The account;I read of Zoltan's Commander being bashed against a reef by crashing waves for a prolonged period of time...... making horrible noises...... Him thinking it surely was being torn to shreds the whole time..... and coming away with just a few scratches and a tweaked rudder.
”At 0558, I awoke to surf swamping my transom and The Way’s keel grinding through coral. My chart was seven miles off, and the current was much heavier than anticipated. There were only a few minutes before I would be slamming against the sharp cliffs of Gaua, destroying and flooding my yacht.
I jumped in the cockpit and tried to steer the boat through the surf. When I made it to the inside where the breakers were smaller, the water became deeper again but not enough for me to stop grinding. My keel drew 4 feet, but the depth was only 3 feet. With every new wave, my boat lurched atop the coral, sounding the worst crashing noises a sailor could imagine……..”
Read the rest here (post #16 of this thread)
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