a boat with them, after Hurricane Katrina, Allstate would not write a policy in Mobile or Baldwin Counties, the coastal countys of Alabama. A year after Katrina, I bought a CD30, they wrote me a policy, but only because I had multiple policies with them.
God Speed for a quick recovery for everyone who suffered the rath of Hurricane Ike.

Jerry Albright
Mobile, Alabama
CD 30 Cutter
"AMAZING GRACE"

[Warren Kaplan]

I live on an inlet of the Atlantic Ocean on Long Island New York. Getting insurance even up here is getting very difficult. The insurance company I use will write me mine for the same reason Jerry got his. I've been with them 28 years and I insure my house, my cars and my boat with them.

Insurance companies will write some policies if you give them everything. I can't say that I blame them in disaster prone areas like the immediate coastlines of hurricane areas or flood plains near the major rivers in the middle of the country...even though flood insurance is supposed to take care of that.

By the way, I have national flood insurance too.

[Troy Scott]

Erika,

After my Pearson 33 was destroyed by Katrina in Mobile, Boat US eventually paid off. But when I bought the Cape Dory 36 several months later, Boat US informed me they would NOT write a new policy for anyone who had lost a boat in Katrina. After a long search, the Hartge Agency in Maryland managed to get Zurich to write a policy, but it was very expensive. This despite the fact that the Cape Dory is on-the-hard in a sturdy airplane hangar 80 miles from the coast!

Apparently the insurance industry feels that losing a boat in a major hurricane is just irresponsible. I'm sure that in some cases, especially when the owner does nothing special to protect the boat from an approaching storm, this attitude is understandable. But a unilateral decision to abandon EVERYBODY who lost a boat in a particular hurricane is just not right. I lost all respect for Boat US.

[Ocean Girl]

I really think marinas have to step up and force boat owners to prep their boats for hurricanes. Maybe have a policy that if you don't have chafe guards on at least 4 bow lines and 4 stern lines with min of two springs, the marina will do it for them and charge a exorbitant fee along with a fine! If I sound a little cut throat its because I just came back from another trip to the marina and heard of at least 4 vessels who where properly prepped, sunk or severely damaged by just 2 boats who were not prepped.

Also, I thought it would be good to take a picture of my boat after she is prepped but before the storm. I think it could be beneficial to show the insurance company claims man what lengths I went to protect her.

I know this may all sounds like pie in the sky (is that the right analogy?) but I'm a bit at a loss on what else can be done.

Bye the bye I took a closer look at all of the her dock lines and they are all ruined/damaged. When I first checked on her I didn't even notice her lines, I just wanted to see her floating and damage free. but now I see that the lines, which are of good quality gold braid (maybe 4+yrs old), the lines are all compressed and the braid is almost unrecognizable. Lets just say the lines now look twenty years old. Another interesting thing I noticed is the older three strand plain jane white line faired much better than the braid.
I had planned on getting new line anyways and spicing the chafe guards into the eyes (thanks to Zeida I have some great chafe guards coming).
Well, thanks again for this great message board.
Erika

For all you who have to endure my spelling (excuse the curse word):

I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way.
-The great Mark Twain

[Troy Scott]

Erika,

I think twist is generally better than braid for docklines.

I do appreciate the detailed reports!

[mgphl52]

Hi Erika & Troy,

From my experience, twisted nylon has more stretch than braid. I use the braided lines for day-to-day docking because they are generally easier to deal with. When stormy weather approaches, I replace them with oversize twisted nylon (which is stowed below and out of the sun except when needed).

Ever since Ivan in '04, the local marinas usually call for forced vessel evacuation, which can be a real pain. Especially since KAYLA and the two boats on either side of her helped keep a large section of the dock in place during Ivan because of the ground tackle we all had set and proper lines to the dock. Back in Opal ('95), Many of the boats were tied "tightly" but not properly - they pulled up many of the pilings making a walk down the dock feel like a roller coaster ride! Some folks just don't comprehend what it takes to accommodate a 10 foot storm surge!

Regarding BoatUS and insurance: I checked with them twelve years ago about insuring my Typhoon and they wanted over $350 a year which was about a 1/10th of what I had paid for the boat! I have been using Progressive Insurance for over 9 years now. I do, however, maintain my BoatUS towing policy, especially since it will cover *any* boat I may happen to be aboard.

[Ocean Girl]

Well, I'm a believer after seeing the braid so tattered. I read a practical sailor article about hurricane prep and it talked about how the line heats up under stress. Maybe the three strand can dissipate the heat better(?).

I will create a hurricane bin and so far it will have:

*Full set of 1/2 inch three strand with chafe ready to go and clearly marked (ex. port stb bow boat side or port stb stern dockside).
*whipping twin
*extra chafe gear pre cut in 3 ft lengths for me and my neighbors who need help
*lots of scrap line
*copy of insurance policy
*to do list check list (still to be determined).
I'm sure there will be lots more to add but I also want to keep it simple.

I helped a CD36 in Palacios Texas (150 miles south of kemah) get ready for Ike when we thought it was going to hit Corpus Christi (300 miles south of us) ironically it hit kemah where the Lauren Leigh was. Anyways, the most time consuming part of the day was (1) figuring out the lines and adding the chafe gear. (2) removing items from the boat and (3) finally removing the canvas which only took about 1 1/2 hours. The owners are new to boats so there was a lot of time spent explaining too. Having a set of lines already marked stating which line is going where would of cut the prep time in half not to mention the stress. Also, the marina is in very bad shape so that didn't help either.

Erika

[Sea Hunt]

I am a rookie but I am beginning to think that, where possible, moving one's sailboat into the mangroves or up a narrow river, etc., is probably preferable to leaving it at a commercial dock, even one that is well maintained. From all I have read and seen about Ike, and all I have seen from prior hurricanes in South Florida, it seems like boats tied up at docks suffer the most damage. Boats tied into mangroves seem to do fairly well-except for the dirt, leaves, etc.

I think a large part of the reason is that in the mangroves you are generally around or near other boat owners who have moved their boat to the mangroves because they believe it safer. That effort to move on their part translates into effort to properly tie and anchor their boat in the mangroves. I observed this on both occassions when I moved S/V Tadpole to the mangroves so far this season. There is always the errant exception of course.

However, again from personal observation of two local public marinas, it seems that most boat owners at marinas make little effort to more securely protect their boats before a hurricane warning is issued. They leave canvas up (head sails on furlers, mains, biminis, etc.) and do not add additional lines. Folks like Zeida are the exception. Someone like Zeida spends hours in preparation to make sure Bandolera II is as secure and protected as possible while some boat owner near her does little if anything. That boat breaks loose in a real bad storm and ends up damaging several boats nearby.

Just my 2 cents and it's probably not worth even that.

By the way, I am told discarded fire hose is very good chafing gear. You can usually get it from the local fire station. As I understand the regulations, they cannot reuse fire hose. They inspect annually (or sooner) and discard a lot of hose during their inspections. In South Florida, I am told inspections in Miami Dade County are in Jan/Feb annually. You may want to visit the local fire station and see if they have hose that has been "condemned" but is just fine for chafing gear. The hose may have an inner layer (with rubber on the "inner' side of the inside to assist with water flow) and an outer layer. If you get 6' of hose you can separate the inner and outer hoses and have 12' of hose to make chafing gear. I made mine 3' in length each.