Equinox - It was the middle of the night

It was the middle of the night, not sure why and never seen any evidence but it seems always to be then!

We were part of the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers and I’d come on watch as we approached the mid Atlantic so 1040 miles from nearest land when I noticed there was a new creaking noise in the cabin of Equinox my aluminium Vermaas Veno 441.

I had found a loose windvane bolt through a creaking letterbox sort of noise 2 days earlier and set about tracking down the cause of this new, intermittent creak.

With the noise only every 20seconds or so it took a while to listen to the mast, shrouds, doors and the cabin walls but the noise did seem worst in the mast.

Nothing obvious around the mast but the backstay tension was reduced, usually 3.8bar on the hydraulic gauge and only 3.0 now.

I’d not gone up to the forestay when on deck earlier as all looked fine in the torchlight and my centreline jack stay which stops you getting even near to the gunwale only goes as far as the mast. Looked at closely the forestay was sagging with the toggles loose and rubbing at the attachment point. Tightening up the backstay helped a little but at the expense of excessive masthead bend and I realised in that memorable phrase from the Apollo mission that ‘I had a problem’! The forestay was broken!

The first aid step of reefing the poled out jib was followed by attaching the spinnaker halyard to the anchor roller and tensioning it to the maximum possible. Some anchor rollers are not designed for upward forces and the roller might even be designed to slide out upwards so you do have to know how it’s secured. The backstay tension was then reduced and the halyard retightened.

I also attached and tensioned the running backstay on the weather side even though the staysail wasn’t hoisted as the tension in this stay had increased considerably.

On my furler, a 30 year old Guilot unit, you can’t see the lower swage but if it fails then extra wire would be visible so I suspected a failure at the upper end.

Daylight was only a few hours away so running on mainsail alone with moderate swell of 2 metres and waves of 1.5 metres seemed safe at 6 knots and I prepared an email to send to rally control but also sailing friends who would be able to look more dispassionately at my situation! I specfically asked for advice on safety of using the staysail, desirability of reefing the main so the section of mast between the staysail stay with the running backstays and the masthead was not in use. I also requested a weather routing and advice on whether to try and lower the forestay or leave it hanging on the wire jib halyard. Email via sat phone is good but I specifically asked for an sms message with the response as much easier never mind cheaper to receive.

Daylight came and though binoculars gave a view of the masthead it was my SLR camera with stabilised telephoto lens that clearly showed a hole in the masthead where the forestay should attach and the broken swage hanging at an angle. I prepared the split pins so they were easy to release and tightened the jib sheets moving the jib cars as far forward and apart as possible to give mininal forestay movement.

I’d only had a response from friends after 2 hours so I phoned rally control but didn’t specifically ask that they contact Jerry the rigger who is a long term expert on rigging issues with trans Atlantic crossings. The individual in the control centre gave a personal view and his take on the weather picture but someone in the team did pass on the email. The immediate advice was to reduce movement in the upper part of the rig and try and keep the masthead shape close to normal using only the staysail and main.

It was night again when we received a very helpful mail from Jerry the rigger which is copied below:

Hi Richard, Everything that is written looks sensible to me. I would
definitely lower the furling system. It is only a question of when not if
the halyard parts. Wait until it is light. Do not remove the genoa from the
furling system. Disconnect the bottom of the furler and carefully lower the
whole system on the genoa halyard. Lash the system to the outside of the
lower guard wire, using the pushpit and pulpit as well. Or, lash it to the
toerail. The gentle bend round the perimeter off the vessel will not damage
the system. Once the system is lowered and it is calm enough to be safe.
Ascend the mast and tie a rope, preferably Dyneama, securely to the top of
the mast. Fasten this to the place that the furling system was attached to.
You might need to put a shackle into the chainplate to give a smooth
attachment point. Make this tight. Also use any other halyards to brace the
mast. Go gently and be safe. Better to arrive late with a mast up.


We had already discussed with friends via sat email, other riggers via sat phone, nearby boats via VHF using a PAN call and more distant boat using the SSB net via a nearby yacht as a sort of PAN relay.

The universal feeling was to leave the rig in place rather than lower it which was an initially surprising view but then we were out in long Atlantic swells with a force 5 trade wind sending us squirrelling down the waves at knots under just the mainsail….

