Working on the helm of a tall ship

Posted on 01/04/2013 by Michael

View from the helm of a tall ship

One of the two principal tasks when on Watch is to take control of The Helm (the other is the look-out, to make sure you don’t hit something – or something hits you). The Helm is the driving seat (although you stand up) of the vessel and is welcomed – or not – very much depending upon the weather.

(So I don’t get accused of teaching grannies how to suck eggs I will assume, for the benefit of this post, that the reader knows absolutely nothing about the workings of a tall ship – very much as I did before getting on board 2 months ago.)

The first thing to stress is that The Helm is at the back of the ship which is like driving from the boot if you’re a car driver. Also you can’t see where you’re going, there’s the wheelhouse and the sails in the way. And anyway, at least for a huge chuck of this voyage it didn’t matter that you couldn’t see where you were heading as all that could be seen from the front was sea, and more sea. It’s for the look-out to make sure that you don’t hit anything.

The helm itself is a big wheel (about 4 foot in diameter) that is as far as it is possible to be at the stern (the back or the blunt end) of the vessel. Go any further back and you’re in the water. This wheel is not protected in any way from the elements. That was OK when we were in the Caribbean, when ‘the elements’ were basically the blazing sun, but it becomes a different matter when heading further north into an uncertain late European winter/early Spring.

That has meant that since we started the northward/eastward journey we have encountered more rain and the wind can be ‘bracing’ as they say. In fact, one thing that has been surprising, to me and others, is the way air temperatures have remained fairly constant and relatively high. To take a random date (when I wrote a first draft of this post) the 11^th March, both the day and night-time temperatures were around the 13°C level – and at the time we were heading towards the Bay of Biscay. So it’s not necessarily the air temperature falling that makes it cold on The Helm, it’s the wind chill that you get either from the following wind that fills the sails or the wind created by the vessel itself when under power.

There is a helm under cover. That’s in the wheelhouse but that’s just there to taunt you as you fight against the gale force winds (which we had on four or five occasions) and the face stinging rain that normally accompanies the occasional squalls that we encountered with increased frequency. This wheel does work (it was tested when we were shown what would happen in the event of the wheel being put out of action for any reason) but it has never been touched in anger, to the best of my knowledge.

Inside the wheelhouse

As this is a training ship the policy to keep The Helm outside is probably all about building character, but personally I’d rather have no character and be warm.

At the same time, to be fair, a proper, professional helmsman/woman on a sailing tall ship such as this would need to be able to see and hear how the sails are reacting to the wind. They can remain stable for a long time but the changes of wind speed and direction can happen quite quickly at times, again especially as we head north into more uncertain climatic conditions.

So that sets the picture.

What does being on The Helm entail?

Basically obeying the orders of the Officer of the Watch and looking at 4 dials that give you the information you need to understand what is happening.

I’ve forgotten to mention that actual helm of the vessel is powered by hydraulics, it would be impossible for one person to move the rudder on such a ship without powered assistance of some kind. The speed at which the rudder reacts depends upon a number of factors; the speed of the vessel at the time; whether it is under power or under sail; sea conditions, i.e., how rough it might be (a big wave can push you off course by an amazingly high level of degrees); as well as the ability of The Helm operator.

So the 4 dials to watch, from left to right, are: the wind speed indicator; the wind direction indicator; the dial that shows the position of the rudder; and the compass heading. These are illuminated at night and are all replicated inside the wheelhouse so that the Duty Officer (who doesn’t have to stand out in the elements) can see what is happening in the outside world as well. If the weather conditions are not bad it’s quite easy to take in this information. If you hit a squall and it lasts for a while then the driving rain makes reading the dials slightly more difficult.

In general, being at The helm is fun. Here you are basically controlling this 114 foot, 250 tonne vessel, on the high seas. In a sailing ship all the crew does is prevent the vessel from going where it wants to go so The Helm is where that all happens. For example, if the ship naturally wants to go towards the port but your desired direction is to the starboard this means there is a constant ‘fight’ between the two forces.

And the physical experience is dependent upon the weather conditions. In the Caribbean the seas were quite gentle, as were the winds, and it was relatively easy to follow the heading given. But when we started getting into the heavier and more aggressive open waters of the Atlantic it became more of a battle, and you knew you had been working if you were constantly moving the wheel to keep on course. The hydraulics make it possible for a single person to control the rudder but it’s not the same sort of powered steering that you get on an articulated lorry.

