[CaptNeil]

I just saw some photos of the Bad Company. They hit a whale the other day and destroyed the bow of the boat. Anyone else seen these photos?

[CaptNeil]

Pics.............

[CaptNeil]

.......................

[CaptNeil]

Not a good day for Team Bad Co... I feel like a kid with his bike stolen, sick to my stomach. Below are emails from Steve... Pat Healy from Viking said in all his years building boats, he has never seen an impact this major isolated to the front of the boat...

But it's just a boat, everyone is safe and that's all that matters..

Anthony

Steve's email..

We had just finished catching all the bait for Anthony's trip and caught several Marlin. It was 11:30 am.

We had seen Whales everywhere all morning. Many breaching. One had jumped two days prior and hit a boat upon falling back into the water. We had just gotten the boat to 22 knots. 2 people on the bridge looking for Whales. When the bow was thrown straight up into the air. 40 tons of Whale colliding with 40 tons of boat at 90 degree angles.

You can see the point of impact in the pix. After careful examination of the damage , the only conclusion is the Whale was just about to breach. It struck with such force that Pete was thrown several feet in the salon into the aft bulkhead. If I had not been with my back against my chair I would have been thrown from the bridge.

I have seen several boats that have hit Whales in the past. Usually, you ride up on the back much as a boat going up on a sandbar, roll down the side and do strut, prop and rudder damage. None of this happened. All of the damage was sustained forward , at a hard angle to the chine. I can't begin to explain the violence of the collision. If I had to guess I would say the Whale was going to jump quartering towards us, almost straight up. You can see this in the pics. The fiberglass that is peeled back is from the hydraulic force of the water peeling it loose as we traveled home. The picture of the Port side shows the force of impact knocking the tube loose and punching a hole in the opposite side.( Note the fiberglass strands sticking out)

We were very fortunate to save the boat and not wind up in the water. It wouldn't have been a bad thing as several boats were around us. I would have lost 30 years of unreplaceable notes and all our personal belongings though.

Unbelievable amount of fiberglass forward in this boat. I can't belive how many laminations were in the stem. I don't know how the boat survived the impact.

Last thing. We spent about a half hour today helping a guy with a broken boat. Lending him tools, talking him through his problem until he was running. I spent my weekend on the phone helping someone else out that was having all kinds of boat issues and was stranded in San Carlos. Talked him through all his issues. It took several hours.I saw the guy we helped today, he was pulling his boat out of the water as ours was coming out. He looked at me shakes his head and says" All those people on the bank today, your the only one that came on the radio when I needed help. Of all the people for this to happen to, sometimes there just is not any justice"

I am sick right now. Gonna try to thing about something else for a few minutes.

Steve

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Subject: FW: accident pics Bad Co
Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2009 14:13:00 -0800

All,

These are the first pix. The Whale, I believe, was in the act of a breach. It was coming up at a very steep angle and made contact with the bow on the starboard side just below the bow thruster tube. There is a hole the size of a basketball that is punched completely through the hull.I believe the tube saved the boat from having a hole punched competely thru it.
The yellow spot just aft of the tube is where the main impact was. It hit so hard it broke the hull on the port side as well.
The stem from 2 feet forward of the tube to 2 feet aft of the tube is crushed.

On impact the bow was thrust a minimum of 6 feet straight up in the air. The prop only gave the whale a glancing blow. There doesn't appear to be any damage to props, struts or rudders.

We were taking on water at a faster rate than the pumps could keep up , so I had Pete hook the raw water intake from the generator to a hose. We also had a condenser pump for A/c pumping water but it wasn't enough.

We were traveling at 22 knots when it struck.

I cannot believe the amount of glass in the stem. I believe any other boat would have split in two on impact..

Steve Lassley

[Mavrik1943]

Seems a whale of a tail to me. I see some evidence of delam! Looks all too familiar, maybe the 630 Bert also hit a Whale, yes!

[Pascal]

I would not doubt the story is accurate but i can't help thinking that a solid glass bottom would have faired much better. some cracks, some water in but not the massive amount of delamination we see here.

[CaptNeil]

The fiberglass that is peeled back is from the hydraulic force of the water peeling it loose as we traveled home. The picture of the Port side shows the force of impact knocking the tube loose and punching a hole in the opposite side.( Note the fiberglass strands sticking out)

The delam occurred after the impact with the water tearing strips of fiberglass free as they made their way to port. I think it's lucky they all survived the crash and a good example of how tough Vikings are built.

[Pascal]

I understand that, but doesn't it show that no matter how well a cored laminate is built it will fail even more dramatically once something happens?

I don't' think a cracked solid glass laminate will be ripped and pealed like this.

Remember that coring is not used for strength, it is used to reduce weight while keeping the laminate stiff.

[CaptNeil]

I think that you would see this on any type of fiberglass construction. Even a solid core fiberglass is layered and layered. A crack through the hull and the hydrolic pressure would evenually find a weak point and exploit it. Whether it is solid or cored is irellevant I think. (I however like having two materials. I would prefer the strength comming from juniper planked construction though rather than a balsa core laminate construction.) In this case though I think that the laminate was strong enough to take a 22 knot beating of a breeching whale at 90 degrees and make it back to port safely. Pretty impressive.

[MedRascal]

We saw what happend to the boat... but what about the unfortuante whale? Anybody knows what happened to it?

As for the delamination, certainly the effect shown on the photos is due to the water pressure hitting on the damage area while enroute to land (any reference to the Bertram 630 case would be pure mean specualtion). Nevertheless, i think that a solid "old style" fiberglass hull, even after hitting a floating object that would crack the gelcoat, would never end up revealing the different materail layers used in building... or not?

[rampage38]

Maybe the fact that the whale hit so close to the bow thruster it caused more damage. That could be seen as a weaker spot on the hull. Just a thought.

[Windswept]

It looks like it held up a lot better than that big Bertram with the catastrophic delam. Kudos to Viking, glad everyone is safe.

[K1W1]

I wonder how much damage was done with the whale right at the time of impact compared to the damage now.

I would be willing to bet that an inspection by the mate or deckie of the area involved in the strike may have resulted in a far different outcome with the application of some careful shipboard contingency planning for such an emergency.

A Bunk mattress slung lengthwise over the front and secured at the top and with bands of rope may well have been able to stop the water being driven into cracks in the layers with such massive forces.

[Capt J]

Originally Posted by Pascal

I understand that, but doesn't it show that no matter how well a cored laminate is built it will fail even more dramatically once something happens?

I don't' think a cracked solid glass laminate will be ripped and pealed like this.

Remember that coring is not used for strength, it is used to reduce weight while keeping the laminate stiff.

I agree. A solid fiberglass hull might get a crack, but I don't think you'd see the peeling like we are with the cored hulls. The solid fiberglass should stay together as it is essentially one unit when laid up and not peel like the cored hulls do.

[OutMyWindow]

"We had seen Whales everywhere all morning. Many breaching. One had jumped two days prior and hit a boat upon falling back into the water. We had just gotten the boat to 22 knots.
I have seen several boats that have hit Whales in the past. Usually, you ride up on the back much as a boat going up on a sandbar, roll down the side and do strut, prop and rudder damage. "


This guy obviously learned nothing in his 30 years of boating and has little respect for his environment.
A sensitive whale breeding area that he’s aware of, and they blast through at 22 knots.
Personally, I would hope his boat gets confiscated and he gets a big fat fine.