I've fallen and I can't get up!

A few friends and I had talked about taking a spinnaker handling course this fall. We ended up waiting until December for a bunch of reasons, and then the holidays, travel plans, and lack of wind pushed it into January. We finally agreed on the weekend of January 20 and 21, and got two sunny days with wind!

On Saturday, Sandi, Norbert, Emily, and I learned how spinnakers are constructed, the different weights and sizes, and how to properly pack them in turtles. Then we practiced some sets, gybes, and douses at the dock with M7 (a Merit 25). Finally, we went out to the bay and sailed with the spinnaker for about an hour. It was a relatively uneventful day, but we learned a lot and all did pretty well.

Sunday was altogether different. We got to the docks under dark, cloudy skies and about 12-15 knots of wind. We repacked the spinnakers we'd used the day before and went to Eric's for an early lunch. As soon as we got back, we loaded five spinnakers, along with all the rigging, onto M7 and started prepping the boat. Leslie told us to go ahead and rig the boat for the spinnaker without his help, and we did. It took a while, and we were all hoping it was rigged correctly.

We motored out of the channel and up to the bridge, which took quite a while. Eventually, we raised the main and jib and were sailing. When we got close to the bridge and had plenty of space for a downwind run, we tacked and raised the first spinnaker. That went pretty well. There were a couple of small errors in the rigging, but we fixed them and went on to practice peels. A peel is when you raise a second spinnaker inside of the first one and then peel down the outside (original) spinnaker. We did that a couple of times. It was a bit awkward, but we were able to do it.

Leslie decided that since we had quite a bit of wind (I'm guessing 15-20 knots by this time), we should practice broach recovery. At this point, we students were all thinking that there was too much wind to be flying a spinnaker, and I even suggested that we reef the main. Leslie said no, because we needed the full size of the main to counterbalance the spinnaker. So we motor-sailed back up toward the bridge, tacked, and raised another spinnaker. It was the biggest spinnaker we had with us—a 1.5.

We started to broach a few times, and did the right things to right the boat. After a couple of successful broach recoveries (from about a 50-60-degree angle), we broached for real! A gust came up at the exact wrong moment, and we went over in a flash! The boom was submerged, the sails were floating in the water, and I was catapulted out of the boat into the water! I was hanging on to the spinnaker sheet and didn't let go, even though I knew—even in the chaos of getting tossed overboard—that if I let go, the boat would right itself. But I held on anyway, because I didn't want to get separated from the boat.

Although it felt like an eternity, only about 20 seconds went by before Norbert grabbed me and hauled me back into the boat. Once I was comfortable that I wasn't going over again, I let go of the spinnaker sheet, and the boat righted itself.

THE BACK STORY: I was working the spinnaker sheet on the low side (port) but sitting on the high side (starboard). When the boat broached, I was thrown over the opposite side of the boat and ended up in the water on the port side. The rule for recovering from a broach is "high side hold on, low side let go". I should have let go, and perhaps if I had let go as we were starting to broach, we might not have gone over. Also, if Leslie (who was at the helm) had steered the boat under the spinnaker, we might not have gone over. But there was a huge gust of wind just as we were at a critical point in the broach, and it all happened very fast... too fast for either of us to react.

This picture is not us. Believe me, no one on our boat had time to take any pictures that day, and there were no other boats around. I found this image on the web and included it here, because it comes pretty close to showing what we must have looked like. Add me floating in the water next to the sails, and you get the full picture.

As soon as we were all secure in the boat, we doused the spinnaker, raised the jib, and started sailing back to the marina. Leslie did a debriefing, but I don't think any of us really knew what happened until we talked on the phone over the next couple of days. In fact, each of us had a different perspective. Norbert said that I actually went over in two "hops" — first to the other side of the boat and then out into the water. The bruises across the backs of my thighs support that story. Emily said that she was sure she was going over, too, but somehow grabbed onto something and stayed in the boat. Sandi was down below in the cabin (which was now on its ear) and said that all she could see in the cockpit was water and that the water came within inches of flooding the cabin. All I was aware of was holding onto that line to stay with the boat. I did not want to be the subject of a man overboard drill with a spinnaker sail up in high winds!

To say this was an eventful day of sailing is a gross understatement. This was the most exciting day of sailing I've experienced yet! I don't really want to repeat it but, all in all, it wasn't all that bad! I know... I must really love sailing to say that. I do!