Last weekend I turned my H16 into a submarine and turtled for the first time. It was during a race and I was running to the C mark When a gust came along and pushed both hulls under. I tried to get up on the hull in the water as fast as I could but the mast went under faster than I could swim around the boat. I now know why turtling is far worse than just having the boat on the its side. Another sailor jumped off his boat to help me get mine righted and we pulled and pulled without any evidence of the mast coming up. We finally got the boat on its side after Jamie Diamond came by and told us we needed to be on the stern corner pulling. After we got the boat on its side the commitee boat lifted the mast up for us and we got her righted.

After thinking back on what happened I know I had my main sheeted very loose and when the gust hit me I figure it pushed the boat down instead of forward. I would be interested in other opinions. I have not sailed much in wind over about 10mph and it was definately a learning experiance.

Project for this weekend, Seal any possible leaks on mast.

Good ole' Jamie to the rescue :-) My first turtle was when the water was 50 degrees and no dry/wet suit, so I had incentive to get it back up.

I found that a turtle is pretty easy to achieve during a pitchpole. I was able to get it back to capsize by jumping up on the leward hull and lean back with the righting line. I was luckily in the deepest part of the lake and didn't get stuck in the mud, so it swung back up fairly quick. I also believe my comtip is filled with closed cell foan to aid in bouyancy. If that a standard feature of the comtips or am I just lucky?

Brent

When I dropped the sail after coming in it had about 8 inches of mud at the top on the luff rope. I suppose it could have been alot worse. The only breakage was the shock cord for the trap lines. The water temp was about 67, cold but at least tolerable.