Sea Sense - Doing the Math

   If there's anything at all I've learned at sea, if you are going to get where you need to go, you have to do your homework. It doesn't matter what size the boat is - if you miscalculate your equations doing the math in your navigation, the mistakes can be painful.
   Literally.
   That's one thing I've admired about Julian Stockwin, author of the well acclaimed "Kydd" series novels. He writes of the days when our seas were defended with wooden ships of fighting sail and iron men.
   And no GPS.
   Julian is definately one who does his homework. He's a seaman who has seen the harder ways of a life at sea, and in reading one of his novels, "Quarterdeck", I couldn't get past the navigational solution worked out between Kydd, now an officer, and his navigator Rawson at the end of Chapter Four, without remembering a time when I would have enjoyed a bit of peace having Julian along.
   There have been times when knowing the sea and the way she works has saved me. During the ice storm related in the beginning of this web log was only one such incident.
   The one time that memory recalled Julian's novel "Quarterdeck", only fortunately without the fog, happened several years before that day in the Arctic. But it proved just as memorable, and with just as unexpected an ending.
   Kodiak Island, Alaska is located at the northwestern head of the Gulf of Alaska, where the Japanese Current comes up along the Aleutian Chain and then curls down into the Southeastern Panhandle, as we Alaskans refer to it. The weather that these colliding fronts can create is serious business, especially beginning in August, and hits the southeastern side of the Island and it's archipelagos quite hard. 
   But it's through this open coastal waterway I had to travel each fishing season, to get to my commercial fish site on Kupreanof Straits, over 140 nautical miles away. In an 18 foot open double ender.
   Then after the fishing season was over in August I had to use this same route to return, to get to our home at the village of Old Harbor, tucked just inside the straits of Sitkalidak Island. Over two thirds of the passage was across the open face of the gulf of Alaska, and it's not a run to take lightly. The weather picks up suddenly and hits hard across this stretch, and several of my friends are no longer with us now because of it.
   On this occasion I had completed a good season, and was towing a new skiff I had designed and just shelled in to complete once I had it home, for the next year's fishing season. She was a gull wing 18 foot built to run with twin outboards, but until it was finished I would not have use of her. So she had to be towed behind the tough little double ender.
   I had been watching the weather fronts - Alaska has some of the best weather channels I've seen, covering marine weather at sea as well as for flight operations. I studied the moving fronts, calculating the effect on the tides and the wind patterns that I would encounter on the way home. The currents would play a serious part in the way the passage was effected by the oncoming weather, especially across the open waters of the Gulf, and timing the tides with the hours of daylight remaining that time of year was critical. A mistake would find me in a building sea at night, with several rocky areas across my path - and a falling 20 foot tide exposing their hazards to a wooden hull.
   Not good.
   I'm known for being safety conscious, especially at sea. I did the math, worked out the time and distances with the tidal effects, and calculated the positions I should find myself in at each point I knew needed to be specific.
Then I went over the boats again to make sure everything was in order. The little double ender was a proven, tough little boat. We had weathered a lot of rough seas together, and I knew the route well enough that, if things got too bad, or the unexpected happened, I could find a hole to get out of it. Even if I had to get rid of the new skiff to do it, I would make it.
   As long as knew where I was - even in the dark.
   Which meant doing the math.
   It was a good thing I did.

   The day I was to depart, unexpected family complications held me up, and I didn't cast off until several hours past my planned departure. I knew from the allowance I had made, that the tides would work with me past the worst of the points across my path. But approaching the Straits into Sitkalidak, if the weather started to build, I would be hunting a hole.

   At night.

   The long Alaskan days were starting to shorten enough that I knew I wouldn't make it in time if the weather turned. The forecast was good, and was usually reliable, but anything could happen. I rechecked my positioning as I went, the tide finally changing and my time and distance calculations with it. Dusk had settled in long before I cut across Boulder Bay as I passed Dangerous Cape, and adjusting for the building ebb tide, I approached the entrance of Sitkalidak Straits in darkness.

   Here's where a moon would have been nice. Any light at all. But the new moon was invisible and the stars that sparkled above me, while helping me to maintain my course, only gave enough of a visual aid to show the black outlines of a cliff side to either side of me. There was no references of any kind to indicate how far I was from either side. Or the rocky shores defending them.

   I could tell by the motion of the boat beneath me the way of the water, the depth enough to feel at peace with my position in the channel thus far. But it felt like I was in a black tunnel with only the top of the box open, and no way to see where I was at going through - middle, or sides. But I was familiar enough with the double ender to know what she was telling me, and continued with my faith in her reading the water I couldn't see - and the math that had told me earlier where I should be.

