Suddenly Overboard

by Tom Lochhaas

  According to their applications, both Karl and Brenda had sailed some but it had been a few years ago for both. In the classroom they seemed knowledgeable and confident, but on their first outing 2 days ago, neither of them—nor the Swede—had done very well in the other keelboat. From the chase boat Ryan and another experienced instructor had watched while the three glided toward shore in a light breeze. “Time to tack!” he’d shouted, and they’d started the move okay but had released the jibsheet way too soon and were much too slow to tighten the main, and they blew it. Their second attempt was even worse. Worried they’d go aground before finally getting turned away from shore, Ryan had pulled up alongside and boarded the keelboat to take control.

  Back to the classroom.

  Today, however, after many more hours of instruction, they seemed reasonably in control. The Etchells held a straight course on a starboard broad reach and the sails were trimmed well.

  “Time for a new helm,” Sandra said to Ryan. “Brenda needs some tiller time.”

  “Right,” he said, and began easing the launch closer to give them a shout.

  An Etchells 22 is seldom used for beginning sail training for the same reasons it is an excellent race boat. The sleek hull and fin keel let it turn on a dime. Well ballasted, it is generally stable even in strong winds, but crew position is always important. The boom is low and long, providing for a large mainsail, but forcing crew to be nimble to duck below it on a tack or jibe. The cockpit is shallow but has room for the legs of three or four (average-size) crew. There are no stanchions or lifelines, and when close-hauled the crew sit on the windward rail hanging out over the water.

  All of which means that a critical aspect of sailing an Etchells is the ability to move smoothly and quickly from one side of the boat to the other, ducking below the boom as it crosses while maintaining perfect control of the boat.

  At the helm, Karl watched the launch approaching. Ryan shouted something. Karl cupped his free hand behind his ear, then turned and said something to Brenda, but she made an I-don’t-know gesture. The Swede leaned back, apparently to listen.

  As Ryan brought the launch closer and swung to starboard, Karl turned first to his left and then twisted all the way back and around to his right to watch the launch, inadvertently jerking the tiller behind him. The Etchells responded instantly by turning to port, swinging away from the launch where now both Ryan and Sandra were shouting, “Starboard!” Too late the crew realized they were jibing and Brenda and then Karl quickly leaned down just ahead of the boom snapping across the cockpit.

  The Swede hadn’t started to duck but instead had risen slightly as if to stand, and the boom swung into his ample belly and pushed him overboard.

  Ryan reacted immediately and brought the launch near where the Swede, wearing a life jacket, floated in the chop. Sandra watched the Etchells moving away, now on a port tack with the mainsail out full and the jib backwinded, the students making ineffectual adjustments as they stared back at the launch. Oh, well, they’d either get it under control or they wouldn’t, but at least the Etchells shouldn’t capsize.

  Ryan throttled down and slipped into neutral. “Are you okay?” he yelled to the Swede. “Are you hurt?”

  “Okay,” came his reply. “Just cold!”

  Thinking of the launch’s propeller, Ryan eased back into gear and idled up to the Swede, then cut the engine. At midships he knelt at the gunwale and leaned down and grasped the arm the Swede raised. “Okay, good. Now let’s get you out of there.”

  Fortunately the launch was big and well balanced with the ballast of its diesel inboard, so they didn’t have to worry about tipping or taking on water with the weight of all three of them on one side. But it had a freeboard of about 1 meter, making it impossible for the Swede to climb aboard by himself.

  Sandra joined him at the rail. “Give me your other hand,” she told the Swede. She took hold.

  “On three,” Ryan said, and they both pulled as they strained their leg muscles to stand with the Swede’s weight.

  His hands rose in the air above the rail, but they lost leverage as more of his body left the water and he grew heavier, and he slipped back into the water.

  “Okay, again,” Ryan said. “This time, grab the rail with your hands. Got that? You hold on so we can let go a moment and grab you down lower.”

  The Swede nodded. His teeth were chattering audibly and his eyes were rapidly moving around.

