News & Views for Southern Sailors - Southwinds Magazine

FROM THE HELM
Hurricane Season 2011 Comes to an End
As the 2011 Hurricane season comes to an end (ends Nov.
30), Floridians and most of the South again escaped being
hit by another strong storm. Hurricane Irene, which had
grown to a Category 3 as it passed through the Bahamas,
did hit parts of North Carolina’s Outer Banks, but it was
downgraded to a Category 1 by then.
I had a friend of mine leave West Florida on a cruise
north to New England. He was confident that leaving
Florida for northern latitudes would be a safe bet against
tropical storms. I’d forgotten about him until I received an e-
mail that he was in a Maryland marina preparing for Irene.
After stripping his boat of sails and other gear on deck, he
secured it to a concrete dock. The wind howled all night, but
he made it through without any damage. So much for leaving
Florida and going north during hurricane season.
The North did suffer some damage and I received e-
mails about some of it. One was from the Herreshoff Marine
Museum in Bristol, RI (that’s right—a hurricane in Rhode
Island). When Irene was only in the Bahamas on a
Wednesday, it was forecast to hit Rhode Island that weekend.
It was the weekend of the museum’s Classic Regatta—
the second most important fundraiser of the year. The museum
decided to cancel and removed all the floating docks
that were placed for the event. They even removed the deck
of the main pier to protect it from the expected storm surge.
They did experience some damage to the museum and a
few boats. Many onshore watched as a 43-foot ketch chafed
“through its mooring lines and banged up against it [the
museum’s pier] for most of the storm. We could only watch
helplessly as the boat proceeded to destroy itself.”
Sounds like what you’d expect in the South during hurricane
season. Rhode Island only had 50 mph winds and the
storm surge was not as bad as expected—but they don’t
have storm preparations as we do here in hurricane country.
Guess they’ll have to rethink that.
That makes me wonder if we are getting complacent
down here in Florida, as we will get hit again, and what
STEVE MORRELL, EDITOR
really costs is complacency. We know how to prepare, but
it’s been since 2005 that we had our last big storm season,
and people forget easily. We have till next June to think
about it.
Speaking of hurricane information, I received an e-mail
from Sailors for the Sea, an organization which “educates
and engages the boating community in the worldwide protection
of the oceans,” which led me to a web page titled
“The Impacts of Hurricanes Underwater.” This page had
some unusual information, but what particularly interested
me was the effect storm surge has on altering coastal lands.
You can find it and a lot more about the sea and Sailors for
the Sea by going to www.sailorsforthesea.org, then “Sailing
and the Environment,” and then “Ocean Watch Essays.”
Do You Have A Great Optimist Photo
In the December issue we have two great articles about the
Optimist. One is a general overview by Dave Ellis who has
done many great small boat reviews for us. The other article
is by Cliff McKay, who sailed the first Optimist when he was
a boy. It’s a fascinating story.
We are looking for a great cover shot of an Optimist for
the December issue and anyone out there who might have
one, please e-mail it to editor@southwindsmagazine.com. It
needs be high resolution. We will pay our standard rate of
$65 for a cover shot. Please don’t send more than one photo
per email at high resolution. I will reply to you when I
receive it.
Photo Correction
In the October issue I made a photo error in the Rebel boat
review. Only the first photo by Glenda Libby is a Rebel.
The rest are Blue Jays. I received the photos of the Blue Jays
and mistakenly put them in the Rebel folder. My apologies
to all. You’ll probably see those photos again when we
print a Blue Jay boat review this winter. They are already
in the correct folder.
News & Views for Southern Sailors SOUTHWINDS November 2011 7