Sometimes you might be told to steer not on the compass heading but by reading the wind direction. Here you guideline is that you must try and keep within a certain part of the wind direction indicator ‘clock’ – it’s divided up as a clock would be into 12 units and your guideline might be to keep with 25 and 20 to the hour (not the way it should be described, that involves degrees, but the easiest way for novices to understand). Failure to do so could mean that the wind gets on the ‘wrong’ side of a sail and the consequences can possibly be quite dire. The breaking of the boom on the spanker on the TransAtlantic crossing leg of the journey was probably due to this backing of the wind. It’s from this situation that you get the saying ‘sailing too close to the wind’.

From what I understand anticipation of what will happen is the key to working successfully on a tall ship. If you leave your adjustment until it starts to show then you have left it too late as the vessel takes some time to understand what it should do, this is even more so in rough weather when the rudder might be spending some time out of the water. This might make it difficult for experienced yacht sailors as those vessels respond much more quickly. And you won’t make many friends below decks if you are constantly following instead of leading at The Helm as the ship will tend to rock back and forth making any objects not nailed down fly around at random.

One thing I’ve found interesting about being on The Helm is your impression of speed. If it is at night and the wind is behind you, blowing relatively strong (i.e., 20 – 30 knots) you think you’re racing along even if you’re not. If you’re sailing during the day, with the winds negligible and therefore under power, you get the impression you are barely moving when you might be doing 5-6 knots, which isn’t a bad speed for such a vessel.

And as to speeds they have varied, as you might expect, on such a journey. With little wind and the engines on we can expect about 6 knots. But when we had the most favourable winds in mid-Atlantic we were clocking up more than 11 knots for short periods of time. That meant it was quite uncomfortable down below but we certainly clocked the miles then and that helped us to do the crossing from Bermuda to The Azores in less than 14 days.

Since we leaving the warmth of the Caribbean being on Watch, and especially at The Helm for any length of time, a wind proof jacket is vital. As mentioned above the air temperatures have been fairly, and surprisingly, high and constant but the wind chill is what gets to you.

Although I haven’t been too successful in capturing it on film another aspect of being on The Helm in bad weather is that you are totally oblivious to the walls of water that build up behind you. The vessel has been very adept at dealing with these types of conditions but the way the vessel rises on the crests of waves and then shoots down into the troughs makes for an unforgettable picture in your mind of the power of the ocean.

Under normal conditions you wouldn’t be on The Helm for more than about 30 minutes. In conditions which are in any way challenging you need to concentrate and that would be lost if you tried to stay on too long, especially for non-professionals. This is even more the case during a night Watch. The red compass heading dial becomes quite mesmerising as it ticks away virtually every second. You try and follow the course given but with modern equipment you are trying to do what would have been impossible in the past. Before modern electronics The Helm would have followed the general course as well as they could but it would then have been corrected over a period of hours rather than a period of seconds.

But it’s not just a matter of standing and occasionally turning the wheel. If you hit either rough weather or you have a favourable wind which will tend to make the ship list to one side you have to move to maintain your centre of gravity at such a point that you can remain standing. This means you have to bend your legs to compensate for the listing and this would be an acceptable exercise regime for Premier footballers. And although you have hydraulics assisting the wheel it still needs effort to turn that wheel, especially if a quick correction is called for, and your arms and back feel the strain after a difficult Watch.

Wheelhouse at night

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A storm in the Bermuda Triangle in February 2013

Posted on 28/03/2013 by Michael

A tall ship lists to starboard during a storm in the Bermuda Triangle

More on sailing on a tall ship

It would have been almost impossible to sail in the Atlantic in February without encountering some bad weather and we had to deal with our first storm on the 17/18^th February, as we passed through the Bermuda Triangle.

After a couple of weeks sailing around the islands of the southern Caribbean it was time to start the long journey back to the UK. At first we remained with the calm we were used to and could be on deck at four in the morning in shorts and t-shirts, so benign was the weather.

But this couldn’t last. Heading north, especially at this time of year (it was the middle of February and that’s still the winter in the northern hemisphere) we were bound to hit something different. And on the 17^th we did. We had been motoring along, getting no assistance from the wind, when we bumped into a gale, the bottom end of a system that had been dumping a lot of snow along the eastern seaboard of the United States and creating havoc in the seas to the north.

It was the first storm of the journey (we were to have 4 or 5 more before the end) so for those of us not used to sailing it was the first opportunity to see what the sea can do when it’s angry.

