References

Gear

I learned from the trip in 2016. There are a few items that need addressed.

Real foul weather gear. The North Face raincoat and REI goretex pants worked OK. But we had never *really* been in horrible, horrible wet, cold weather. I knew I'd probably been lucky.

A Garmin InReach or similar satellite tracker that tracks my position for others to follow and also allows short text messages.

I wanted to work out the way I carry gear on my life jacket/harness. In testing I realized it was all but impossible to get into the convenience pocket when the life jacket is inflated. I needed to figure out where to store items like the strobe light, whistle, knife, maybe a handheld VHF or personal locator beacon so they would be accessible with the jacket inflated.

I started trolling for sales on gear in the fall of 2018. Traditionally this is when the new stuff is starting to come out. I buy new boat shoes and boat paint during this time. I figured foulies would probably be on sale, too.

I found some close outs on Amazon over that period and wound up with a pair of offshore bib pants a jacket and also tall boots. The boots might be overkill, but they were just $100 more.

Next I started reading up on the Garmin InReach communicators. I read a lot of the product reviews were people complaining about problems getting text messages within 15 mins, etc. I did a lot of work on this in forums, etc. A lot of the problems are related to the cell carriers limiting text message capabilities and changing them around all the time. It seems Emails are much more reliable. I'll be emailing- duh!

I bought an inReach SE+. Reviews of the smaller inReach mini were critical of the system to enter the letters when writing messages. the SE+ was better in this regard. I didn't need the map functions (we use charts) on the more expensive InReach Explorer+.

I've not been able to test all the functions yet. I'm waiting to activate the data plan that will connect to the satellite network until closer to departure date. The 30 day subscription starts when I activate it so I'm trying to do the trip in on 30 period so I'll only have to pay for one month.

Next, I started working on the life jacket storage problem. I bought a couple of small tactical MOLLE pouches that fit on the rear straps of the jacket. these will serve as pockets for stuff. I'll tether anything i put in there so if I *do* fall in the water and need something out the pocket, it won't fall to the bottom of the Atlantic when i open the pocket.

The strobe and whistle I tethered to the jacket and then nestled them in around the air bladder. They will deploy into the water upon the bladder inflation so I'll be able to find them quickly if i fall off the boat at night.

Auto-Inflating life jackets use a CO2 cartridge and a dissolvable tablet, called a bobbin, to inflate the jacket when the wearer falls into the water. The bobbins are supposed be no older than three years. My jacket is just about three years old, so i bought a couple of arming kits.

Since I know the existing CO2 cartridge and bobbin were going to be replaced, I decided I wanted to don the jacket and then immerse it to see it it worked and what it was like.

I drove over to a small lake by my house and tried it out.

References

S/V Weatherbird

Weatherbird was a Gibsea/Dufour '43 - She was lost in a storm when she parted from her mooring off the town of Jamestown, Conanicut Island, RI in 2021 (not sure on that date)

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References

Gear

References

S/V Weatherbird

National Hurricane Center

PassageWeather.com

Ocean Prediction Center

North America Surface Observations

Windy