The Gray Monk

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November 15, 2003

Waterside show

This afternoon I took a walk along the riverside, something I find very pleasant and enjoyable, particularly as a would be boat owner and long time "messer abouterer in boats". At this time of the year, of course, there are few boats out and about, but I did pause to admire a large, obviously newly acquired, gin palace grumble up to the lock.

Then the fun started and rapidly descended into something the Marx Brothers could possibly have used. For those that have never tried to bring a large craft alongside in comparatively shallow water or into a lock cut, there are a few tricks you perhaps ought to know first. One is that there is always a current running out of the lock cut which is often complicated by the associated weir. If the weir is upstream of the lock, and the lock entrance is at an angle to the main river, you can have quite a vicious courrent across the lock channel. Woe betide the coxswain who doesn't allow for this. Believe me, there are usually indications if you watch the water surface, but they can be deceiving.

Anyway, this skipper obviously hadn't tried this particular approach before, or had not tried it in this type of boat. His first mistake was to allow the boat to swing in the cross flow, which he then tried to correct with full helm and more power. Bad move, the boat swung wildly and careened off the wrong side of the entrance marker post. Much swearing and falling about.

Boat now firmly lodged on the putty. Puts crew to heave against the marker post (which is now conveniently hard against the upper rubbing strake) and whacks engines to full power astern! Massive wash, lock keeper runs across to tell him to ease off, just as boat comes out of the putty like a cork from the proverbial bottle and dumps crew over the side in the process. Crowd begins to gather as the show starts to heat up with boat now in the grip of the current and the movement from the engines as it charges back towards some moored canal barges. Barge owners now frantically putting out fenders and yelling advice.

Skipper succeeds in stopping reverse charge by throwing everything the other way and careers off across the river in the direction of the opposite bank and the restricted approach to the weir. Crowd waits with bated breath - but, he's in luck! The combination of current, shutting off power and the resultant loss of forward way avoids a second attempt at the putty. What now? He is now alone on board and in the middle of the river. To get alongside, he needs to bring it in gently and get a line onto a mooring point sharpish. More yelled instructions from the lock keeper, his crew (presumably his lady wife, although this is now difficult to gauge under the combination of mud, weed and sodden clothing) and one or two other "helpful" boat owners from respective boats.

Generally, it all put me in mind of a naval signal to a destroyer skipper who had made a mess of coming alongside the refueling berth. It read: "You may reattack the Oiling Berth at this tide, or berth at Berth 15 and be warped to the oiler when the tide slackens." In naval terms, that's pretty insulting language.

Our hopeful skipper, now much more cautious, managed on his second attempt to get his nose into the cut and then to allow the cross current to push him against the wall where his waiting crew grabbed a line off the deck and secured him to the applause of the watching crowd. I felt a pang of sympathy for him. Its not much fun handling a large and unfamiliar craft in confined water, especially when there are hidden currents.

As I walked on I reflected ruefully on one that I nearly got wrong spectacularly a few years ago. I used to coxswain a preserved fire boat "Massey Shaw" - a Dunkirk "Little Ship" (Check this site Association of Dunkirk Little Ships <www.adls.org.uk>) credited with bringing off no less than 600 men to other ships and 104 herself all the way back to Ramsgate. She is 78 feet long and 13 feet 6 in the beam and draws only 3 feet 9 fully laden. You've guessed, she was NOT designed to operate at sea! In fact, she makes a fair impression of a submarine in any sort of sea over about three feet and can roll to an unbelievable angle. (Tried it - took her to Dunkirk with twelve other blokes in 1990 - 50 years and all that!)

Anyway, one day I was asked to move another boat moored with us, a former Motor Fishing Vessel which, despite the name, had never been a fishing vessel, she had been built for the RN as a fishery patrol vessel and harbour duties craft.

Taking her off the mooring was no problem. She handled much more easily than the Massey and I thoroughly enjoyed taking a turn around the West India Dock with her. Nice pair of Gardiner Diesels driving her twin screws, well balanced rudder and generally nice and handy. Putting her back was another story. It is a berth you have to back into. I am used to handling boats with outward rotating screws, this little beauty had screws that rotated INWARDS. OK, so I may have to explain that to some readers. The ship has a tendency to swing its stern (the back end) in the direction the screw rotates. When you are driving forwards the screws would normally be rotating so the left hand one is running anti-clockwise and the right hand running clockwise. When you go astern this is reversed.

Now, by playing with your engines, you can make her swing her tail to the left or the right using the "torque" of the screw and engine and this helps to control the direction as you back up. If you are used to them running one way, and now take over a boat that has the opposite .....

Well, it took me about 20 seconds to figure out that there was something wrong when I tried to line up as I backed into the berth. It took three seconds to cancel engines astern and get myself out into the main dock again. Then I rang the engineer and asked which way his props rotated. "Inward rotation Skipper, sorry, thought you knew!"

Well, I knew now. The second attempt was much more orderly, but I was in a closed dock, no currents and plenty of water to play with. I must have got something right that day, the crew reckoned I handled her better than the regular skipper. Flattery got them a pint later.

Posted by The Gray Monk at November 15, 2003 08:16 PM