9.08- Climbing the Mast

Self portrait while sitting astride the spreader bars of the Hirondelle during a pause in my descent from retrieving a slipped haliard.

During tropical storm Hanna, the jib-halliard on Captain Dave's Pearson 39 (the Hirondelle) became detached from the deck, and the loose end rode all the way up the mast until it wedged in its fairlead up there (translation for lubbers & stink-potters: the rope used to raise the front sail came loose and slipped up the mast and got stuck there).

This being Oriental, other captains quickly offered assistance and tools to retrieve the halliard.

This morning, Capt. Tory came to help, bringing his "boatswains chair" (used to haul folks up masts for rigging jobs) and the heavy-duty drill with a winch-fitting bit... Capt. Tory uses the drill to raise sails on his own boat.

We rigged the boatswain's chair to the main haliard and to an extra haliard (for safety) and I got the job of riding the chair up to the top of the 55 foot (17 meter) mast to retrieve the slipped haliard.

Capt. Tory slipped the drill into the main haliard winch, and I got a motorized lift to the top. I had to stop at the spreader bars to untie the safety line, slip it around the spreaders and re-tie it to the boatswain's chair before continuing up. Same on the way back down.

Capt. Dave also gave me a couple of "while-you're-up-there" tasks... running a new signal haliard (for flags) and another line for a future project.

While I was up the mast, Capt. Roy and Capt. Ken came by to watch... Capt. Ken and Capt. Tory were having a nice conversation about Capt. Tory's drill while I was hanging at the top of the mast.

I hung my little Kodak camera from my side, in video mode, for the trip, and stitched together a video of my journey (accompanied by Manu Dibango) below. In the picture above, and the video below, you will see the Bauer 10 dinghy tied up in Hirondelle's slip.

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