Picking someone up from the water

[lakelandterrier]

Originally Posted by Doug Stormforce

On the basis a MOB is in distress (i.e. his life is in danger) then its a Mayday.

Current teaching is Mayday NOT Pan Pan.

I'm not convinced that's always the case. As one who grew up racing singled handed dighies I would often capsize & end up on the oggin - you righted the boat, clambered back in & & carried on with the race- as I'm sure still happens today. I therefore don't understand why a MOB is deemed automatically to be a mayday event.

My understanding is a mayday is "grave & immient danger" not just danger. It must surely depend on the situation - individual, speed at which the MOB happened, time in water, clothing , sea conditions,water temperature, dsitance from safe haven etc.. . a MOB CAN be a mayday, I'm not convinced it's an AUTOMATIC mayday. I'm willing to be pursuaded though.

[Pikey Dave]

it's all a bit academic shirley. PanPan or Mayday, you'll get the same attention from the cavalry. You ain't going to get your legs slapped for calling either

[m chappelow]

Originally Posted by lakelandterrier

I'm not convinced that's always the case. As one who grew up racing singled handed dighies I would often capsize & end up on the oggin - you righted the boat, clambered back in & & carried on with the race- as I'm sure still happens today. I therefore don't understand why a MOB is deemed automatically to be a mayday event.

My understanding is a mayday is "grave & immient danger" not just danger. It must surely depend on the situation - individual, speed at which the MOB happened, time in water, clothing , sea conditions,water temperature, dsitance from safe haven etc.. . a MOB CAN be a mayday, I'm not convinced it's an AUTOMATIC mayday. I'm willing to be pursuaded though.

I think the mayday for a m.o.b. is aimed at perhaps the yachties or hard boater or fishing boat with someone not dressed or expecting going into the water ,who could then be in shock injured or perhaps having difficulty in recovering them back aboard with a boat with high freeboard and then with the onset of hyperthermia and secondry drowning .
I have known people go over the side climb back on board and apart from a bit of F,,ing and blinding and a change into a pair of overalls being non the worse for the ordeal ,then there have been others ,me included that went over the side and were totally out of it .

[BogMonster]

If you are worried about the prop turning then surely the answer is to stop the engine in gear? In any case a clout round the head from a lump of metal, regardless of whether it's the prop windmilling (watermilling...?) or the skeg, is probably going to draw blood with a ton of rib behind it.

I've never done a real MOB so can't say too much but having given some thought to how I would handle it if I did (because there is not much help around and by the time it arrived the person in the water would be in a bad way with the cold), I decided I'd leave the engine on until I at least had a line to the person in the water as the often gusty winds here will take a light boat like a rib in an unexpected direction very quickly. If you shut the engine off when they were 10 yards away you might well miss them completely... I've done a fair bit of practice with buoys and in windy conditions, getting close enough to grab somebody without overcooking it and running them over is definitely not as easy as you think before you try it.

Keeping the fan and the person at opposite ends as far as possible would seem to be the sensible thing to do?

[geir]

Anybody tried to use a nozzle/shield around the propeller for diving operations? Will it increase drag/improve handling or have any other side-effects?

[BogMonster]

Originally Posted by geir

Anybody tried to use a nozzle/shield around the propeller for diving operations? Will it increase drag/improve handling or have any other side-effects?

Prop guards do exist but everything I have ever read about them says they increase drag and reduce performance. No doubt good in the right situation, but not something I want to fit just to stop rotavating penguins

[Poly]

Originally Posted by lakelandterrier

I'm not convinced that's always the case. As one who grew up racing singled handed dighies I would often capsize & end up on the oggin - you righted the boat, clambered back in & & carried on with the race- as I'm sure still happens today. I therefore don't understand why a MOB is deemed automatically to be a mayday event.

My understanding is a mayday is "grave & immient danger" not just danger. It must surely depend on the situation - individual, speed at which the MOB happened, time in water, clothing , sea conditions,water temperature, dsitance from safe haven etc.. . a MOB CAN be a mayday, I'm not convinced it's an AUTOMATIC mayday. I'm willing to be pursuaded though.

