During the 1995 Eastern Caribbean hurricane season, over 4,000 boats were lost or damaged, and several persons were killed - including yachties - as a result of tropical cyclones. In spite of these tragic events, as the 1996 hurricane season starts, some cruisers are heading for the Bahamas and the Caribbean.

The high winds that are generated in the path of a mature hurricane produce severe wave action and a powerful storm surge that are simply unmanageable. Although there are many precautions that one can and should take if exposed to a hurricane, in the final analysis the survival of a vessel and her crew depends more on luck than skill. It is my opinion that this is an unacceptable situation for a cruising sailor to be in.

This point of view was formed as a result of both my Naval service, and my experience cruising with my family aboard our CSY-44 cutter SV Jean Marie. Over the last thirty years I have been in three Atlantic hurricanes, five Pacific typhoons and one Indian Ocean tropical cyclone. I have experienced these storms ashore, at anchor, and at sea. As a US Navy deep sea diving and salvage officer my duties directly involved hurricane preparation and planning, at sea rescue, and cleanup / salvage operations. My last assignment prior to retirement was as the Commanding Officer of a rescue and salvage ship. Although most of my tropical storm experience was gained in large steel ships with plenty of skilled sailors, I did ride out an Atlantic hurricane moored in a Virginia marina aboard a 33 foot sailboat, and an out of season tropical storm anchored in an Indian Ocean atoll with my family aboard SV Jean Marie. I am not an expert on hurricanes. I am only a sailor who has been humbled by them, and felt quite inadequate in the fury of these powerful storms.

The main problems facing the crew of a cruising vessel preparing for a tropical storm are: high winds, heavy wave action, storm surge, flying debris and adrift derelicts. The first two of these can be dealt with and are the focus of most of our hurricane preparations. There are many fine texts that address the methods of rigging small craft for heavy weather (high winds and heavy seas), and I will not attempt to rewrite them here. It is the last three manifestations of these powerful storms that I listed that have repeatedly proven themselves to be the unmanageable part of the problem. Being in the path of a hurricane is a high-stakes game of Russian Roulette. If the depression stalls, speeds up or maintains just the right speed (pick one, old Murphy will) and comes ashore at high tide, the storm surge can easily be twice the predicted level (that is, twelve feet instead of six feet over high spring tides)... and you lose. (Those tall pilings that you look up to in your slip will be under two feet of water, and a real holing hazard to your hull.) If there is a slight hook in the coast line where the inlet to your perfect harbor of refuge is located and the wind comes out of the wrong quarter... the surge is amplified, and you lose again. When a broken tree limb or an empty oil drum, propelled by one hundred plus knots of wind, comes flying into your well-prepared boat, either is likely to hole, sink or dismast her, regardless of the size of your rigging or anchors... you still lose. If that anchored sailboat moored next to you (the charter boat that was hastily moored, and then abandoned), or that poorly maintained foreign flagged fishing trawler on the other side of the harbor, or that high sided inadequately secured powerboat down the pier becomes adrift and hits your securely moored and well prepared vessel... you won’t have a chance to affect the outcome. If you try to outrun or evade a hurricane at sea that is four hundred miles away traveling at ten knots (i.e. you are in Antigua and the storm is in Barbados), and the hurricane changes course fifteen degrees or increases its forward speed fifteen knots (or both, it happens all the time) - it can easily catch and kill you in the open sea. Do the arithmetic. You may not only lose your boat, but you may lose your life as well.

Granted, a well anchored, well found cruising vessel that is free to keep her head to wind in a protected and isolated anchorage (and mangrove swamps are ideal) stands an excellent chance of riding out a hurricane. However, when the actual availability of such harbors of refuge is compared to the high number of boats in the Eastern Caribbean, the fallacy of this theory is soon evident. When these large, fast-moving, dangerous storms approach, those ideal hurricane holes are quickly overfilled with lots of desperate people aboard ill prepared boats. When I hear someone who has not experienced a hurricane first hand explain how they are going to do this or that to protect their boat and combat the storm, I am reminded of the realization I came to as I worked my way down the deck of a thirty-three foot sailboat on my hands and knees to check my mooring lines in only seventy knots of wind (barely a hurricane). I looked up at the thirty-two footer in the next slip healed over forty-five degrees and hanging from her mooring lines, set up like violin strings. If one of his lines parted, my boat would be lost. My extensive preparations had little effect on the overall safety of my vessel.

During the Service family’s four year circumnavigation aboard SV Jean Marie, our very lives were dependent on that boat, just as your life is dependent on your boat when you are aboard her. Like most international cruisers, we chose not to cruise in hurricane areas during tropical storm season. We found Venezuela, New Zealand, and South Africa full of experienced cruisers who had come to the same conclusion.

Nobody asked me... but, in my opinion the answer to safe cruising during the Hurricane Season is to change your latitude, not your insurance policy. Think about it.

Tropical Cyclone: an area of relatively low pressure, generally circular, originating in the tropics or subtropics. Tropical Disturbance: discrete system of organized convection with no closed isobars. Tropical Depression: one or more closed isobars, highest sustained wind speed is 33 knots. Tropical Storm: distinct rotary circulation, highest sustained winds up to 63 knots. Hurricane or Typhoon or Cyclone: closed isobars, strong and pronounced rotary circulation, and sustained surface winds of 63 knots or greater.
Source: American Practical Navigator by Nathaniel Bowditch, D.M.A. Pub. No. 9

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From 1987 to 1991 Tom & Jean Service circumnavigated with their teenage daughters Dawn & Jennifer aboard their CSY 44 S/V Jean Marie. Jean is a business manager and accountant for a law firm; Tom is a retired US Navy Diving & Salvage Officer and a licensed Merchant Marine Master. Together they own and operate their own maritime professional management and consulting firm, the WhiteStar Marine Company in St. Petersburg, Florida.