   But after the first hour, now deep into the channel against a strong ebb tide, I couldn't help but long for a light, any light of some kind to confirm my position.

   Be careful what you pray for - you just might get it.

   I was studying the blackness around me when I noticed ahead, that the channel was starting to brighten. And not just a bit, but with a blaze of light as, from around the bend to my port bow, well ahead of me, a large fishing boat came into view from around his side of the channel. His "Norwegian Sunrise", as we refer to the massive array across the masthead light bar on our fishboats, was brilliantly illuminating everything for miles across the channel as he turned my way, and headed for the open sea.

   Suddenly everything was vividly portrayed in every detail - and to my relief, I was right on course, in the middle of the channel.

   And right in the fish boat's way, if I didn't adjust course! Fortunately we passed without incident, and in the fading light I found a perfect little bay to drop the hook for the night. I secured my berth, fixed a welcome meal, and stretched out under the stars after a prayer of gratitude to a loving Heavenly Father who saw the needs of a simple fisherman. Sometimes He teaches us in His answer, and sometimes He teaches us without one, knowing whatever it is, it's something we can handle and learn from ourselves. The important point is that we are willing to learn.

   I fell asleep having learned that either way, He answers prayers.

   And it pays to do your homework.

   Thank you, Julian.

   -WKD

    

Master's Craftsman...

   From a mist, darkness parting; So mysterious the outline, shape of things
                                       To come,

   Like a good horse, closer nuzzling under the arm there feels the breath of life stirring.

   Creation of heart and hands of the sea, speaking trust, she feels peace

                                      and in tenderness awaits

                                      Her growth in patient increments.

               Molded of a Master's Hands, we grow together as One,

   She within me grows before me, vision of my dreams with each careful tooling touch -

   I within Him grow before Him, Master of the Winds and Sea that obey His every Will,

   Work I in careful patience the craft of life He teaches with His Son.

   These with mortal hands carry the reality of art into life, breathing the crisp air of the ocean's majestic power, rhythm of the waves in heart pounding move together;

   Bonding, building, expanding our dreams through the sweat and hopes

                                        of Triumphs won,

   In vision and sweep of blade, pull of mortal arm into dawn of eternal

                                        Victory

   We depend upon each other, live for each other as does He for us.

   Thus mortality speaks its lessons, stirring the dust of man into the

                                        Shape of things to come,

                                        Forever One.

                                                         - WKD

   So it continues, as the frames are now cut and, labled with their length on the ends of each piece, are soaking in a salt water solution awaiting their time in the steam box when it comes. With the Long'l stringers in place, the three jig frames are marked and set to hold each, as the frames are bent around them - set inside what will be the upper surface of the keel, outside of the long'ls, and tucked back inside the long'l gun'l "framing" to cool. The holes within the gun'ls are cut prior to receive the frame ends, then the real shaping begins at the bow and stern, bringing them all together.

   And Keilidgh Irene really begins to look like the living creature of the sea she has been conceived to become...

                                                   WKD

  

Keilidgh Irene - From a Rib...

   If you want a wood frame kayaq, be prepared to climb a tree or two. And if it's on a bluff to get the knees you need, you may have to go out on a limb to get what you want. Either way, I was using muscles I had forgotten I had. The number of times I've climbed a tree since I was a boy you could count on one hand, and probably have fingers left over. If you're careful with the saw.
   The project awaiting my efforts was finding and shaping a knee timber to secure the cockpit on it's forward end, and the deck ridge pole immediately in front of it. The ridge pole would extend forward to be swept upward into the byforcated bow.
   The tree that had the knees I wanted was a close grained pine at the edge of the bluff. It's not a bad drop, but the slope made handling the saws a challange, as a lot of wood was to be cut for the shapes I needed. It took an hour to do, which gave our 115 pound Chesapeake/Sheppard time for some fun on the waterfront.
   We returned to the shop, and set up for trimming the cut knees to shape.

   As the wood was green, the work was slow, requiring a careful shaping with saw, chisel and draw blade. But a few hours later, the knee's basic form was squared off, and the cockpit's forward knee brace was oiled and ready to set aside to cure. By the time I'm ready to start the final shaping of the knee, so it will fit snugly into the framework, it will have set up enough to be worked without cracking.

   The ends are left in the round with additional stock for creating the final shape of the frame to fit into it's assigned section. There is much to do before that is done.
   It's a lot of work for each piece of the kayaq, and there's 56 pieces in each of the Arctic Eskimo boats I build of the North Pacific framing arrangement.

   But the end result is worth it.
   Life can be like that... - WKD