That was a few years ago but similar conditions. A lot of southerly wind and an adverse current in the area around the "Chops" of Vineyard Haven. We were sailing last week into both when I took this photo of my son at the helm.

Shortly there after we'd furled the jib and started the engine to make the last 10 or so miles to Woods Hole directly to windward as quickly as possible to catch the tide through. We were within a couple miles of where we'd lost the steering (a cable turning block loosened up and the cable dropped off) a few years before.

Back on deck, suddenly smoke billowed out of the engine compartment. We had a fire! Deja vu! Everyones jaw dropped. To top it off, we were between the Hedge Fence Shoal to port and another less forgiving shoal to starboard as I killed the engine.

I went below and pulled off the panel to the engine to see lots of smoke but no flames. My daughter who was below would keep looking for the source, the fire extinguisher right at hand, while I went back on decks. We were running out of deep water fast and getting pushed into the shoals to starboard.

Up on deck, young Tom and Mary Ann were getting the boat back sailing. The reefed main and mizzen still raised. It took some jockeying to get the boat to fall off enough to fill the jib, jibe(not a good time) and get sailing across an opening in the Hedge Fence back toward Marthas Vineyard. All the while asking MJ below if she could see the fire source. She couldn't and it appeared the smoke was clearing. Phew on that!

Here's what it was. Several feet of 12 gauge wire had burned the insulation completely off between the alternator and the ignition panel. This is the line between the panel that supplies power to the high output alternator. The insulation burned all the way up the wire to the ignition panel, went through on ON OFF switch, and was on it's way through the rest of the panel before it stopped by turning off the power. The 12 ga. copper did not burn and would easily have carried the short and fire through the panel to the end of the circuit. Scary.

The reason it did so was because a loop of the wire had loosened, fallen, and found the exhaust manifold, melted, and caused a dead short.

Why? I'd been chasing charging problems this whole trip eating several alternator belts. This included changing out the regulator to a back up I have and not properly bundling the wires knowing I'd be switching back soon.

I'm not superstitious. Nantucket Sound can be a nasty stretch of water at times (seems it's always our time) and the nasty short steep chop conditions can find weak spots on a boat . Last time, age weakened fastenings were loosened in the rough steering conditions. This time, shoddy wire tying was easily shaken loose.

With the short snipped and removed, we powered through Woods Hole without and alternator but had plenty of 12v power stored. Later in Hadley Harbor, I replaced the 12ga wire between the alternator and the ignition panel and a few other lines that either got knicked by the passing fire or also burned. This was a mini torch traveling through the boat. We were ready to put it out if it had gotten out of hand but fire can happen quickly.

I'm thinking I may install a 20 amp fuse in the ignition panel line in, that will protect all the 12 ga. load wire in the ignition panel(between gauges, switches etc, all 12ga), and would have opened on this short fed from the ignition panel. Any thoughts?