JOURNAL

I have been in Cape Town for the past 2 weeks to see friends and family, Captain Mike set off from Kraalbay on Tuesday to collect me from the jetty at the Langebaan Yacht club. Took a clearly marked “shortcut” on the chart that we only use on exceptionally high tides due to the shifting sand in the lagoon.

You know where I am going with this……SV Knowind hit a sand bank and came to a rapid and grinding halt. Depth metre showed 1.7 metres and our draft is 1.8 so he was nicely wedged into the sand. Tried to go forward at full power (4000 rpm) and that was a mistake ! Tried to turn, tried to reverse and go back the way he came, tide started going out, situation got worse and then our old lady slowly and gracefully started heeling over. Eventually the boat was tilted at 38 degrees.

Before she tilted to that degree the NSRI arrived, obviously alerted by some vigilant soul on land who realised what was happening. Small tender at first with 2 x 80 hp engines, no luck, so brought out the big guns, a second big rescue launch with 1000 hp and a 1000 metre long tow rope which they attached to the bow. Rope attached to mast halyard from smaller boat.

Pulled the boat to try and get the keel out of the sand.

No luck, stuck solid.

As it was getting dark, they gave up.

Picture the boat leaning so far over that the portholes were about 20 – 30 cm from the water!

Huge thanks to the friendly, professional NSRI members from Langebaan, well co-ordinated between the smaller tender and Resue 4.

Michael battled to move around inside the boat which was now practically on it’s side, a fight against gravity. Crockery, pots and soda stream slowly crashed to the floor and he could do nothing to prevent it, impossible to get to the galley.

Set an alarm for 3 am when the tide was coming back in, the boat righted herself fairly quickly once the water started swirling around her. Started the engine and noted it wasn’t cooling, no water coming out of the exhaust at the back of the boat. NO!!

Had to fix the cooling problem first, checked the water intake filter, nothing wrong. Could only be the salt water pump. Replaced impeller with a spare. Took about half an hour to do this and now it was a race against time as high tide was rapidly approaching.

Panic mode as it took a while for the cooling water to come out the exhaust again after starting the engine.

Tried to go against the incoming tide under full power and after 20 minutes or so she moved ever so slighlty so kept on slowing down, speeding up, turning to port and starboard to try and loosen up the keel off the ground. Finally! Success and she slid off the sand bank.

Went back the way he had come in and made it to the safety of the yacht club jetty at 5 am , via Oudepos and Schaapen island. Managed to jump off and tie SV Knowind on. Freezing cold, wet yet very thankful.

Stiff whisky in order, sadly he had none on board at that time.

I arrived safely later that morning, lunch with the kids in the yacht club, they left and we climbed aboard.

Captain went to routinely check the engine room and was horrified to find that the bilges were full of water, almost up to the floorboards! Mild panic, where is the water coming in? Is there a hole in the bloody boat. Quite quickly noticed that water was coming in at the shaft gland (where the shaft goes through the boat). Water had spread throughout the entire boats bilges from the engine room. Frantically find emergency pump. Start pumping. Took about an hour to get 2 tonnes of water pumping from the rest of the boat back into the engine room and from there out using 2 bilge pumps. Realised why it was such a battle to get off the sand….the boat had been taking in water and was extra heavy! By a tonne or 2.

Thought we had everything under control until I turned on a tap….no running water. Captain had to check fresh water pump and discovered corrosion on the wire, electrical contact had broken off, cut the wire, twisted together again and joined with good old trusty insulation tape.

Auto pilot was not working when we left the jetty, swinging wildly from one side to another, think the rudder angle sensor got flooded. Still on the list to look at.

Dropped anchor at Oudepos in the National Park and THEN we had that stiff whisky.

The Princess is right. Shit show of note.