Through the small hours though while I replaced the toilet pump I did reflect on this discrepancy.

A rig failure which results in the heavy forestay, sail and fractured swage crashing down in an uncontrolled fall could cause much more damage than a deliberate lowering though the halyard would be more likely to fail at the extremes of rolling and so fall outboard rather than against the mast. The idea of it being a random act of God rather than damage caused by our attempts to lower the unit and so ‘our fault’ did perhaps favour inaction. Finally the Morings, a young couple with children on Gertha 4 articulated the view that it would be very difficult to lower the forestay with only 2 adults and even other better manned boats echoed this concern.

With dawn on the second day came an unforecast force 7 with crisp white horses tumbling down the big blue swells and we spent the rest of the day waiting for a lull and going through the steps as well as preparing sail ties and guiding lines see separate box. What we and Jerry hadn’t considered was the effect of even the moderate swell and waves we eventually had on the rig which weighs 100 kg plus. We knew we wanted to get the drum over the split pulpit but concentrated more on how to lift the drum and not on what was the most dangerous aspect of the manoeuvre - controlling the lower end of the foil and sail with the drum. We intended to lift the drum up and over and then lower it into the water while lying a hull with no mainsail to be torn by the upper swage. The mast movement pulled the drum out of my hands and overpowered the crew member holding the stay with a bowline. The effect was of a ball used to demolish houses and had it not got tangled in the safety rail would likely have caused significant injury. I strongly suggest anyone trying this manoeuvre at sea fixes a trio of adjustable lines to the lower forestay to solidly fix the drum but still allow enough movement to lift the unit up and over the pulpit.

Because we were ahull there was minimal force on the drum in the water and we were able to carefully lower the stay on the halyard with only minor impacts with the upper spreader and cap shrouds. The stay lay neatly alongside the upper safety rail and it was a matter of seconds to lash it with lines that had already been cut to length and tied to the rail. Slight damage to the aerials on the aft radar post and slight scratching of the topsides but all in all a successful drop and it was just a matter of supporting our new bowsprit with the pole halyard and rehoisting the main before we were on our way again.



Steps in dropping forestay with upper end failure.

It is vital to go through this procedure several times with crew before starting!

Choose calmest conditions available, wind is less important and will heel boat and blow rig away from mast.

Tie 2-3 m ties along rail

Neck if jib halyard long enough to allow drop of upper forestay low enough. With a cutter rig this is easier as the mast is more central but in a sloop you may have to attach an extension as solidly as possible, I used many lengths of thick whipping twine sewn into the halyard and thinner line extension.

Lie a hull with main dropped and no engine.

Disconnect jib sheets.

Ensure crew controlling jib halyard can lower freely on winch with no binding from jammers.

Lash lower stay and drum to pulpit with line to stop drum going more than 2m beyond deck.

Remove highest pin accessible to free forestay.

Lower peak of jib by 15cm or so to allow jib to be passed over or through centreline of pulpit.

Using timing of roll lower halyard to avoid upper forestay passing into any mast triangles or damaging the spreaders. Some contact with the cap shrouds is inevitable.

Tie in the sail/forestay as lowered

Detach jib halyard and fix to bow or anchor roller.

Support forward end of staylooking like a bowsprit with either another sail halyard or the pole halyard.



learning points

Investigate new noises as they are often significant.

‘New Rigging’ can fail and a rig inspection cannot look at swages inside the roller reefing unit.

Stabilise the forestay with extra halyards, ideally dynema, and use a wide sheeting angle with the jib sheets to reduce flailing.

Even wire halyards will chafe through so consider lowering the forestay even out at sea. It’s hard to decide to do something that may cause damage to the rig but an uncontrolled collapse is likely to cause more damage and its only a question of when, not if.

The weight of sail and furling unit is considerable even at rest in the boatyard and any pitching or rolling can turn the forestay into a demolition ball so work out a system of lines to solidly fix and guide the beast where you want it.

Go through the procedure including what ifs with the crew several times and consider using your mast climbing crash helmet.

Be prepared to drop the furler overboard rather than damage the rig

Use all your resources, other boats, riggers via mobile phones, rally control and knowledgeable friends to spot issues you’d not considered.



Richard Sawyer