Onward to Hingham: A Storm Named Anna

Monday (May 4) was a busy day.  All Class Detailing finished the waterline up wax job, we provisioned the boat and the crew. Dick Hoffman and David Jones, arrived in the early evening. Once everybody was situated aboard we adjorned to the Harbor Cove Restaurant for a celebratory dinner.

That was the easy part.  It gets tougher from there.

David, Les and Dick ready for an early departure.  

The forecast for the waters off Fort Pierce Tuesday morning called for east winds at 15 to 20 knots and 5 to 6 foot seas with a 7 second period.  Not favorable for the start of a 1,200 nautical mile run to Hingham.  Worse, the weather pattern, which I'd been following since the wind started to blow from the east two days earlier, was holding very steady and was forecasted to do so for the next few days.

The cause of the brisk easterly winds was high pressure over the Appalachian Mountains.  The high appeared to be holding colder air to the north at bey.  High pressure generally correlates to good weather and that's what we had been experiencing with the sea breeze.  It also comes with a clockwise flow and that was kicking up the seas, right out of the north east.

Notice on the weather screen shot below that there is no evidence of low pressure off the coast.  We had heard that an area of low pressure was moving north from the Bahamas but it was not depicted on the map below.  On the other hand, maybe I did not look hard enough.  I did not go to NOAA's Active Alert page, which at the time may have provided information on what was then a developing storm.  That will not happen again.

Note the high pressure along the Appalachian Mountains

Now to the question.  Whether to run north on the outside or on the ICW.  The math is simple. The distance to Fernandina Beach (Amelia Island) on the ICW is 263 NM.  That translates into three days of travel. The distance on the outside is 213 NM to the St Mary's shipping channel just north of Fernandina Beach.  Running through the night that can be accomplished in one day.

The conditions on the other hand are more complicated.  The ICW is protected water but it comes with bridges and shallow water especially as you get further north.  The outside for the same two day period comes with seas of 5 to 7 reducing to 4 to 6.  Not exactly the makings for a smooth ride.  That said, except for the head sea as we exit the Fort Pierce Inlet, the run along the coast would be a beam sea, which would be smoothed out by the stabilizers.

Decision. Given that we were literally two miles from the Fort Pierce Inlet and therefore could back track immediately if we did not like the conditions, we decided to stick our nose out there and see what it was like.

Guided Discovery just north of Fort Pierce

We liked what we saw.  The winds were out of the east at 25 knots and the seas were the predicted 4 to 6.  The 63 was comfortable handling the beam sea.  We had departed Fort Pierce at 6:43 AM.

Explanatory Note: The screen shot above reflects wind and sea conditions from Sirius.  We are in the light blue along the shore.  Just east of our position the color or the waves is green.  The colors go from dark blue (calm water) to light blue (3 to 4s) to yellow (5 to 10) and then light red to dark read (heavy seas).

Off Cape Canaveral at 4:00 PM

Rain showers just south of our position

By Wednesday (May 6) at around 8:00 AM we were north of Fernandina Beach crossing the St Mary's River shipping channel and had traveled 213 NM. Winds were north northeast at 18 to 20 knots according to our on board weather station and seas were 4 to 6.  We now had a quartering head sea off the starboard bow.  These conditions continued essentially unchanged for the next 18 hours. By then we were on the north coast of Georgia.

Dick at the helm

David relaxed and observing despite moderate seas

David at the helm

Meanwhile, at 6:00 PM on Wednesday, we formally assessed our options in light of the weather that we had been faithfully monitoring since leaving Fort Pierce.

The weather on the route to Morehead City, where we would arrive at 3:00 AM on Friday morning was as follows:

• Thursday night: East winds 20 to 25 with gusts to 30.  Seas 5 to 8 building 6 to 8 after midnight.
• Friday: East winds 20 to 25 with gusts to 30.  Seas 6 to 8 subsiding 5 to 8 in the afternoon.  Chance of showers and thunderstorms.

The weather around Cape Hatteras, which was now 328 NM or 40 hours from now was a follows:

• Friday: Southeast winds 10 to 15 with seas 5 to 7 with an 8 second wave period.  Slight chance of showers or a thunderstorm.
• Friday night: Southeast winds 10 to 15 with seas 4 to 6. Slight chance of showers or a thunderstorm

We would reach Cape Hatteras around midnight on Friday.  Essentially, the above forecasts translated into more of the same in terms of sea conditions with a slight chance of rain.  We decided to continue to monitor conditions in light of the following options:

• Put into Southport and run the ICW to Morehead City or continue around Cape Fear
• Put into Morehead City and run the ICW to Norfolk or continue around Cape Hatteras

The ICW from Morehead City to Norfolk requires 3 days to cover 185 NM.  However this route has several challenges including the Alligator River swing bridge that does not open if winds exceed 30 knots.  The challenges on this route are discussed in depth in the next two articles.

