b3ta.com user Muntered Tinny
You are not logged in. Login or Signup
Profile for Muntered Tinny:
Profile Info:

none

Recent front page messages:


none

Best answers to questions:

» Water, boats and all that floats

SOS Save my Shorts
First B3ta post so go easy on me!

I used to work as a flotilla skipper in the Greek Islands. This is where you guide a bunch of novice to amateur sailors around the islands, briefing them in the morning and dealing with the chaos in the evening when you have to assist in the mooring of 12 Yachts in a small harbour.

Anyway, one evening I was helping in the last yacht. Drop the anchor, reverse in, tie up the lines.....sigh of relief then relax with a cold G&T. Well in this case not quite. Due to the tricky spot this yacht was moored, I had to lay out a second anchor using the RIB (Inflatable tender). This is something I have done many times without disaster. So I sit the anchor on top of the tender and give it large in reverse to pull the anchor and chain away from the yacht and drop it in the deeper water. When the chain ran out, everything went tight and the sharp part of the anchor punctured my tender causing one side to deflate rapidly with a large bang. Now I had the attention of everybody in the harbour....a sure sign sign that the situation is going to get worse. The anchor had not freed itself from the RIB and was slowly pulling it and the still running engine under water. So to stop this from happening I had to free the the anchor. The only way was to jump in the water lift anchor off the RIB then problem solved. As I did this the anchor got caught in my shorts, with one last breath I was rapidly being dragged down to the seabed 20 meters down. Saved my self by releasing the belt on my shorts and saying goodbye to my radio and wallet with it. As I came to the the surface my friend was there in her wee boat and launched my self into, very quickly realising I wasn't wearing very much.

Now to top it all off, the whole event was witnessed by a journalist from one of the uk's biggest selling yachting magazines, who happened to be writing an article on my mates yacht about chartering in the Greek Islands. She asked if she could tell the story in the mag, and I said yes....but please don't mention my name or the company I work for. Next months magazine had a picture of me wearing a company shirt and guess what, I was named and shamed.

Moral of the story, Always wear underpants and never trust a journalist. Argh time for a rum!
(Fri 2nd Nov 2012, 23:54, More)