Maritime Wood

As our Sailing Club chief instructor told us, safety is a serious business. But no one stops learning – as he recently discovered. It started as a routine day afloat. The final exercise involved capsizing a Wayfarer dinghy which his students promptly righted using a sideways tow with a RIB.

To make things more interesting, he suggested that the forepeak might be holed and flooded – so they attached a bridle to the transom and headed for the slipway – a distance of about half a mile. Since, in reality, the boat was structurally ok, the instructor positioned himself on the foredeck to keep the bows in the water and make it easier to steer.

The weather was fine, so he leant casually back against the forestay. At that point, he spotted a famous ocean racer, approaching astern, and turned round for a better look. As he did so, he stared slipping across the deck – and grabbed the nearest thing in sight – but with a sudden searing pain, ended up in the water. He bobbed to the surface, his right hand shredded and in need of serious medical care.

Childrens lifejackets, what is the kids choice, When choosing children’s lifejackets it’s vital to try them for size – because a poorly fitting garment – of, for that matter, one that’s badly adjusted – can be worse than useless. But how do they work in practice? And what about the kids who actually have to wear them

Handle flares with a gloved hand, Emergency or handheld signal flares can save your life. But they can also harm you. When you let off a handheld red or white flare, the steel body of the flare starts by getting red hot, then turns white hot when it gets going

Light of your Life, Six seconds at six knots. That’s all it takes to be out of sight of a men overboard at night. Once he’s out of sight, it could take a near miracle to find him again if he has no means of making his presence known.