PARACHUTE SEA ANCHOR CHAINPLATES

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Multihulls do exceptionally well lying to a parachute sea anchor during storms at sea. Their broad beam means that a good bridle will hold their bows into the wind and seas during storms.

The biggest enemy of parachute bridles is chafe, and during a storm at sea it would be nice to not have to worry about chafe. You don't want to be going forward every half hour to change or adjust your chafing gear.

Also, you need a bridle attachment point that is secure. You don't want to attach your bridle to your crossbeams and rip them out, and you don't want to rip bow cleats out as well.

I got around this problem by installing sea anchor chainplates on board Exit Only when I was in New Zealand. These chainplates are a chafe free way of lying to a parachute sea anchor, and they will never pull out of the deck. We tested the chainplates in a storm - squash zone - three hundred miles north of New Zealand during the New Zealand winter - not a good place to be. The chainplates worked awesome. Check out these pictures and drawings. They might work for you.

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What's your method of attaching parachute sea anchors to your multihull?

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Addendum:

I sometimes use these parachute sea anchor chainplates to attach my anchor bridle to Exit Only in a chafe free way. I have the option of using my deck cleats, the parachute sea anchor chainplates, or both when anchoring in a tropical storm.

The chainplates are a good back up, and they come in handy if you want a chafe free point to attach a second anchor for those rare occasions that extreme conditions are heading your way.

[ForumAdmin]

When using a sea anchor from the bow do you find there is a need to adjust the bridle lengths so as to adjust the brldle to hold the boat at a slight angle to the wind and so leave a slick as per the Purdy's?

[Maxingout]

When using a sea anchor from the bow do you find there is a need to adjust the bridle lengths so as to adjust the brldle to hold the boat at a slight angle to the wind and so leave a slick as per the Purdy's?

We have only had to use the parachute sea anchor one time in fifty knot winds and confused seas. In that particular instance the parachute sea anchor was pure magic. It held us directly into the wind and seas.

Some people believe that the parachute creates it's own slick to windward. They claim that the parachute disturbs the water to windward of the yacht so that breaking seas diminish in the corridor of water between the chute and the yacht. Since I have never been in massively breaking seas, I cannot comment on that point. We drifted about half a mile in 17 hours of lying to the parachute, and I can imagine that the chute could possibly create turbulence in the water that would have a protective effect, but I just don't know.

During the storm north of New Zealand, a container vessel came up on radio and asked us what the heck we were doing out there in that mess. They said everyone on board the container ship was seasick, and that they had to slow the ship's speed down to twelve knots to have a reasonable ship motion in the disturbed sea state. I later heard reports that a lot of containers were lost overboard from ships during that storm. We told him that everything was fine on Exit Only, and nobody was seasick.

The one caveat of using a parachute sea anchor is that to have optimum results, you need to be on one side or the other of the center of the storm. That way you will experience the largest seas from mainly two quadrants. If you allow the eye or center of a storm to go right over your yacht, you will get seas from every direction, and chaos will ensue. You might take a beating even lying to the parachute sea anchor.

Storm planning involves positioning your yacht before putting out the parachute if at all possible. Make every effort to be on one side of the storm or the other; do everything possible to stay out of it's direct path.

Your parachute will do an excellent job of holding your bows into the prevailing winds, but if giant breaking seas are coming on the beam, you may suffer damage.

If you are in cross seas, then adusting the parachute bridle can split the difference in the seas to some extent and give you additional protection. You do what you have to do. But it makes much more sense to preposition your yacht in a favorable location when you know that bad weather is coming on weather fax. Even if you have to turn around for twelve hours to put yourself in a better position, it's worth doing because your parachute will do a better job of protecting your yacht because there may be less cross seas.

When Bernard Moitessier sailed in the high southern latitudes, his storm strategy was very smart. As an overtaking low came up his stern, he sailed north until the center of the low passed under him, and then he turned back to the southerly quadrants as he ran downwind. His strategy meant that he was usually on the north side of the lows and he recieved the biggest seas mainly from 2 quadrants. This diminished the risk of cross seas that would pound his yacht if he was further south. He was a smart mariner.