It was windy in Astypalea. We put out our second CQR anchor with 2 long lines to the right of our main anchor because the winds were so strong from that side and we wanted to better secure the boat. We had already put out a spring line, and had doubled the stern line on that side as well. Eventually most of the boats decided we would all put lines to shore on the right from our bows to hold even better. The winds were 40 gusting 50 kph. We were using *all* of our long lines to secure the boat.
A 51′ Beneteau decided to leave the harbour. It was quite gusty. The 51′ Beneteau is actually slightly shorter than our boat but much wider. They are huge. They have 2 deep rudders, one on each side of the boat and a deep keel. Lots of bits hanging underwater to catch things on. They were to the far left of the port so it was shallow to the front of them, so when they left they would want to turn to their right as soon as possible. The depth was roughly 5m at the dock going to less than 3m just before the swimming area. There was a small 40′ boat beside them, and another 51′ Beneteau beside that, both with their anchor chains extended 30 to 40m in front. As the big Beneteau left their spot and turned right they picked up the anchor chain of the small boat beside them (but didn’t know) and then caught the anchor chain of the other 51′ boat. We could all see the chain on the larger boat start to move. Much yelling by everyone, the big Beneteau starts to turn around the caught chain going out of control a bit. Eventually they seemingly got free but they couldn’t go forward.
They were using their bowthruster and spinning around. It was like watching a train wreck in slow motion. Suddenly they dropped anchor again and started trying to backup into their spot. I saw their windlass stop working, and then it looked like their bow-thruster stopped working (they were using it a lot and probably threw both breakers), so they couldn’t control their bow any longer and they ended up sideways to the dock. It was a complete disaster.
We found out later that they had caught the anchor of the smaller boat right beside them and this was stopping them from going forward.
I felt sympathy for the person at the helm…..there were probably 20 people in the port watching this happen, and being at the helm of an out of control boat is not fun especially with an audience yelling lots of different directions. After it stopped one of the young skippers responsible for a big boat beside us told me they call this ‘Boat TV’ which I thought was hilarious.
When Victoria and I left the next day we had to deal with 2 anchors but we managed to get them both up without too much drama…..the little CQR was really dug in and it was hard for me to pull up! I’m glad we have this as a second anchor. I’m thinking we might want to upgrade our main anchor to one of the modern ones as our main seems to like being on its back too much. I can dive down and flip it over and push it in (which admittedly is fun to do) but it would be nicer to not have to worry about it so much. We will see!
Adventures on Spruzzo 