13948_NC INWATER BOAT SHOW_19950302

CAMA R'[REDE AND ILL
GENER
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as authoriI.{W.t�i�,Stegfp�pr,#��'ylina
Department of Environment, Health, and Natural Resources and the Coastal Resources Commission
in an area of environmental concern, pursuant to 15A NCAC
Applicant Name.-'r f ., �� V. Phone Number
Address )
City 4f State Zip
Project,Location (County, State Road, Water Body, etc.)
Type of Project Activity
•••DESCRIPTION
Pier (dock) length
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offshore
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This permit is subject to compliance with this application, site
drawing and attached general and specific conditions. Any
violation of these terms may subject the permittee to a fine,
imprisonment or civil action; and may cause the permit to be- i' applicant's signature
come null and void.
This permit must be on the project site and accessible to the permit officer's signature
permit officer when the project is inspected for compliance.
The applicant certifies by signing this permit that 1) this pro -
is consistent with the local land use plan and all local
antes, and 2) a written statement has been obtained from
adjacent riparian landowners certifying that they have no
objections to the proposed work.
attachments
issuing date expiration date
In issuing this permit the State of North Carolina certifies that
this project is consistent with the North Carolina Coastal application fee
Management Program.
I

State 'of Norlh Carolina -
Department of Environment,
Health and Natural Resources a
Division of Coastal Management
James B, Hunt, Governor ^ F
Jonathan B. Howes, Secretary Lei
Roger N. Schecter, Director
March 6, 1995
Mr. Joseph D. McCotter, Jr.
112 Wedgewood Drive
Washington, NC 27889
Dear Mr. McCotter:
Attached is General Permit #C-13948 issued to the N.C. In -Water Boat Show to install
12 temporary mooring piles/anchors with cables and a gangplank 103' x 6' on the landward side
of the existing breakwater on the waterfront in downtown New Bern, at the Sheraton Hotel and
Marina, on the Trent River, Craven County, NC.
In order to validate this permit, please sign all three (3) copies as indicated. Retain the
white copy for your files and return the yellow and pink signed copies to us in the enclosed,
self-addressed envelope.
Your early attention to this matter would be appreciated.
Sincerely,
Jams L. sl
Field Representative
JLM/dh
Enclosures
P.O. Box 769, 3441 Arendell St., Morehead City, North Carolina 28557 Courier # 11-12-09
Telephone [phone] FAX [phone]
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N.C. IN -WATER BOAT SHOW
ADVERTISING ACCOUNT "-152/531 478
P O BOX 1166
MOREHEAD CITY, NC 28557
PAYTOTHE
ORDER OF
DOLLARS
—v/ — --
Wachovia Bank of North Carolina, N.A.
Moriehcad City, ,NC 28557
':0531015291: 5468 001821u■ 4�8

P.O. Box 4065 Cary, North Carolina 27519
919-469-1071 / 919-469-5623 (FAX)
BWSHOW
State of North Carolina
Department of Environment,
Health and Natural Resources
Division of Coastal Management
January 10, 1995
Mr. James L. Mercer
P. O. Box 769
3441 Arendell Street
Morehead City, NC 28557
Dear Jim,
668wto"66r4r r
We would like to renew our General Permit #12053 which calls
for substituting a system of Helix Anchors for the temporary
placement of 12 mooring piles as originally authorized at the
Sheraton Hotel and Marina located on the Trent River in New Bern,
NC.
We placed the Helix Anchors and placed the cable. The eye of the
Helix Anchors were placed a few inches below the surface of the
bottom. After the Boat Show, we removed the cable and marked the
anchors with Crab Pot type floats so that our diver could relocate
them. By removing the cable from the anchor eyes, this made us
comply withe the special conditions set forth in 15 NCAC Subchapter
7H.1905, rendering the system unusable.
Our request is to be able to use this system this year under the
same conditions with no changes. The Boat Show dates are March 23,
24, 25 & 26,
Thank you again for your cooperation and help. Please respond to
this request to:
Joseph D. McCotter, Jr. Phone #[phone]
112 Wedgewood Drive Fax #[phone]
Washington, NC 27889
I will give you a call and send a check for this request.
