gia de hang | medical school interview questions |
The Farallon Islands, 28 miles from the Golden Gate Bridge, are known as the Devil's teeth for the sharp, rocky spires that spring from the open ocean. Frequent gale force winds and steep, breaking waves make it a threatening shore for approaching boaters. But since the annual Full Crew Farallones Race began, in 1907, using the islands as the turning point, there had never been a fatality.By CHRIS MUSELER
Published: April 19, 2012
Stephen Lam/Reuters
A vigil was held at the San Francisco Yacht Club for the five sailors who were killed during a yacht race last Saturday.
Related
-
San Francisco Club Shaken by Loss of Sailors in Race (April 20, 2012)
Ben Margot/Associated Press
The Giants observed a moment of silence for Alexis Busch, a former bat girl who is missing off the Farallon Islands.
John J. Kim/Associated Press
A couple died during last year's Race to Mackinac on Lake Michigan when their 35-foot sailboat capsized in a squall.
On Saturday, the San Francisco Bay was uncharacteristically calm when the 38-foot Low Speed Chase was among the 52 sailboats to start this year's race. The boat and its eight-person crew even remained in the race after nearly half the fleet had retired after three miles, when the typically powerful wind from the northwest began gusting to 25 knots.
But around 3 p.m., as conditions worsened, the Low Speed Chase was flung into the rocks while making the turn at the Farallones, and its crew went overboard. Three were rescued by Coast Guard and Air National Guard helicopters. One body was found, but four others were lost in the swirling whitewater.
With participation rising each year in ocean racing events, accidents are gaining more attention. Deaths in ocean racing are so statistically rare that when three sailors died in accidents last year, U.S. Sailing , the national governing body for the sport, decided to form a panel and open its first safety investigation.
In early summer, a young girl drowned after becoming caught under a capsized dinghy in Annapolis, Md. During the Race to Mackinac in Lake Michigan last July, a 35-foot sailboat capsized in a squall, trapping and killing a couple . During the Fastnet Race in August, the 100-foot Rambler, with a crew of American sailors, capsized in the Celtic Sea when the boat's ballast keel broke. All the crew members were rescued.
"Part of sailing is risk management," said John Rousmaniere, a member of the panel and the author of "Fastnet, Force 10," which chronicled the 1979 Fastnet Race , in which 15 sailors died. "You make one little mistake in demanding conditions, and suddenly it becomes a big mistake."
The findings and recommendations from the U.S. Sailing panel were completed in October and shared with the sailing community at safety seminars this spring.
Rousmaniere, a safety-at-sea instructor, said the panel identified three contributing factors to the accidents: inconsistent stability requirements in races; misunderstanding of what the Coast Guard does and does not do; and confusing weather forecasting terms that led some sailors to underestimate conditions.
The Mackinac race has taken several of the safety recommendations to heart for this year's event. According to the committee chairman, Lou Sandoval, the boats need to meet a higher stability standard, and new personal safety equipment requirements include a knife and a quick release tether for harnesses. Both changes address contributing factors to the deaths in last summer's accident.
Rough conditions are expected in ocean racing, and safety investigations by national federations are not common. Rousmaniere said that after the deadly 1979 Fastnet Race, the Royal Yachting Association in Britain held the first known investigation by a national federation into a sailing accident. Recommendations from that investigation led to an overhaul of design rules, safety gear, rescue techniques and safety seminars that are standard today.
It was not until the 1998 Sydney to Hobart Race , when five boats sank and six sailors died, that another national federation created a panel, this time in Australia. That investigation led to stricter crew eligibility standards and led to further safety studies by the International Sailing Federation.
As the sailing community in San Francisco Bay mourns , experts are trying to make sense of the accident at a time when personal locator beacons, safety harnesses and advanced life rafts should be preventing loss of life.
According to Laura Nunoz, executive director of the Yacht Racing Association of San Francisco Bay, the competitors in Saturday's race were required only to meet the minimum safety equipment list under the sailing federation's Category 2 offshore requirements, based on the race's proximity to land. A Category 1 event, like the 635-mile Bermuda Race, requires life rafts and safety education for 30 percent of the crew; a Category 2 event does not.
Sailing experts say that even the best ocean racers do not tether themselves to the boat when making a turn as they would in bad weather and at night.
But Kimball Livingston, author of "Sailing the Bay," a book about boating in San Francisco Bay and the Gulf of the Farallones, said: "We can make it safer with new electronic equipment, and we have. But if you fly your airplane into the side of a mountain, your parachute does no good. And that's what we may have here."
Accidents and fatalities have occurred before in races around the San Francisco Bay. In 1982, four sailors died in the Doublehanded Farallones race, and one died of hypothermia in the 1984 running after a capsize. Two sailors were lost in the 2008 Doublehanded Lightship Race that goes only halfway to the Farallones. U.S. Sailing's 2010 Hanson Rescue Award was given to sailors who rescued a group after they were thrown from their sailboat at the Farallones.
"Rounding the Farallon Islands, you are truly in an 'other place,' " Livingston said. "It's a moonscape. Rocks rising up. You're out at the edge of the continental shelf, and seas travel for thousands of miles before they build up there. It's spectacular and awe-inspiring. You just don't want to get close."
The 2013 America's Cup will be sailed within the San Francisco Bay, and the event is working to manage the gusty and wavy conditions through design.
"Sailing the Cup here is intimidating, but that's the game they've decided to play," Livingston said.
He said that designers of the 72-foot America's Cup catamarans, the first scheduled to launch in July, must balance the equation that says stronger equals slower.
John Kostecki, a Bay Area native and a tactician for Oracle Racing, the defender of the America's Cup, said: "We're taking strength very seriously. It's pretty extreme inside the Bay. Bottom line is you need to finish races here."
The haunting shell and shredded sails of the Low Speed Chase continue to be battered by waves as the Coast Guard considers salvage options off the environmentally sensitive shoreline.
"I can't believe this hasn't happened more," said Kostecki, who sailed the Farallones Race when he was 11. "This stuff can be dangerous. You have to respect Mother Nature and the ocean."
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: April 30, 2012
An article on April 20 about safety concerns in ocean racing events in the wake of five recent deaths in the Full Crew Farallones Race off San Francisco misstated the number of sailors who died during the 1982 Doublehanded Farallones race, which took place in the same area. Four sailors, not eight, died in the race.
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét