I was just leaving my dock, w/o the motor on, and thinking to myself "you know, I am really getting the hang of this." Just as that thought escapes into the ether, I looked up to admire the evening stars starting to shine thru the cloud covers. Something else catches my eye as I start to unfurl the jib and in surreal slow motion the mast is on its way down on top of me. I instinctly reach out to grab it as it is going down and manage to break the fall with my head, ouch. I look around to see if anybody saw that ( I meant to do that!) then cranking on the motor, I limped back to my slip. My perfect summer evening sail had come to an abrupt end. I inspected the forestay and found that the quick release pin had worked loose and released the forestay and of course, you know the rest of the story. I installed my CDI roller furler earlier this season and when I put it together the clevis pin already had a line attaching it to the deck, just so I wont lose it if it came loose or I dropped it. Unfortunately I should have tied it to the forestay because every time I furled or unfurled the tether would coil tighter and tighter until... you guessed it, it pulled the pin out. So Anyway 30 minutes later I was again heading out, no motor, from the slip and enjoyed a lovely 45min night sail. I was also able to beat into the slip at the end of the sail... man Lin and Larry would be proud.
BTW my head is still a little sore, and I am glad I don't have a 35ft mast. gil _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats
