Cruising Sailors Forum Archive

I worked in a very unforgiving enviroment

my entire life. I worked on and close to between 4, 220 and 500 thousand volts of electricity. If you made one mistake, the chances were extremely high that you were done for. That's the mind set I carry into my sailing and cruising. In the 2004 season Mexico cruising fleet I knew 2 different guys who went over the side. The owner of S/V Lovely Rita was fishing and leaned on the lifeline which let loose. His wife was able to turn the boat around and fish him out. The other guy fell overboard while his wife was asleep but, thankfully, he was harness on. It took a couple of hours for his wife to wake up so he could get back aboard. He said he was banging on the hull and screaming at first but then just hung on trying to keep the banging on the hull his body was doing to a minimum until she woke up. Both guys were extremely luck IMHO. Anyone who goes over the side, even in a marina, and can live through it is lucky as far as I'm concerned.

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