We continued on our course to Morehead City.  At midnight on Wednesday we were north of Savannah having traveled 319 nautical miles.  Winds were northeast a 27 knots and waves were 4 to 6 producing a head sea off the starboard bow.  I recorded "ride same as."  We had burned 365 gallons of fuel according to the engine monitors.  Adding 27 gallons of generator time gave us an estimated fuel burn of 392 gallons.  908 gallons remained.  Hence, we had plenty of fuel to round Cape Hatteras and continue north all the way to New Jersey.

At 7:00 AM on Thursday morning we were 18 NM northeast of Charleston.  We estimated seas of a 6 to 8 feet with a wave period of 8 seconds.  The wind shift to north at 30 knots was producing a head sea.  The pitching was tolerable but not fun.  We had covered 347 nautical miles since leaving Fort Pierce.  Despite the turbulence I was easily able to perform a fuel transfer moving about 280 gallons from the auxiliary to the main tanks.

Then the conditions worsened.  At 8:15 AM on Thursday we changed course for Georgetown, which was 26 NM for our present position.  We estimated arrival at noon.  As we proceeded toward shore and the inlet the winds were out of the north northeast at 36 with gusts to 40.  Dick  described the waves as "huge."  We were experiencing 7 to 9 footers with an occasional 10 to 11 and lots of spray in addition to moderate rain.  We were now taking water over the bow (but no burying the nose).

David returning from a trip below reported that water was leaking from the hatch over the VIP and that the books on the port side bookshelf were dislodged.  Tightening the hatch screws stopped the leak.  Dick and I then took all the books off the shelves and stored then in the VIP and guest hanging lockers.

At 9:44 AM we recorded a wave period of 3 to 4 seconds.  At 10:44 AM we experienced heavy rain (but no thunder or lightening).  An hour later we passed the mark (R2) off the East Bank Shoal with slightly diminished winds (33 knots) and seas (4 to 6).  Bottom line.  As we go closer to shore the waves diminished.

R2 off East Bank Shoal

The view from the helm
We are just off East Bank Shoal in heavy rain and spray

Radar and Sirius Satellite Weather

This prompted a decision at 12:17 PM to continue to Southport at which time I programmed in a route along the shore.  Our estimated time of arrival was 10:00 PM at the mouth of the inlet.  Factors favoring this decision included reduced seas, the elimination of a lost day on the ICW and a commercial well marked inlet.  Concerns included a mile and a half on the ICW headed to the marina and arriving at the marina at ten o'clock at night with no one there.  We called the Southport Harbor Village Marina by cell phone and made a reservation.

The ride through the late afternoon and early evening was bumpy with lots of spray.  Winds continued out of the north at 30 knots with seas of 4 to 6.  We arrived at the inlet at 9:56 PM.

The run up the Cape Fear channel was straightforward thanks to a route, radar and night vision.  It took just under an hour to reach the ICW where we turned west for a mile to reach the marina.  Now the challenge was docking in a 25 to 30 knot wind that was pushing us off the dock. Fortunately, the face dock was wide open giving me plenty of room to maneuver and folks on another boat came out to help.  It took me a couple of tries to set up an approach that used momentum to get us close to the dock.  At 11:05 PM we were securely tied to the dock.

Late in the evening while checking Sirius weather the cause of our rough water became quite clear. The forecast screen showed a low pressure center of off South Carolina with a trough of low pressure extending south.  The "hurricane" page on the Active Alert menu showed an "X" in the same area as the low pressure.  Clicking on the "X" revealed a tropical disturbance with a greater than 60% chance of becoming a tropical depression.  That disturbance came to be a depression and later that morning was name Tropical Storm Anna.  She along with that nasty high had been the cause of our discomfort

Dick, David and I celebrated our arrival by killing a good bottle of Chardonnay with cheese and crackers.  This turned out to be one of those days when the old adage "I'd rather be in here (port) wishing I were out there (on the ocean) than out there wishing I were here" applied.

Statistics:

• Distance today: 489 nautical miles
• Average Speed: 7.7 knots
• Total Distance since Sarasota: 708.4 nautical miles
• Hours: 69 hours and 54 minutes
• Engine Fuel: 588 gallons
• Generator Fuel: 105 gallons (70 hrs x 1.5 GPH)
• Total Fuel Used: 693 gallons (estimated)

Written by Les.