Sincer ly yours,
Jo ph D. McCotter, Jr.

State of North Carolina
Department of Environment,
Health and Natural Resources ' s
Division of Coastal Management
James B. Hunt, Jr., Governor
Jonathan B. Howes, Secretary v=_ A
Roger N. Schecter, Director
March 24, 1994
Mr. Joe McCotter, Jr.
North Carolina In -Water Boat Show
P.O. Box 4065
Cary, North Carolina, 27519
Dear. Mr. McCotter:
v My supervisor, Mr.'Charles Jones, and I have reviewed your request
to modify General Permit # 12053 which calls for substituting a
system of helix anchors for the temporary placement of 12 mooring
piles as originally authorized at the Sheraton Hotel and Marina
located on the Trent River in New Bern, North Carolina.
By way of this letter, the proposed changes are authorized as a
minor refinement of the specific permit issued. In order to fully
comply with the intent of the special conditions set forth in
15NCAC Subchapter 7H .1905, you must render unusable the mooring
capability of the system once the boat show is closed this year.
Thank you again for your cooperation and continued support of our
coastal permit program.
'Sincerely yours,
James FEB 2 1
k '!+
rju
CC: Charles - Ll � Jones DCM Dist. Man t.
Norm Sanders, COE
P.O. Box 769, 3441 Arendell St., Morehead City, North Carolina 28557 Courier if11-12-09
Telephone 919-72&7021 FAX [phone]
An Equal Opporlur)i Y Affirmative Action Employar 50k recycled,r l0% post -consumer parer

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FEB 2 1 1r95
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IN-INA ER
OAT SHOW
March 21, 1994
Marine Fisheries
Attn: Jim Mercer
Dear Jim,
North Carolina TN'MMER Boat S1 io w,
I' O. Box 4065
Cary, North Carolina 2751.9
1-919-469-1071
1-919-469-5623 (Fax)
This is in response to our telephone conversation as of today March
21, 1994. Enclosed you will find a drawing showing where screw
anchors are placed and the cable to be laid. We understand that
this a one shot deal for the Boat Show only, and we also understand
that we may re -new this permit next year.
Thanks an awful lot for your cooperation in this matter. We are in
a bind. Please, give us an immediate response. Your response can
Ile faxed to the Sheraton Grand New Bern at fax # [phone].
Sincerely,
1*
Joe McCotter,Jr.
FEB

Materials presented here are reprinted from
July 1992 and January 1993 issues of
Seaworthy, The Boat/U.S. Marine Insurance
and In
e Avoidance Reports.
The BOAT 1J.S. Marine Insurance and Damage Avoidance Report'
Turn of the Screw
i..
Helical "Screw" Anchors Get High Marks in Tdr'M§T'-,�"�"°".
A screw anchor with a single helix
("Rethinking the Traditional Mooring,"
Seaworthy, July, 1992) was tested this past
November at the harbor in Marion,
Massachusetts. According to observers the
helical anchor didn't budge after being
pulled from four different directions by a
36' tug.
The helical anchor was screwed into the
mud, clay, and gravel bottom by the A.B.
Chance Company to demonstrate its
holding power to local harbormasters,
boat owners, and town fathers. Marion is
one of several harbors that is considering
using helical anchors to replace traditional
mushroom and dead weight anchors.
Using a strain gauge to measure forces, the
tug exerted a steady pull of 5,600 pounds
but on several occasions, as the tug was
changing course, the anchor was briefly
subjected to as much as 10,000 pounds of
pull. The anchor was tested in 10' of water
using 55' of chain, giving the mooring a
scope of approximately 5.5 to 1. After the
demonstration, the anchor was unscrewed
and found to have sur-
vived with only a slight
sweep.
The tug also pulled on a
disc anchor (similar to a
mushroom) and a tradi-
tional 1,000 pound
mushroom. The disc
anchor moved easily using
only about 2,000 pounds of
pressure. The mushroom
had been buried for several
years and was subjected to
5,600 pounds of pull from
one direction, which was
the same direction that the
mushroom was set. The
mushroom anchor held.
