Squalls (nice word but nasty things)

Date & Time 20-12-2011  0000hrs

Position:- 09* 54’ S  138* 19’ E

Course:- 300*

Speed:- 5 Knots

Wind:- NW 20 Knots (Force 5 Fresh Breeze)

Sea State:- Moderate (3 to 5 feet Moderate waves taking ona more pronounced form. Many white horses are formed. Chance of some spray)

Weather:- Overcast(Complete cloud cover)

Temp 81F

(Wind Sea & Weather are all taken from the Beaufort notation to indicate the given conditions)

Distance to go:- 2270 nautical miles

On the chart we are to the east of the top left compass rose near enough where the 10* Latitude line and 138 Longitude lines cross  

http://www.charts.noaa.gov/NGAViewer/74008.shtml

We are heading to the North as fast as we can to evade the worst part of the potential tropical storm. The forecast last night was slightly mellower than the previous one with a maximum predicted wave height of only 5 meters.

As the depression has not deepened too much and therefore the storm has not yet configured we are hoping that it dissipates as they often do. If not we are travelling north to get away form the worst of it and use the available islands to afford ourselves some protection.

The music of the day

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mu7BlDvK-ns

One of the weather features out here are the short vicious squalls that come out of nowhere. (In fact that description reminds me of Chad the Whore Junkie’s latest disastrous chapter in his somewhat unusual life which I will share with you later.)

A squall is a localised mini storm that just appears out of the blue and can strike with considerable force. You will first notice a sudden accumulation of dark cloud in a localised area, this is often accompanied by a large fat line on the ships radar.

Experience tells you what it is, however it is difficult to tell if it is just a localised downpour or a fast moving squall. The radar will show some tracking but your eyes are the best tool in this situation.

Sailing vessel were particularly prone to serious damage if they hadn’t shortened sail in advance of a squall and many have been de-masted, lost sails or been blown over as a consequence. The importance of a good all round lookout on a sail vessel cannot be stressed enough.

For a motor driven vessel the dangers are not so bad but care and attention still needs to be taken. If we are close in next to a platform with divers down of engaged in a heavy lift, or any of the other position critical jobs we do, then a large powerful squall could have serious consequences to the operation.

What we do in the daytime is search the front of the squall with binoculars looking for the amount of disturbance on the sea surface to give us an indication of the severity. The more disturbance the more powerful the squall and with enough warning we can suspend operations, move the divers to a safe haven and or move the vessel further away from the platform. At night we are dependent on the radar to show is the track of the squall and give us an idea of how quickly it is moving.

You can be sat in glorious sunshine as a squall approaches with a 5 to 10 nmot gentle breeze running and the squall will hit like a hammer and within 10 to 20 seconds the wind could be 50 60 70 knots or more.

Last year we had one that hit with the ferocity of a steam train and had roared  from 10 knots to 75 knots in the blink of en eye. When you are in that sort of wind on the panoramic windowed bridge the noise ins incredible. It is all wind and rain withy the rain being driven horizontally and reducing visibility to just few meters. On this occasion after we thought the wind had peaked at 75 knots there was sudden deafening bang, enough to make us all duck on the bridge and the wind shot to 102 knots for a few seconds before reducing to amore respectable 80 knots and then slowly over 15 minutes or so down to 25 and then half an hour later back to clear blue skies and a gentle breeze.

The outride of the vessel looked like it have been scrubbed by a thousand charwomen it was blasted so clean.

The sea itself whips up and gets a bit frothy locally during that time but because the winds are so localised and moving so fast it doesn’t have a chance to heap the seas up into proper waves and after the wind has passed it is back to normal for the wind conditions very quickly as though nothing had ever happened.

That is one of the bizarre things about the sea is that if you suffer a massive storm on land there is always tell tale signs of its passage.  Roofs gone, massive trees that had been part of the landscape gone, it leaves a scar that takes along time to heal.

At sea you can travel through a patch of sea that is a raging maelstrom, with towering violent waves smashing into the ship and a wind so powerful it threatens to rip your breathe out of your lungs. A violent, roaring, dangerous, expression of raw power.

A day or two later it is a calm, peaceful, silent, welcoming oasis of gentleness.