You are right - it depends on the circumstances, and obviously dinghy sailors who plan to spend some time in the water and are usually in company (often of a safety boat) is quite different from mid channel at night in a F6 when you had just taken your lifejacket off to put extra clothes on!

However as I understand it the reason we are encouraged to regard "all" MOBs as Maydays are:

(1) People overestimate their confidence in getting to the casualty quickly. In general "we" always practice MOB when we are expecting it and in generally good conditions - the dummy/buoy is usually quite visible (so training centres get them back).
(2) People forget to make the call until things have escalated to a proper emergency resulting in lost time in mobilising resources.
(3) There may be some reluctance at making the call at first - the emergecy services are clear they want the call early (and stood down if not required) - the idea is that it avoids the uncertainty of "is this a grave and imminent danger" or just an "urgency" situation - or am I going to get a bollocking for wasting their time.

So it is a MAYDAY unless there is a good reason its not.

Common sense would suggest that if you fall off when untying your boat from its mooring in relative shelter, are wearing a life jacket and there are lots of people about that this is probably not immediately a mayday (although people do die falling in at moorings). Even in great weather I can't imagine a situation when I am on the plane and someone falls overboard and its not going to justify a mayday.

[njensen]

Originally Posted by geir

Anybody tried to use a nozzle/shield around the propeller for diving operations? Will it increase drag/improve handling or have any other side-effects?

We (diving club) used to have a Avon 4,2 rib with a 40 HP evinrude. Some years ago a prop-shield was mounted on it. It changed the performance of the rig quite much. Top speed, hole-shot and general handling became quite bad. The direction stability was huge which means it was really tough to handsteer. I would never mount such a thing on my own Rib.

[Razorbill RIBs]

Originally Posted by Pikey Dave

it's all a bit academic shirley

"Shirley you can't be serious?"......"I am serious, and stop calling me Shirley"

[Pikey Dave]

Originally Posted by Dan Worth

"Shirley you can't be serious?"......"I am serious, and stop calling me Shirley"

I wondered how long it would take
About 6 posts by my reckoning

[Jizm]

Having been a MOB I would say it's bloody scary and would want the motor off unless it's unusual circumstances....
That said I can't remember much other than wanting nothing else in the world other than to be back on board so I don't recall whether the motor was off or not??

[Simon B]

As a diver and now more a boathandler for divers I have only ever operated the "engine on all day" dogma without question, this thread is interesting, as mentioned a boathandler will routinely leave the engine on and disconnect from the killcord. I have also accidentally smashed the detent/throttle lock it took a bit of doing, however as a guestimate a divers backside sitting on it if they overbalance should suffice.

Interestingly when we bought our boat surface mounted throttles were rejected (even though I did try and point out they were arguably safer than side mount) on the grounds of accidental knocking into gear, clearly no one thought of turning the engine off at this point. During this years boat handling I have had 2 ocasions when people have either moved past the throttle or grabbed the throttle accidentaly whilst under way.

The only other argument for engine on all the time might be being ready to react to an emergency imediately, though there are other factors and issues that could lose you the 3 to 4 seconds an engine start takes. I will be thinking carefully about this as our boat briefing needs an enema.

[GordyP]

As with all these things common sense should help to dictate what you do. If you've just had someone go overboard, if you have a visual on them and are confident of getting them back on board quickly, then putting in a mayday can wait till you have them back on board. If on the other hand you've lost someone over board and you either can't see them or its obvious that they are in a bad way then the quicker you get on the blower the better.

As for switching off the engines, I do this as a matter of course when picking anyone up from the water.

Oh, once apon a time when running powerboat courses we started with using a tyre with a bouy attached then moved onto the students being the man overboard. I dare say that these days H & S will have killed this dead which is a shame, gave everyone proper experience of what it is like and also how difficult it can be to recover an inert body.

[bosun]

We often recover dinghy sailors that have fallen out of their boat which has then drifted off or that are just too knackered to get back in,we always switch off unless near the surf line or somewhere dodgy but always pull them in over the side opposite the throttle lever, because they will grab anything to try and help pull themselves in and if they bend the gear lever out at ninety degrees sideways or pull it off it causes a bit of a problem!
Climbing up the transom using the cavitation plate is a good one if they're able and for fat ba***rds you can lift them in with the power tilt. Engine off is a must for that one!