Actually I think I first heard this idea from Bill Roberts and I may have refined the idea slightly. Next time my trampoline is off, we'll be incorporating it into our 20. Basically, put a zipper pocket under the trampoline and have a small drag chute / water anchor in there with some line and a decent carabiner (you can get a weighted/sprung chute with a bridle that will pop open in the water for about $30). If you find yourself capsized and need the system, you unzip the pocket from the underside of the trampoline and pull out the chute, line, and carabiner. One side of the line should remain attached to the trampoline / mast post. With the line feeding through the carabiner, clip it to the forestay bridle on the hull in the water. Toss the drogue off the bow. With it clipped to the forestay bridle, it should quickly spin the boat into the wind and provide some brakes to the boat's progress through the water (though I'm not sure if it would be enough to allow someone to swim back to the boat).

Right the boat as normal but now when the boat comes up, the chute will hopefully keep the boat bow to the wind. Once you've got everything sorted out, you just grab the chute line at the front beam and pull it until the chute is lifted out of the water at the carabiner - you can probably leave it there while sailing.


This would possibly help if you are A) having trouble getting the boat positinged into the wind for righting or B) had someone get separated from the boat or C) are afraid the boat will take off without you when it's righted (I've been there too and it ain't fun).

I think Bill Roberts suggestion involved a similar system but for the bigger boats that are hard to right and once the chute was deployed, you would center the mainsheet traveler and sheet the main in hard - the main would provide more help in righting the boat immediately. The drogue would hopefully keep the boat positioned into the wind and keep it from flip flopping to capsize again.