  They pulled again and were able to get the Swede’s hands on the rail. He curled his fingers and held on while Ryan leaned far over, feeling along the side of the Swede’s torso for something to hold on to. Finally he just grabbed a handful of cloth and pulled. He had the lower part of the Swede’s jacket, below his life jacket, and it rode up on him when he pulled—then nothing. Leaning over with almost no leverage, he couldn’t raise him more than a few inches.

  Sandra was frantically searching the launch, tossing aside fenders and coiled lines and kicking jerry cans. “There isn’t a rope ladder? Why isn’t there a rope ladder?”

  Ryan knew why but didn’t say it aloud; most of their students weighed less than the Swede and usually it would be faster to pull a person aboard than get a rope ladder and put it over the side. “Just get a heavy line,” he called back over his shoulder, still holding on to the Swede. “Hurry!”

  She uncoiled a dock line and threw one end over the rail beside Ryan.

  “Hey!” he called to get the Swede to look at him. “Tie this around your waist.”

  The Swede stared at him. He had been in the water only a couple of minutes but he seemed to be losing touch already. But he took the end of the line in one hand and let go of the boat with the other, dropping back into the water. Ryan bent and reached down and held the collar of his life jacket to steady him as he fumbled with the rope underwater.

  It took a long minute, but then the Swede raised both hands back up.

  Ryan and Sandra grasped the rope and pulled. The Swede twisted in the water and then reached both hands back down. His life jacket rose up his torso, and they could see the rope had slid up his chest to his armpits. “Keep your elbows down!” Ryan shouted, and they pulled with all their might.

  But his body rose no higher than it had before, and still they had no leverage. Ryan stepped back, braced both feet against the inner hull, and leaned back with all his weight, but it made no difference. His mind racing, he tried to think of anything from his training. On a sailboat they’d bring the boom over and above the victim and winch him straight up from the water, but nothing on the launch gave them height or leverage.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Sandra was saying. “We make a loop in another line for his foot and cleat it off when he steps into it. Maybe we can get him to stand up, work the line up. Or even one for each foot, tightening them alternately.”

  “Do it,” Ryan said. When she released her hold on the first line to get another, he could no longer hold the Swede, who again slid down the hull.

  Now the Swede was panicking, clawing at the hull with his hands, his mouth open and bubbling. He was fumbling with the line around his chest. “Leave it!” Ryan shouted at him, but the Swede suddenly raised both arms to reach for the rail and the loop slipped up and off his body. Ryan bent over and was able to grab one of his arms.

  Sandra had tied a quick bowline loop and lowered it over the side. “Grab it!” she directed the Swede. “Get your foot in it, like a rope ladder.”

  The Swede seemed to stare at the loop but made no move for it, and they saw his eyes suddenly roll back and close and Ryan felt his heavy weight go limp. “Oh god, he’s unconscious!” he said. Sandra briefly locked eyes with him, then she jerked away from the rail and ran to the helm.

  A second later he heard her shouting Mayday into the radio. Three times, just like they were taught, then the name of the boat and the longitude and latitude from the GPS. “Man in the water! Can’t get him aboard! We need help fast!” She repeated the longitude and latitude, then paused. Th
e radio crackled back; the Coastguard had heard her. A few more quick questions while Ryan held the Swede as high as he could to keep his open mouth above the waves slapping the hull, and then the school’s other fast boat broke in on the radio and said they were on their way too.

  “I think he’s stopped breathing!” she heard Ryan yell above the sound of the radio. “Gotta do rescue breathing.”

  Sandra made a last transmission to inform the Coastguard she had to get off to help the victim.

  “Hold his arm,” Ryan said when she reached him. “I’m going to lean way down so hang on to my belt.”

  With her left hand she held the Swede’s arm as high as she could, and with her right she grabbed the waistband of Ryan’s pants as he leaned over and eased down, getting as close to the Swede as he could. He had trained in rescue breathing from the side of a pool and on a low dock, but that had been a long time ago, and trying to do it from 1 meter away while hanging over the side of a boat was very different. After a moment he found and grasped the collar of the Swede’s jacket below his throat with his left hand, then pinched his nose closed with his right. Another wiggle and he got closer and put his mouth over the Swede’s and blew in, counting one long beat. Release. Repeat. With his abdomen pressed hard against the launch’s rail, taking most of his weight as he leaned over, he could barely breathe himself. Release. Repeat. He had no idea whether the air was going in.

