Wake me when September Ends

Recently we had a very eventful day, to say the least, sailboats were dragging through the anchorages, crashing into piers, and ending up on the beach or on the reefs. Tropical Storm Karen passed just north of Grenada bringing a downpouring of rain, large waves, and high-wind and plenty of excitement. On SeaSparrow we prepared by anchoring in a place where we felt safe and would feel minimal impacts from the tropical storm. We made sure our anchor had a good hold, secured any loose items and stood watch on the boat.

The day started with a half sunken fishing boat floating by our boat and towards neighboring boats, we jumped on the radio to warn our neighbors of the intruder lurking beneath the surface of the water. Later, we were alerted to the catamaran behind us dragging across the St-Georges channel and towards the rocks on the other side. When calls on the radio failed to get the boat’s skipper’s attention, Eryk and Hugh lowered our dinghy, grabbed a person from a neighboring boat and raced over to knock on the hull to notify our fellow yachter to his predicament. Lucky for him, he started the engines and the crisis was over.

Late in the day, another unanchored boat drifted toward the cruise ship pier on the other side of St-Georges, this time we watched two good samaritans risk themselves as they climbed on board the drifting boat and unsuccessfully tried to start it. They eventually gave up, which left the boat drifting into the pier sustaining some damage to its aft. As the night fell, the excitement continued on the radio as other anchorages more exposed to the southern winds and waves sustained 30-knot winds and 8-foot waves. Moorings broke and anchors lost their hold, which left boats on the beach or reefs.

Karen was the second tropical storm to pass near us, as in early September Dorian passed over St-Lucia and sent us running from Carriacou back to Grenada for protection. However, Dorian was relatively uneventful due to the distance of the storm to us in Grenada.

Hurricane season officially runs from June 1st to November 30th, however, the height of the season occurs in September. As I have stated in previous blogs, the SeaSparrow 2019 hurricane plan was to hideout south of the hurricane belt down in Grenada. This, of course, doesn’t mean we are completely safe from hurricanes, as historically mother nature has dealt Grenada a few doozies. One such event was in 2004 when hurricane Ivan hit Grenada as a Category 3 hurricane. So even though we are out of the hurricane belt we vigilantly watch the horizon for storms. Fortunately, in this day and age, the internet is a large help in keeping cruisers safe. On SeaSparrow we consult the National Hurricane Center at NOAA and our favorite weather app Windy, daily.

Hurricanes need warm water, low winds and high levels of moisture in the atmosphere to form. Our greatest threat in the lower Carribean islands are the storms that originate off the coast of Africa and travel west across the Atlantic. This gives the hurricanes lots of time and the conditions they need to form. Fortunately, there are several sophisticated forecast models, that using the current conditions in the atmosphere, attempt to model global weather systems and hence predict the most likely path and the intensity of the hurricanes. Once we know there is an area of interest on the horizon (typically 5 to 10 days out), our hurricane watch increases from daily to several times a day (as new model runs are posted several times a day), and we keep a close eye on the progression of the storm. If such a storm looks like it has the potential to become a hurricane, there are additional resources we tap into including, videos by Tropical Tidbits that do an excellent job of explaining the system steering features and perhaps more importantly, the certainty levels in the forecast models. On the day of the storm, we can also use the Windy app to watch the actual progression of the storm through satellite and radar images.

Once we decide a storm requires our attention we start to come up with a plan for ensuring we experience the least amount of impact. Since the storms are cyclonic in nature, we need to select an anchorage that accounts for changes in wind/wave direction as the storm moves past. With the two recent tropical storms that meant we left the more northern island of Carriacou and sailed back to Grenada to put more distance between us and the storm center. Each storm has its own circumstances that surround it, which will mean we will need to evaluate the conditions surrounding each storm and determine the best course of action for us, always airing on the side of caution.

So far this season has had its share of tropical storms and hurricanes, most of them turning north around the middle of the Atlantic with only a few venturing near or over the Caribbean Islands. We will hold out for one more month before we start to move north again. Regardless of our storm watch, we continue to enjoy our time hanging out with friends, swimming, snorkeling and honing our fishing skills.