A slightly less scientific test was conducted
by Art McLean at nearby Mattapoisett
Boatyard. McLean installed two screw
anchors (each also had a single helix), and
tried pulling them out with a land crane.
The anchors held, according to McLean, but
the crane started dragging. McLean said he
Rethinking the Traditional Mooring
�Q -
t
f
Don Andrews Photo
Hurricane Bob made one thing clear: boat mooring systems need rethinking. Since Bob,
harbormasters, community leaders, marina owners, marine surveyors, boat owners, and
research groups have been evaluating what went wrong in that devastating storm. How
can mooring systems be improved? Considering the number —and value —of boats that
are crowded into many harbors, the traditional practice of using a mushroom or nonde-
script weight with minimal scope and chafe protection to secure a boat is no longer
adequate. Starting on page eight, Seaworthy shares some recent thinking on securing
boats on moorings. continued on page 8
had been able to drag any mooring in the
harbor using their steel workboat but
"couldn't touch" the screw anchors.
McLean hopes to eventually replace all of
the moorings at Mattapoisett Boatyard with
helix anchors.
Article above appeared in January 1993
in follow up to July 1992 article which
begins at left and continues on the next
three pages.
A.B. Chance, USA
210 N. Allen Street
Centralia, Mo. 65240-1395
314-682-5521
Fax: [phone]
A.B. Chance, Canada
100 Howden Road
Scarborough, Ontario
Canada MIR 3G1
416-288-9444
Fax: [phone]
A.B. Chance, U.K. Ltd.
Old Mill Road
Portishead, Bristol BS20 9BX
England
44-275-84-2963
Fax: [phone]
Bulletin 31-9303
L

From page 1
More On Moorings
On Friday afternoon, August 16, when
weather forecasters first mentioned the possi-
bility of Hurricane Bob coming ashore in New
England, John Sheehan rowed out to his 33'
sloop Shadowline moored in the harbor at
South Dartmouth, Massachusetts, stripped
off the sails and took the electronics and pro-
pane tanks home for safekeeping. When the
forecast didn't change on Saturday, John
added 30 additional feet of
chain and increased the
scope on his nylon moor-
ing pennant. On Sunday "Mushroo
he rigged a second pen- themselves in
nant through a block and
cut up an inner tube for in the words
additional chafe protec- marina owne
tion. He also emptied the
water tanks to lighten the anchor that i
boat. n„ fho hnffn
On both Saturday and Sun- around like
day, despite increasingly
dire warnings from
weather experts, John said
there was surprisingly little activity in the
crowded harbor.
Monday was a different story. Only hours
before Bob would come ashore it was "panic
time" in South Dartmouth with skippers
scrambling to prepare boats. But John says he
noticed quite a few of the boats that were still
swinging quietly at their moorings, with lines
devoid of.�chafe protection and sails furled
neatly on booms and forestays. It made him
nervous.
John's apprehensions werewell founded. Only
hours later, Bob's winds, tidal surge, and
accompanying waves would drive 130 of the
boats in the harbor ashore. The South
Dartmouth harbormaster estimated later that
almost 40 of those boats were completely
destroyed. Shadowline would remain at its
mooring, but its hull would be scraped and
gouged by drifting boats, Claim #915363.
While the devastation at South Dartmouth
was bad, it wasn't especially unusual. Further
up Buzzards Bay, Marion's harbormaster es-
timated that 200 to 300 boats were blown
ashore by the storm, either because moorings
dragged or because pennants chafed. Cotuit,
Plymouth, and Hyannis were also hit hard.
And at Pleasant Bay near Orleans all 25 boats
in the harbor, still attached to their moorings,
were driven ashore by Hurricane Bob. The
moorings must have dragged so quickly that
lines never had a chance to chafe.
Moorings
Of all the components that go into building a
8 Seaworthy July 1992
ms
co
of o
rs
on
sm
m r
successful mooring —chain, scope, chafe pro-
tection, etc. —there is probably less consensus
about what works best to anchor the system.