  “Ryan,” he heard Sandra say, “I can’t hold you, my muscles are. . .” and he felt her grip slipping.

  He pulled back. “It’s okay. I’m going in.” In a moment he was climbing over the rail in his life jacket.

  A movement caught her eye and Sandra looked up. The Etchells! She’d forgotten all about them, but here they were at last, slowly tacking up to the launch. “Get over here!” she shouted. “We need your help!”

  The students had apparently just drifted downwind a ways before taking control, and had had to tack back up to the launch. At least they seemed to know what they were doing, she found herself thinking, at least they’re in trim. She quickly looked down at Ryan and saw him beside the Swede, giving in-water rescue breathing just like she’d been taught only a few months ago. Something she’d then been certain she’d never actually have to do.

  Then she looked back at the Etchells. They’d come about to the other tack—good. She waved with her free arm and shouted, “Come around on our other side. Upwind side. Stall out and let the wind push you against us.”

  At the helm Brenda waved her understanding, and the Etchells shot past to make its turn upwind. Sandra wondered whether she dared let go of the Swede’s arm long enough to help secure the Etchells to the launch and decided no, she had to help Ryan or else he and the Swede might float way. The students could do it on their own.

  She watched over her shoulder as the Etchells turned as if to tack in order to go in irons and drift back, but Karl didn’t get the mainsheet loose fast enough, it seemed jammed in the cleat, and she swore as the sailboat passed the launch on the other tack, jib flapping loose, being blown back downwind. Damn it all! Now they’d have to set the sails, make way, tack back, and try it all over again! And it was getting gustier.

  Abruptly the radio crackled. “Powerboat northeast of Yarmouth. Powerboat a mile offshore east of Yarmouth. This is the fishing vessel Agatha a half mile astern. Do you require assistance?”

  She craned her neck to look back over the stern and saw a small rusty trawler steaming toward them. She didn’t dare release the Swede to go to the radio; why hadn’t they tied him to a line? She tore her cap off her head and waved it frantically at the fishing boat. A glint of light, maybe binoculars. The vessel was coming closer.

  Two minutes later the trawler was close enough for her to see a face in the wheelhouse window and another man on deck positioning fenders as the boat steered for their windward side. She saw the Etchells returning now on a tack toward the fishing boat and she waved them off. They were too far away to hear her, but she prayed they would realize it would be easier to pull the Swede up into the Etchells than the launch or the fishing boat and would come right back.

  Then the trawler bumped once against the launch, lightly, and one of the men stepped off and into the launch. “He’s not breathing,” she explained hurriedly. “We can’t get him back up.”

  The fisherman looked over, then immediately dropped the end of the line they’d used earlier back into the water. “Tie it around him,” he said. “Let’s pull him up.”

  For a moment Sandra felt hope—they’d finally get him out, help was on the way—but then realized it was just the two of them—she and the fisherman—because Ryan couldn’t stop the rescue breathing long enough to climb back aboard to help. And even if he did, she doubted the three of them could do it; it was just too much weight with no leverage.

  They tried their best nonetheless, the fisherman straining until the tendons in his neck seemed about to burst, but without success.

  “Your boat,” Sandra said, “you have winches, yes? Something like a boom we can swing over him to hoist?”

  He looked at her, thought a moment, turned and looked at the trawler standing off some 30 meters to windward. “Yep,” he said. He gestured at the radio. “That thing work?” She nodded. “I’ll call the boss, then.”

  Sandra remembered the Etchells again and looked around to find it and wave them off again, get it out of the fishing boat’s way. But as she raised her head to look, she heard the noise of an approaching helicopter.

  Thank god.

  The Coastguard was on the radio. The fisherman nodded at her and reached down for the Swede’s arm. She dashed to the radio. It was the helicopter.

