Devices to hold chain come in various degrees of ease, strength, durability, complexity, convenience and expense. The ones I use, called fast hooks or grab hooks are here: http://www.mcmaster.com/#chain-hooks/=1udla0 The worst case I saw was on an oil tanker I was crew on. Called a chain stopper, the chain payed out from the windlass and through this device which had a handle which could be used to lower a jaw between links to hold the chain fast. One day when the chain was let go to drop the anchor, somehow, perhaps due to the vibration when the chain runs out (each link is about 10" long), the handle moved and the gate dropped onto the moving chain. The chain stopper was bodily ripped out of the deck and jambed into the upper end of the hawse pipe. Nobody on board had ever heard of that happening before. We were all grateful there were no injuries. The premier classic anchor story was supposed to have happened in Subic Bay, the Philippines. It was the early days of handheld radios, mostly CB units. As one ship was leaving another was preparing to anchor. The Captain of the anchoring ship gave the order to "Let go the port anchor!", but the Mate on the departing ship heard the order and thought it was his Captain giving the order. When he questioned the wisdom of doing this the anchoring Captain repeated in no uncertain terms to "let go the @#$% port anchor!!". On the departing vessel the Mate let go the port anchor with very expensive consequences. This incident was given wide publicity and since then our communications always included the name of the ship. Norm S/V Bandersnatch Lying Julington Creek 30 07.695N 081 38.484W _______________________________________________ Liveaboard mailing list [email protected] To adjust your membership settings over the web http://www.liveaboardnow.org/mailman/listinfo/liveaboard To subscribe send an email to [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected] The archives are at http://www.liveaboardnow.org/pipermail/liveaboard/ To search the archives http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] The Mailman Users Guide can be found here http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman/mailman-member/index.html