The harbormaster at Marblehead has decided
to replace mushroom anchors with cement
blocks. The harbormaster at South Dartmouth
would like to get rid of cement blocks and
replace them with mushrooms and railroad
wheels. Jamestown Boatyard would like to
replace its few remaining
railroad wheels withgran-
ite. And a company in
don't bury Woods Hole thathad been
arse sand and, studying different moor-
ings has began actively
of the local promoting railroad
a mushroom wheels.
a to
erely resting One obvious reason forthe
�n be towed disparity of opinions is that
different moorings work
beter trap." better indifferent bottoms.
A boat owner who kept
his boat at Pleasant Bay
said the harbor has a sandy
bottom, which is why the mushroom anchors
were ineffective. Mushroomsdon'tbury them-
selves in coarse sand and, in the words of one
of the local marina owners, a mushroom an-
chor that is merely resting on the bottom can
be towed around like a lobster trap.
But set up to the top of its shank in soft mud,
nobody would argue that a mushroom an-
chor has impressive holding power. Ideally,
a mushroom should be blown far down into
the mud with a jet. In actual practice, the
mushroom is typically placed in the mud by
circling with a small boat and left to work
itself in over time. One New England sur-
veyor complained that mushroom anchors
were a "lousy design" for a mooring since
they tend to set themselves to the prevailing
westerlies only to be rotated out of the bottom
when a storm comes roaring out of the east.
Massive cement blocks like these are readily
available and relatively inexpensive. One draw-
back, however, is that a cement block, while
heavy and cumbersome to handle on land, will
lose almost half its weight underwater. Tying
two or more blocks together in a grid pattern
would distribute the load to improve holding
powerand also provide extra protection against
an eye breaking or pulling out of a block.
Another complaint voiced by several
harbormasters is that mushrooms need to be
inspected periodically, which means either
hiring a diver or, in most harbors, pulling the
mushroom out after it has finally worked its
way down into the mud.
One approach to the devastation of Hurri-
cane Bob is to increase the size of the mush-
rooms. The weight of mushroom anchors
used in Massachusetts' Marion Harbor be-
fore Hurricane Bob was calculated by multi-
plying the beam of a boat by its length. A 30'
boat with a 10' beam, for example, was re-
quired to have a 300 pound mushroom. A
new formula being proposed would increase
that number by 50%, so that the same 30' x 10'
boat would be required to have a 450 pound
mushroom. Similar increases in mooring
weights are already in effect for new moor-
ings at South Dartmouth harbor.
Dead Weight Anchors
"Dead weight" anchors are used by many
boat owners, especially where coarse sand or
rock bottoms make it difficult or impossible to
bury a mushroom anchor. As the name im-
plies, dead weight anchors rely on weight to
anchor the boat (some extra holding power
can be supplied by suction when the weight
sits in soft mud). Unlike a mushroom anchor,
which must be buried sufficiently to deliver
its full holding power, a dead weight anchor
leaves less room for doubt.
Weight on shore and weight in the water,
however, can vary significantly, which is an
important consideration when selecting a dead
weight anchor. Massive poured concrete
blocks, while readily available and widely
used in many harbors, are relatively porous
and lose almost half their weight in water.
Granite is somewhat denser, followed by steel
and lead. Skippers, for whatever reason, al-
most always refer to their mooring's "dry"
weight, which can obviously be misleading
since a 2,000 pound lead block would be
63% heavier underwater than a 2,000 pound
concrete block.
Look Out Below
Knowing what has the best chance of holding
is one thing; knowing what type of mooring
you have is another. Moorings in many har-
—j

bors tend to pass frorn one boat (and boat
owner) to another, leaving skippers with only
a vague notion of what is at the other end of
their mooring. Before John Sheehan bought
his mooring (a 1,000lb. mushroom), he talked
to several skippers with moorings for sale
who didn't have a clue what they were sell-
ing. John wisely opted to keep looking, which
is one reason his boat survived.
Mternatives to Traditional Moorings
Mushrooms are unpredictable. Dead weight
anchors are bulky and difficult to handle.