  Then things happened very fast and she didn’t have to think anymore but just do what they said. The helicopter hovered just to leeward, the downdraft from its blades whipping the water into froth, and a basket came down on a wire. The rescue swimmer was in the water already and quickly swam the basket over to the launch. Sandra and the fisherman helped steady the cables at each end of the basket while Ryan worked with the swimmer to maneuver the Swede into the basket. The last thing Sandra noticed was the look of surprise in the rescue swimmer’s eyes as the cable was hoisted and he saw clearly for the first time the size of the victim.

  Ryan was exhausted, but the fisherman got him back aboard with a jerk. He lay still a long moment, then sat up and started slapping his arms and legs to get his blood flowing. The helicopter was already gone.

  A minute later the fisherman stepped over the rail back to the rear deck of the trawler and the boat moved away. She hadn’t even had time to thank him.

  “Where are our students?” Ryan said.

  God, she thought, spinning around, and spotted them well to windward, on the other side of the trawler. They hadn’t capsized, and she could see the two of them aboard.

  The radio crackled again. It was the sailing school’s other rescue boat, still coming on fast, now about a nautical mile away. “It was the Swede,” Sandra explained. “They’ve got him in the helicopter.”

  She was glad they asked no more questions except “Anything we can do to help?”

  She and Ryan looked at each other, and she reached for the ignition key. “Yes,” she said, “the Etchells—can you take them back?”

  “Roger that.”

  She started the engine and shifted into forward. The helicopter was almost out of sight now, flying fast and low over the water. There was a hospital just a few miles away in Cowes, no need to waste time now gaining altitude.

  The helicopter crew started CPR as soon as the basket was inside the helicopter. The Swede’s body felt very cold, but that didn’t mean much, and could be to his advantage. As soon as they got his chest dry they attached the defibrillator pads, but there were no electrical signals from the heart. They kept up CPR until EMTs took over when they landed.

  The emergency department staff took over at the hospital and made every effort to resuscitate the Swede, but less than an ho
ur after he’d been removed from the water he was pronounced dead.

  The foregoing is a retelling from the facts described by the UK’s Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB), which thoroughly investigated this incident. The pathologist who conducted the postmortem examination of the Swedish sailor stated the cause of death was hypothermia. The MAIB investigation, however, concluded that death by hypothermia was unlikely after only 24 minutes in the water and suspected heart irregularities.

  Investigators also carefully considered all actions, decisions, and the boats and equipment used by the sailing academy, including the background and experience of the students and instructors. No faults were found, and in normal circumstances survival could have been expected for at least 45 minutes or longer in the water, during which rescue by academy resources would have occurred. The only deficiency found was that they had not foreseen possible problems recovering a man of this victim’s size from the water, particularly given the “high risk” of falling from the type of boat he was sailing on. The academy thereafter took new measures in its safety management program, and the MAIB made no further recommendations. The actions of the instructors were praised.

  In the end, what we can learn from this incident, as in so many others, is the importance of constantly being prepared by questioning “what if” such a thing happens.

  Briefly

  The English Channel, May 2011. It wasn’t stormy, but a west wind of about 25 knots had raised moderate seas in the channel. Aboard the 40-foot Beneteau were the skipper, mate, and eight paying crew, among them a relatively inexperienced woman in her early twenties. They were running downwind under a spinnaker when the sail tore. The mate and two crew rushed forward, lowered and gathered up the sail, and began to hoist a heavier spinnaker, which slipped out of control and wrapped around the forestay. Over the noise of the wind and the flapping sail those on the bow couldn’t hear the skipper’s shouted instructions, so he turned the helm over to the nearest crew, the young woman, and went forward himself. Minutes later she became worried about a fishing boat close ahead and shouted to the skipper for instructions, but she couldn’t hear what he said. In the confusion she moved the helm slightly and the boat instantly jibed. As the main and boom swung across the cockpit, the mainsheet tackle smashed into her, sending her to the deck, unconscious and bleeding from a head wound. A rescue call was made, and she was evacuated by helicopter and then hospitalized with head and spinal injuries. The unlucky incident had occurred within seconds, but luckily she was not knocked into the water, although her injuries did require 2 months of hospitalization followed by physical therapy.