Theis,

Well, I do have a couple of older model harnesses in good shape from my first boat, which I originally purchased them at West Marine in the 1980s I suppose. They came with two carbiners at either end of the safety line (tether). The end of the safety line that attaches to a jack line etc. is a simple carbiner. The end that attaches to the harness, passes through two stainless steel flanges (the buckle) on the harness, and holds the harness on the wearer. It is also a carbiner, but has a safety release that must be pulled down away from the jaw before the jaw can be opened. There is only sufficient room where the carbiner is inserted through the harness buckle for a single carbiner, snap shackle etc. These two carbiners are sewn into my harness tethers.

I have looked at the new harnesses for sale, and noted that you can buy a new "basic harness for about $44.99, but that the elastic double tethers (six foot and three foot) are selling for $129.99. I think that you could buy an inflatable harness with tether for about the same price as one of the basic setups with a double tether.

I consulted the West Marine catalog, and the single tether models with snap shackles (chest end) and Wichard safety hooks or Gibb Safety hooks (boat end) run between $89.00 and $109.00. West Marine still does sell snap-hook-equipped tethers (I call them carbiners) for $29.99 although one end of he tether has a sewn eye. A note in the catalog model is not ORC approved because it cannot be released at the chest end.

I suppose that one solution to transferring in the water from a harness forward of the shrouds to my jackline tail would be to purchase a new single tether with a snap shackle and attach it to the current safety-release carbiner on my harness. That way if I need to get around the shrouds once in the water, I could attach the carbiner through the sewn loop on the jackline tail. I could then release the snap shackle on the tether once I was safely hooked onto the jackline tail so that I could get around the shrouds to the emergency ladder. I think that it would be a better idea, however, just to stay on deck.

Now when you start talking about a 6:1 purchase on a safety line, maybe what we should do is attach ourselves to the masthead by bungee cords, and then if we fell overboard, it would be a variation on the sport of bungee jumping.

By the way, I rigged my new jacklines and emergency ladders yesterday and went for a sail in 15 to 20 knot winds with a small swell, a full main and a 110 jib. I decided to reef and change out the jib for a smaller sail because I was sailing on my ear, but in the course of the day, I sailed on all points of sail, but beat most of the time heeling from 20 to 25 degrees with gusts taking me to 35 and even 40 degrees. The ladders stayed on deck, and the lanyards for the ladders and the jackline tails stayed over the rail where they are supposed to be. I attached suction cups to the ladder lanyards and stuck them to the hull about a foot below the hull deck seam. Amazingly they stayed attached to the hull. I moistened the suction cups before attaching them.

A friend told me the whole set-up is very ingenious, but then again he also likes my geothermal coffee pot.