One thing I was to learn very quickly was that it’s difficult to capture, either with video or still camera, the sensation of a storm on a boat. The vessel responds to the waves in the way that it has been designed to do, which is amazingly well. The swell might be mountainous but the dance that the ship does to keep itself afloat seems to mitigate the storm’s force.

If you think about it, all the images you might have seen in films (which in themselves are a false reality) of storms, that make you wonder how the ship can survive, are taken off and away from the vessel itself. The small ship gets dwarfed by the huge, killer waves, but you only get that perspective from a distance which is impossible to capture if you are on board. In the middle of the Atlantic there’s no one out there to take pictures of your progress. The element of threat and danger in a film is created on board by someone throwing buckets of water at the cast, trying to give the impression that the sea wants to invade the man-made environment. But I learnt during the storm of the 17^th – 18^th February that the reality is somewhat different.

And recent technology goes against you when you want to capture the ominous colour of the water. I now know that digital cameras like blue and those black, threatening waves take on a less threatening aspect through a camera lens.

If you want to get a very short (only 30 seconds of a 30 hour storm) impression of what it was like click here for a link to a video I posted on YouTube.

Main Watch during the Bermuda Triangle storm in March 2013

FORECAST

Shipping Forecast issued at 06.00 UCT, 17^th February 2013

General Synopsis: Bad news

Sea Area: Bermuda Triangle

Wind Direction: All the wrong way

Wind Speed: 35 knots, gusting to 50, Gale Force 8 to 9

Visibility: 8 miles – though nothing to see but sea

Precipitation: Nil – we hope

Chances of Mysterious Disappearance: Low to non-existent

Barry Manilow: Severe

The port side during the storm

SOUND

ventilators’ whistle and hum drowned by the ominous wind’s howl

foaming and fizzing sea, impassive still, uncaring, truly the cruel sea

breaking waves splash on deck, buckets of seawater elicit curses from the drenched

flapping, snapping, cracking sails indicate the wrong sort of wind

squeaking, straining ropes on clunking pulleys fight against the elements

grating of the bearings on the helm tell of the effort needed this day

no talking, gales kill the art of conversation, apart from nervous banter

ship’s bell, tolling for us all, so no need to ask

thump of the ship’s bow into sea and the clank of the loose anchor against the ship’s side

radio transmission of May Day calls, one Canadian fishing vessel lost a thousand miles away

below galley utensils play an impromptu symphony

plastic cups clatter in their purpose made niches trying to escape

in cabins restless tossing and turning replaces snoring

prayers being said in muted tones, atheists finding faith too late

The bow crashes into the waves

LIGHT

ship’s lights, white, red and green, tell others what and where we are

grey turns to red on the heading indicator, hypnotising the helm after half an hour

lights in the wheelhouse, white for the log, red for the night

below decks portholes illuminate the foam

red lamp for port reflects momentarily on the spray, indicating danger?

the eerie green on the starboard side reminds us of the unworldly nature of the journey

high white mast light says we’re a vessel under power, sad admission for a sailing ship

moonlight, young first quarter, weak, red, low, short duration, shrouded in clouds – sometimes

pools of stars amongst the clouds, faint, their serenity belies the storm below

beyond the rails the dark abyss of the deep

torch to read temperature, hourly ritual unaffected by the storm

red flashing warning light, but it’s a false alarm, only the bilge

dark apparitions, reminiscent of Carpenter’s Fog, with their slow, unnatural gait, indicate the end is near

time for bed, to sleep, perchance to dream (or lie in the cold, wet arms of a nightmare)

More on sailing on a tall ship

The start of the day on a tall ship?

Posted on 07/03/2013 by Michael

Cabin 10 en suite bathroom

More on sailing on a tall ship

Everyday activities that we take for granted take on a different dimension when attempted on a tall ship. The mundane becomes a major task, needing care, thought, consideration, and a very great deal of luck and good fortune to be able to leave the cabin and carry out whatever activities are called for on a normal working day.

Before going any further it might be useful to set the scene. When a tall ship is in motion, except on the flattest of seas and in the most favourable of circumstances, it will be listing to either port (left) or starboard (right). Under sail that tends to be more gentle and easier to deal with than when under power. Then the movement of the vessel becomes much more erratic and more difficult to predict.

Another matter it is difficult to image, until you experience it for any length of time, is how heavy the most common, every day pieces of furniture, becomes. A door that swings effortlessly on an even keel seems to weigh a ton when at an angle of 20 degrees or more. Drawers that open and close with no problem can either shoot out of their runners on their own accord or need the strength of Superman to open.

