Rudder failure

May I beg to differ with James Stevens (Question of Seamanship, YM, June 2021) on his decision to sail on without rudder by using the sails? I have sailed dinghies and done figure of eights without rudders. I have not sailed a Sigma 38 but I sail a Dehler 29, which is a similar but much smaller boat.

My advice would be to round up, down the sails and anchor while still in the North Channel, which is quite shallow and 400m is more than enough providing you have a good anchor on board. The alternative is to carry on and then sail directly downwind past Hurst Point with a fast running stream – possibly adverse given the reference to confused seas – and too deep to anchor.

My experience of sailing with no rudder is that downwind is really difficult even with broad reaches and that would not seem a good location to experiment, particularly given the likelihood of other boats nearby. In reality you have a few seconds to decide and I know my preference would be to anchor and sort it out! David Morgan

James Stevens responds: There is usually more than one solution and anchoring is certainly an option as I mentioned in my answer.

When I faced this situation on board a Sigma 41 in the same place I decided to continue sailing, steering with the sails because we were over two minutes away from the Hurst narrows and because by easing the main a bit the boat slowed down. The plan was to tack if necessary just before the narrows but if that had failed we could have let the sails flap and the tide sweep us into the Solent where there is more room. Fortunately the mate was confident he could fix it, and luckily he did in double quick time.