Over but not out
We asked readers: what’s the broach you’ll never forget? Here were some of your replies:
Coming out of harbour in Malta. The spinnaker downhaul on the mast track broke causing the pole to fly up. We had a massive broach metres away from the rocks. I remember catching the owner’s kid (I was probably 17 myself). I don’t know how we got out of it but we did. Stefan Debattista
During a Fremantle to Geraldton race
(Western Australia) on a Paul Whiting design half-tonner called Lady Dawn. For some reason, known only to himself, the owner/ skipper, Dick Eastaugh, had a new black spinnaker made specially for this race. There wasn’t even any tape on the bottom so it was impossible to see in the dark. We had so many very high speed broaches. I remember just how miserable and cold we all got from lying on our backs in the water with the boat on its side. I was never more pleased when we pulled into Geraldton shortly after the sun rose.
Steve Dyer
Off the north side of Molokai, Hawaii on a Farr 42, running downwind in a nice breeze and a large following sea. We had the chute up, cleated and a preventer on the main. A big puff hit at the same time as a swell lifted us on the front of a wave, sending us into a Chinese gybe. The pressure on the main ripped the cleat with the preventer out of the deck, sending the main whipping into the water. We were all under water until someone blew the halyard to the chute. Scary ! Ron Martin