I appreciate all the words of encouragement and stories of other people’s mishaps. I have started thinking about alternative scenarios. One big question is what we would have done if SeaTow had not been able to get the boat off the reef or if we had refused the help. I might have been able to get a ride ashore for crew and stayed with the boat, or hitched a ride and come back later with a skiff (this happened 3-5 miles from mooring). I don’t know anything about the legalities of leaving a boat on a reef expecting to return before the next high tide. As I realize now, it was closer to low tide than I thought and it is possible that we could have floated off at the next high tide (about 11PM that night). One could always get towed the next day at high tide. If I had left the boat there to let crew get ashore and then come back out before high tide, when is a boat considered “abandoned”? As someone commented, most of the damage was when the boat was pulled off the reef, so there is an argument that I should have waited given we were not taking on water. Of course that might have changed at night at low tide and then I would have no help and no dinghy. Dave
Aries 1990 C&C 34+ New London, CT
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