Ventura Harbor Boatyard “For All Your Haul Out Needs” Two Travelifts Haul Outs to 160 Tons Full Line of Marine Services
(805) 654-1433 www.vhby.com
1415 Spinnaker Drive Ventura CA 93001
Latitude 38
• August, 2012
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ANNIVERSARY
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(510) 957-2012 Fax (510) 357-3230 bfowler@mcdermottcosta.com
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Bill Fowler MCDERMOTTCOSTA INSURANCE
• YACHT & BOAT POLICIES Offshore, Coastal, Inland and Liveaboards
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• COMMERCIAL POLICIES Marinas, Yards, Yacht Clubs, Brokers, Shipwrights
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LETTERS to pay property tax not only on their boats, but on the berths they occupy. We're not sure how prevalent this tax on berths is, but we know that San Francisco is not alone in assessing it. ⇑⇓A CLEARER LOOK AT THE 4TH OF JULY TRAGEDY Latitude appears to have the wrong length of the Silverton powerboat that capsized and sank on Long Island Sound after the Fourth of July fireworks show, with the loss of three young lives. According to all reports here on Long Island, she was 34 feet, not 37 feet, in length. The fireworks show is put on each year by the James Dolan family in front of their waterfront house, and is bigger than the fireworks shows at most towns on Long Island. The Dolans can afford it, because they are the ones who own Cablevision, Madison Square Garden, the New York Knicks, Beacon Theatre, and so forth. During the day, boats from all over the area — including some very large ones — come into Cold Spring Harbor and anchor, raft up, and so forth, and the party begins. The fireworks show starts just after dark, and upon its conclusion, there is complete mayhem on the water. Why everybody thinks they all have to leave at the same time is beyond me. The local launch service is bombarded with calls from people to be picked up by moored boats, and there are boats headed off to Oyster Bay, Cold Spring Harbor, and out into Long Island Sound. I own a Catalina 30, and we just sit safely on the mooring and wait for it to clear out. With everyone leaving at the same time, and depending on the tide, wind, and water depth, there can be some very nasty wakes and waves coming from all directions. I've experienced it more than once on just a normal busy Sunday afternoon. The operator of the Silverton claims that the boat was hit broadside by a large wake that he didn't see in the dark. It knocked the boat over on her side, at which time she started to sink. There was rain and lightning at the same time, adding to the chaos. A lot of people in town and at the docks have speculated about the cause of the tragedy, and most agree that it was probably foolish to have 27 people aboard. But one theory I heard from a person whose nautical experience I respect is that there may have been water in the bilge of the boat that the operator wasn't aware of, so when the boat was knocked to the side, added ballast helped push her over. The boat's owner had owned the boat for only one season. She was being operated by a friend who had at least 25 years' experience. I enjoy reading Latitude here on the East Coast even though I haven't been in San Fran since '78. My friend who lives in Rohnert Park keeps trying to get me out there to visit with the promise of plenty of wine. Maybe soon. J.S. Oyster Bay, New York J.S. — It doesn't take an expert to know there are some obvious things that contribute to the instability of a motoryacht. Lots of free-moving water in the bilge, as your friend suggested, would certainly be one of them. But we suspect an even greater factor in the Long Island case was the amount and placement of human weight. If we assume that the 27 people on the boat, apparently 11 of them children, were to weigh an average of 150 lbs, that means there were over two tons of movable human weight on a 34-ft boat. If most of that weight was on a flybridge, which is well above the boat's normal center of gravity, and much of that weight happened to be on one side