Sport Today

I heard something about this on the Radio Wedesday morning.
Reportedly the sailor was some 6 miles out the gate!  The
cruise ship made an attempt to throw him a line but was going
to fast, so they radioed the Coast Guard.  However, the
sailor made it back under his own power!  They didn't say
when he made it back -- I assumed he made it back on Tuesday
without spending the night out there, but I dunno for sure.  
I think they said the sailors name John Morris or something close.
The announcer said that he probably learned a lesson, but if he was
anything like most of the windsurfers he knows, he probably
went right back out.  Hehe, good one.

Anybody hear anything else?  Did he sail back, paddle or swim?
Was he ok?  Did he lose equipment?  When did he make it back?
Enquiring minds want to know!

-joel

It was a front page article in Wednesday's SF Examiner (really bad
afternoon paper).  Here's what I remember from it:

The guy (24 years old, sailing for 8 years) started sailing at Crissy
at 4:30PM Monday.  He was out by the north tower when his mast broke.
It was really foggy so noone could see him and it was ebbing hard, at
around 5 knots.  He said before he knew it he was under the bridge and
heading out to the Farralones.  He sounds like he really had his head
together because he quickly dumped his rig and knew that the current
would switch to a flood at 7:30PM.  He was carried out ~6 miles by then.
He was just swimming with his board at this time.

The cruise ship must have nearly run him over, since they did not see
him, but some passengers heard him yelling, so they threw over a bunch
of life preservers, called the Coast Guard, and kept going.

He said he heard the rescue boats and helicopters, but could not signal
them, and they could not see him because of the fog and darkness.

He paddled, guided by those annoying fog horns on the Golden Gate, and
eventually ended up around Pt. Bonita (?) around 10:15PM.  It took him
another hour and a half to find somewhere to land safely.  He didn't
want to "go through all that paddling, then get pulverised on some
rocks".

He had bruised arms (from paddling), a sore neck (from keeping his head
up, I guess), and some frostbite on his toes, but was basically alright.

I think he said something like it was a good humbling experience for him,
and that he'd be sure to carry flares and a whistle in the future, but
no hint at all about not going out the next day.

This is what the Examiner says.  How close to the truth, I don't know.

Ed Wilson
Stanford Aerospace Robotics Lab
Mistral Energy, Hi-Tech 8'6", WindWings, flares, and a whistle

I read something about this in the local section of SJ Mercury earlier
this week.  He broke his mast under the Golden Gate and got swept
several miles out to sea on the ebb.  It seems he waited several hours
for the ebb to subside before seriously trying to paddle back.  Ended
up spending about 6 hours out there and paddling about 3 miles, before
landing on the Marin side.  I presume he ditched everything but the
board.

Alan

Maybe someone who knows the layout at Crissy better than I do can answer
this: why would this guy not just paddle cross-current toward the Marin
shore right away?  What's the logic in letting yourself get dragged out
6 miles and waiting for the current to reverse?  I would say he is one
seriously lucky dude, because at some point out there the currents start
to go north to south, and once you get caught up in that you are not in
good shape.

--

----------

Think of it as vector arithmatic:

Rocks & --                 --
 Cliffs   \  Marin        /
           \            /
            \          /
             \       /
              \____/
                ||
                ||
                OO    North Tower
                ||
                ||
        <-------||- X  GG Bridge center span
         5 knots||
                ||
                OO    South tower  (1 mile from N Tower)
                ||
                ||
               /  \
             /      \
            /         \------------
                          Crissy
             San Francisco

Say you fall at center span in a 5 knot ebb.  You are about 1 mile from either
shore and further if you drift since the bridge is on a point.  If you were
Superman and could paddle at 5 knots North, you'd reach land well NW of the
bridge.  This location is very dangerous with big waves, rocks and cliffs.
BTW, I'm a good swimmer and I can swim 3000 yds in just under an hour in a
nice warm pool.  This would mean If I left Alkatraz Island towards SF in a
5 knott ebb, I'd be about 2 0r 3 miles out the gate before I'd be even with
the SF shore.  This is why Alkatraz was considered "unescapable" as a prison.

Kirk out