The Great Wander

As I am writing this, Hurricane Helene is barreling toward the big bend of Florida.  The track looks like it’s going to take it right over Tallahassee, or nearby there. The width of the storm is over 400 miles and we will catch the outer edges of the storm sometime later in the evening.

Daily, with my coffee, I check the National Hurricane Center website for the latest hurricane information and then PredictWind to see what models are predicting for the latest on tropical cyclones.   I saw this cyclone forming  when we first got back to the boat.  It wasn’t even a depression when I first thought it would become something major.  Just watching the predictions on the various models, it looked like it would become something big.

Pretty soon Helene seemed to bypass the depression phase and jumped straight to a tropical storm.  At that point all of the models started to agree that the winds from this storm would extend quite a ways out from the eye and  it would be making landfall in the big bend area of Florida.  

We chose to stay tied to the concrete pier where we have weathered two other hurricanes, Although those two were not quite as strong as Helene.  

There are advantages and disadvantages to being tied to a dock during a storm.  One big advantage is that when the wind is coming from the right direction, you are being pushed against the dock.  Your fenders protect the side of the boat, and you aren’t going anywhere.  You will stay put.  Of course, the obvious disadvantage is that your boat doesn’t swing with the wind so you are catching the wind from the side, as opposed to the bow.  That tends to make things choppier and rougher.

To prepare for the storm, we first made sure that there was nothing loose on deck.  Everything was stowed.  Cushions, shoes, even the extension handle for the dinghy is stowed.  If it could come undone and blow away, it was stowed away.  You don’t want anything blowing off the boat.

We did leave the sails on.  Some folks in the marina took theirs off.  I simply wrapped the mainsail with some additional line and secured it to the handrails and the mast.  I also tightened the manner in  which our headsail was furled to keep it from coming undone.

After that, we needed to secure the boom and the dinghy.  The boom has a couple of places where you can add some lines, so we tied it off to both sides of the boat and tightened the sheet and the traveler lines.  

The dinghy is a little more challenging.  Our dinghy has inflatable sides and a hard bottom.  We know that in the inflatable sides we have some leaks and we have to regularly inflate them.  This happens even within the course of a day.  So, overnight, with the dinghy on the davits, and with it secured snuggly to the stern, it’s going to lose air and then swing just a bit.  Really I’m just going to have to get up in the middle of the night and tighten it as the night goes on.

No matter what, it’ll be a long night even if I am content with everything I’ve done.  The wind is going to slam the waves into the side of One Life.  That’s loud.  The wind will also be loud…and there’s always the concern of tornadoes.  So, it’ll be a long night.

Update for post Helene.  Storm preps went well.  We weathered the storm just fine.  Lost a zipper on the bimini and needed to reset the chaps on the dinghy, but otherwise all is well.