Hurricane Irene:

Well owning a boat and taking care of it is one thing but doing also trying to survive a Hurricane is an entirely new experience all together. The largest concern I had was how the boat would do having a winged mast which make power in 5 knots of wind and having no idea what it would be like in 50-70 knots was a bit over whelming. In the end I did as much as I could as for mooring prep, and boat prep and hopped for the best. Having a mooring in Wickford had a large part of the fact that it is one of the best protected harbors in RI and showed this during this storm. below is a list of what I did and how it turned out:

mooring prep:

. inspected chain and cleaned as much of it as I could

. replaced and upgraded the shackles and tackle hardware which attached chain to mooring ball and penants

. added a swivel to chain below all tackle which I could attach a safety line which went to mast

. added a 2nd penant, and added chafing gear

boat prep:

. took sail off boom and put in rear berth

. took boom off mast

. filled fuel tank

. filled water tank

. put mast in straight postions forward and aft

. attached jack line wires to forward pulpit rails

. tightened back stays

. attached main halyard to traveler for main sheet, centered and tightened

. removed as much windage as possible from decks

. tightened all hatches

. tied tiller to center

Result:

during storm est wind 30-50 mph the boat was tacking hard on the mooring sailing until penant pulled bow through a tack. interesting to watch concidering all other sailboats where staying straight into the wind. the boat came out with no issues or damage and very happy with resutl