OK. So we will take a ‘typical’ day and try to do what is automatic at the start of the day in a land based environment and see what happens at sea, on a bucking bronco of a tall ship.

The human body, even after millions of years of evolution, does not fully use all that is taken in in the way of food and drink. Waste products are created and have to be expelled on a regular basis if the body is to function at any reasonable level of efficiency. Most people will go through this process first thing in the morning without any thought whatsoever. Not on a tall ship.

Assuming you have evacuated your bunk and arrived at the bathroom door without being bounced against every surface on the way (everything seems much harder on a ship) your first problem is the door to the bathroom. (In this scenario I am using the luxury cabin situation, i.e., one with an en suite bathroom.)

Depending on its positioning it will either weigh a ton and need all your strength to open or will close so quickly you are in danger of crushing either fingers and/or ankles/legs. But for the sake of brevity we will assume that entrance has been gained without major mishap.

Men might piss standing up, gentlemen do so sitting down. Homo sapiens is the only mammal that doesn’t mark its territory with its scent, but that’s exactly what you would do if you attempted a pee standing up. At the same time, if you were able to stand long enough without crashing painfully into the metal wall, you would be able to see graphically the effects of gravity as the normally straight stream of liquid gets distorted depending upon the relevant listing of the ship.

The use of toilet paper also has to be thought about. Standing up in the normal manner is not recommended, you don’t know how well fixed to the wall the tiny basin might be, as that’s all you really have for support. To add to the difficulties related to the ship’s movement the toilet system itself is quite delicate and excessive solids can have the impact of breaking the vacuum and then disabling the whole toilet system on the boat. Not a way to make friends and influence people.

Next to a shave. (This section could be relevant to both genders.)

Standing in front of a mirror to lather up is not really feasible. (In fact, the more experience I have on this ship the more I realise that sitting is preferable to standing in most circumstances.) The use of two hands to carry out an action is just not possible. All the techniques you might have learnt about keeping your legs wide apart and flexing the knees in response to the movement of the vessel will only be effective for a few seconds. Having already broken an ankle as I was getting undressed for bed I don’t want to add to that the breaking of a leg that had been trapped between a toilet bowl and my own momentum, a thought that has crossed my mind not a few times.

However, sitting down on the edge of the bath tub means looking at the mirror at an angle of 90º, which is not easy. A fish would have less problems but evolution having put both our eyes at the front of our face we have to make the best of a bad deal. As to the sitting I’ve found that naked skin is definitely de rigour, as this provides friction which would be lacking if clothed. This is easier in the first class, en suite cabins as streaking along the corridor of the cabin deck would probably be frowned upon.

As to the actual shaving that becomes an acquired skill, either that or you only do so in the calmest of conditions or wait until the ship is tied up in port. After attempting to shave you realise why sailors in the past were predominantly bearded – before the invention of the safety razor the cut throat would have lived up to its name.

Now to the shower. Easy, no? No!

The small bath tub is designed for sit down use and unless tied to a dock that’s the best policy. Again, on land too many assumptions are made, things are done without any thought as they have been carried out so many times before. Those assumptions are positively dangerous on board a tall ship.

Handrails exist but too much dependence upon then whilst standing could lead to the most dire of consequences. Yes, it seems strange sitting whilst having a shower, especially when the water is on a push button timer, but it does make sense. Think of it. Whilst showering there are times when you are effectively blind, either by soap or shampoo. In an environment that is moving it’s very easy to lose your orientation and the next thing you know you are clutching at thin air rather than the handrail you thought was there.

But your problems aren’t over yet. Now you have to get dry. By now you are used to doing things much slower and in a more considered manner so getting rid of most of the water shouldn’t be that difficult. But what happens when you want to get out of the bath tub? You know that non-slip flooring that is common in showers nowadays? Effective, isn’t. Yes, but also no. Not when it gets wet and then you tip it up on its end. I would challenge any manufacturer of such surfaces to prove that they had tested their products under such circumstances.

So, a final warning. DON’T let the floor get wet. Bare feet and a slippery surface don’t mix and when the ship is really moving about that broken leg is just waiting to happen.

I hope from the above that there is now no need to describe the difficulties associated with dressing, they are much the same as already written about.

So a process that is carried out without any thought in the comfort of your own home takes more than twice as long on a tossing tall ship on the high seas with the added threat of imminent personal injury at virtually every stage.

Living space for two months

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Category Archives: Travel

Working on the helm of a tall ship

A storm in the Bermuda Triangle in February 2013

The start of the day on a tall ship?