After years of watching boats drag moorings
in fair weather and foul, several harbormasters
have expressed a keen interest in finding
types of moorings with better holding power,
especially in situations where scope may be
restricted. Arthur Dias in South Dartmouth
has been working to develop a design that
would combine the weight of a permanent
mooring with flukes to help it bury itself. In
Woods Hole, Massachusetts, Marine Systems
Inc. has developed a technique that places 900
lb. railroad wheels (one or more) on a long
pipe. The pipe is meant to be tipped over, so
that in addition to the weight, the mooring
will also have some bite into the bottom.
"Screw anchors," which are twisted down
into the bottom like a screw, were used over
100 years ago to secure lighthouses on the
Chesapeake Bay and have been used more
recently to moor boats in the Virgin Islands.
Anotherproposal being considered for Marion
Harbor would replace the existing mushroom
anchors with screw anchors.
One advantage to screwing anchors down
into the bottom is that screw anchors aren't
affected by scope, or lack of scope, according
to a spokesman for a company that makes the
anchors. A nearly vertical pull would prob-
ably yank the deck cleat out before it dis-
lodged the screw anchor. Another advantage
is that its torque can be measured while the
anchor is being installed.
Wayne Rodgers, a contractor in Michigan
who specializes in marine pipeline installa-
tions, says that a screw anchor with an instal-
lation torque of 200 pounds (which he says is
typically achieved when the anchor has gone
into seven or eight feet of clay bottom) will
have a vertical holding capacity of ten times
the torque-20,000 pounds. Rodgers estimates
that the anchors could probably be installed
for several hundred dollars apiece, including
the anchors, when large numbers of moor-
ings are being installed. He estimates the
anchors would only need to be inspected
every 30 years.
New England surveyor Mike Taylor installed
three screw anchors in 1978 (using a jet and
two scuba divers walking around in circles on
a sand bottom) when he ran a Caribbean
Screw anchors, as the name implies, can be
screwed down into the soil to provide tremen-
dous holding power. Using specialized instal-
lation equipment, the holding power of a screw
anchor can also be measured closely, elimin-
ation much of the uncertainty of other types of
moorings. Screw anchors have been used
successfully to moor boats in the Virgin Is-
lands.
charter company. The same three anchors
were used successfully eleven years later to
secure nine boats during Hurricane Hugo.
Taylor likes screw anchors for moorings but
believes Marion Harbor would be better pro-
tected with steel pilings or I -beams driven
into the bottom. Both the materials and instal-
lation equipment, he says, are readily avail-
able locally. Also, if the installation contractor
encounters a rock, he can "blow right through
it," which Taylor says wouldn't be possible
with a screw anchor.
Another mooring that shows promise is the
Dor-Mor mooring, which looks like a first
cousin of the traditional mushroom but with
a shorter shank and a body like an inverted
pyramid. The short shank of the Dor-Mor
might not be as prone to fouling chains and
twisting out as its traditional counterpart,
and its hard edges are supposed to help Dor-
Mor moorings dig into the bottom rapidly
and hold better when force is applied.
The Dor-Mor mooring looks like the first cousin
of the traditional mushroom, but with a shorter
shank and harder edges. While some experts
think the Dor-Mor may be an improvement
over the mushroom, it has not been widely
tested in storms.
A 200 pound Dor-Mor was used by Tom
Orfe, the Chief Harbormaster for the state of
New Hampshire, to secure a 40' boat in both
Hurricane Bob and the Halloween North-
easter. Although the mooring was consider-
ably below the recommended weight for that
size boat, Orfe said it held in both storms
using a scope of less than 3:1.
Scope
After the 1938 hurricane, a book Permanent
Yacht Moorings by Ridsdale Ellis was written
to bring together what was then known about
moorings. Almost 50 years later, the book's
scientific approach to moorings remains im-
pressive, and its dire warnings sound uncom-
fortably familiar: "Very few boat owners give
thought to what is below the surface .. .
Harbors practically everywhere are so
crowded you cannot get the proper scope of
cable."
Ultimately, the holding power of a mooring
depends as much on the angle of pull as it
does on the mooring itself. A graph in Ellis'
book illustrates how holding power drops
steadily as the angle of pull increases to 25
degrees, at which point holding power sud-
denly takes a precipitous drop (Based on a
study of anchors, but he says the findings are
applicable to moorings). Using heavy chain
and a catenary, helps reduce the angle, but in
a violent storm the angle —and holding
power —are dependent largely on scope.
Scope is especially critical in shallow harbors
where the surge can decrease scope and in-
crease the angle of pull dramatically. A boat in
seven or eight feet of water with 4:1 scope, for
example, has a mooring cable of 32 feet (in-
cluding freeboard). Marion harbor had an 11'
foot tidal surge in addition to six foot waves,
so that a boat with 4:1 scope in Marion had its
scope reduced to less than 2:1 during Bob. The
angle of pull, which was originally 15 de-
grees, was increased to almost 50 degrees
when the boat was teetering at the tops of
waves. It's no wonder then, that
harbormasters tend to talk wistfully about
regridding harbors so that scope can be in-
creased in a storm.
Chains and Shackles
There is widespread agreement that using
heavy chain near the mooring is a necessity,
both for its strength and to reduce the angle of
pull. The chain's heavy weight down near the
mooring also absorbs shock when the boat
surges in heavy seas.
Swivels, used to connect the heavy chain at
the bottom of the mooring with the lighter
chain near the surface, is not so universally
respected. Swivels allow the boat to swing in
circles without kinking the chain, but they
also tend to become fouled by barnacles and
rust. Further, swivels have less breaking
strength (by almost half) of comparable chain,
making it the proverbial weak link in the
mooring's chain.
Seaworthy July 1992

In some harbors, such as Mattapoisett, moor-
ings typically don't use swivels. The straight
run of chain, according to a BOAT/ U.S. Mem-
ber who keeps his boat at Mattapoisett, cre-
ates little or no problems. But at a Rhode
Island harbor, perhaps because of stronger
tides, the harbormaster tells of seeing a chain
that "twisted into knots you wouldn't be-
lieve" because the swivel was omitted. These
knots reduced the length of the chain and
pulled out the mooring. Several other
harbormasters report chains have occasion-
ally wrapped around the shanks and yanked
mushrooms out of the bottom, either because
swivels had become fouled or weren't used.
There are several possible solutions to crusted,
rusted, or omitted swivels. Instead of attach-
ing the swivel between the lower and the
upper chain, Jono Billings at Jamestown
Boatyard recommends attaching it at the un-
derside of the mooring ball, which makes it
easier to inspect and replace. As for swivels
being the weak link, Jono recommends using
a drop forged, eve -to -eve swivel (Wilcox
Crittenden #676) instead of a jaw and eye
swivel, which relies on a small cotter pin to
secure the piston. The cotter pin is prone to
corrosion. If the swivel is under the mooring
ball, Professional Boatbuilder's Technical Editor
Bruce Pfund suggests bypassing the swivel
altogether for the duration of a hurricane and
attaching the pennants to the top end of the
chain. The boat will only swing around the
clock once in a storm, which means minimal
twisting in the chain.
Pennants and Chafe Protection
Problems mentioned by harbormasters and
surveyors alike include woefully undersized
cleats and chocks on many boats that won't
accommodate larger lines, cleats that aren't
backed properly, chocks with hard edges,
and chocks that have been installed back-
wards.
Although nylon pennants (both braid and
three strand) are widely used between the
mooring ball and boat to absorb shock, a
surprising number of experts suggest that
polyester might work better, especially in
heavv weather. Nylon absorbs shock but in
heavy weather this stretching creates heat in
the nylon, both internally and externally, that
can severely weaken fibers. Nylon also loses
a significant percentage of its total breaking
strength (estimates vary between 10% to 20%)
when wet.
An MIT study after Hurricane Gloria sug-
gested that nylon "is perhaps the worst mate-
rial for mooring pennants." Polyester
(Dacron), on the other hand, stretches less
than nylon and is less affected by both inter-
nal and external abrasion. Mike Dahill with
New England Ropes said that nylon surfaces
10 Seaworthy July 1992
working against each other in a surge can
weaken the line quickly, especially if it is
being subjected to sharp bends at the chock
and /or is secured to a cleat far away from the
chock. Brace Brown with Samson Rope Com-
pany said he has seen instances where nylon
line has failed internally despite being well
protected externally with chafe protection.
The nylon fibers inside the line rubbed against
each other and melted.
Old habits die hard. One harbormaster noted
that suggesting skippers use something other
than nylon line for a pennant goes against
apple pie and motherhood. Skippers who are
reluctant to abandon their nylon lines might
consider using polyester for the backup storm
pennant while retaining a slightly longer ny-
lon pennant to absorb the load in mild weather.
One pennant material that doesn't stand up
well in heavy weather is stainless steel. Larry
Willard, who maintains almost 1,000 moor-
ings in Marblehead Harbor, used stainless
steel for second pennants several years ago,
but stopped when they began breaking under
strain. Stainless steel tends to corrode inside
the wire as well as at the nicropress fittings.
Chocks and Cleats
When a boat is kept at a mooring the chock
should be ahead of the cleat, as close as pos-
sible to the stem. Harbormasters complain
that when the chock is back from the stem (a
typical arrangement when a boat will belying
at a dock), the line is led out to the mooring at
a sharper angle, which greatly contributes to
chafe and heat buildup in nylon lines.
Both cleat and chock (with edges) must be
extra large to accommodate larger lines and
chafe gear. Anchor rollers, plow anchors on
the bow, and especially bobstays, chafe con-
stantly at mooring lines. Skippers should con-
sider using a chain pennant with snubbers to
absorb shock or, another Bruce Pfund recom-
mendation, add a towing eye at the bow for
securing the pennant. Pfund warns, however,
that the pad eve must be backed properly or
it could be pulled out.
Types of Chafe Gear
Only about half of the boats that came ashore
after Hurricane Gloria were still attached to
their moorings. The rest either chafed through
pennants or pulled cleats out of their decks.
Chafed pennants are, in the words of one
marina owner, "an enormous problem."
Garden hose, inner tubes, leather, and canvas
have all been used successfully to protect
mooring lines. The key is length: lines must be
protected well above and below the chock
(and any other potential chafe points), or the
line will simply stretch beyond its protection.
Chafe gear must be firmly attached to the
lines to prevent slipping.
One type of chafe gear that is readily available
and widely used is clearPVCtubing. The tube
fits neatly over lines and can be fitted from
splice to the cleat so it won't be as affected by
the line's stretching. A questionnaire mailed
to boat owners by researchers at MIT found
that PVC tubing did an excellent job protect-
ing lines after Hurricane Gloria; much better
than traditional leather chafe protection,
which, surprisingly, had a high failure rate
(The researcher speculated that PVC does a
better job of negating sharp angles at the
chock, which would reduce both internal and
external abrasion). One marina owner warns,
however, that PVC deteriorates in sunlight
and must be replaced periodically or it be-
comes brittle and cracks, sawing into the pen-
nant it was supposed to protect.
One other thing to keep in mind when you
inspect a nylon mooring line: Experts warn
that heavv concentrations of rust, from a
shackle or chain, can weaken the line and are
an indication that the line needs replacing.
Paint, on the other hand, does little or no
damage to synthetic fibers.
Storing Boats Ashore
A survey of boat owners after Hurricane
Gloria found that none of boats stored
ashore in one New England harbor was
damaged. During Hurricane Bob, almost
all of the boats stored ashore at the same
harbor were damaged. The difference was
tidal surge —Hurricane Gloria came ashore
at low tide; Bob came ashore at high tide.
When boats are stored ashore, beyond the
reach of the tidal surge, the chance of their
being wrecked in a hurricane is practically
nil. The kev is to store the boats on high
ground, preferably in an area that has some
protection from high winds.
Storing boats ashore also means fewer boats
left on moorings, which harbormasters uni-
versally regard as a plus. Marion's
Harbormaster George Jennings thinks the
damage in the harbor would have been
much worse if all of the boats had been left
in the water. Both South Dartmouth's
Harbormaster Art Dias and Marblehead's
Harbormaster Larry Dykes say the number
of boats normally moored in their harbors
had been greatly reduced, which meant
there were fewer boats to break loose and
wreck other boats.
Fewer boats in a harbor would also allow
skippers of remaining boats to increase
scope. It would seem that evacuation, like
the search for a better mooring system, is a
trend that should be encouraged. A