Hurricane Sally Report

signal charlie

Well-Known Member
Staff member
We had Hurricane Sally swing by, landfall 45 miles West which put us in the outer eyewall for 4 hours. Winds peaked on our dock at 60 mph but we got hammered with wind driven tide and storm surge as the wind wrapped around the bottom side. 8 feet of surge on our shoreline, 3 foot waves on top of it, fortunately the Casa is at 9 MSL feet and we have a brick kneewall on the back porch that acted as a breakwater. Unfortunately though the Sunfish Shack is at 4 feet MSL and several boats got pounded against the posts before we could get them moved as water level began to drop. Wind blew for another 24 hours. The forecast when we still had time to prep was for 1-2 feet of surge and land fall 125 miles West, once Sally wobbled East like a drunken sailor and the surge forecast went to 4-6 feet hours before landfall with Cat 2 winds we had to go into overdrive to move garage valuables (model railroad) and then ground floor essentials upstairs.

I'll put the bad photos down low, don't scroll if you don't want to see them. 13 of the 15 boats did well, ZIP, WINNIE, and SCOUT were in the Carriage House and ONKAHYE was in the garage. SMEDLEY, CYANE and WILLOW were on their trailers in the front yard.

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MADISON might have some water inside, TRACKER and CHIP seemed to do okay. The kayaks were fine, one broke free from the Sunfish Shack but we waded out to get it during a 25 mph lull. PHOENIX was in the second stall from the water and she has part of her starboard bow caved in. ST. JACQUES was in the stall closest to the house and she did great.

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The Sunfish Shack had 8 boats on 6 dollies. In the picture above you might see where the yard drops off to the right. As the storm winds dropped to about 30 we went out and cut one boat loose at a time, the tiedowns were underwater and they were all floating. I'd cut one loose and shove it towards Skipper, who was beside the house, and she'd shove it to our Son who pulled them partly up onto the last spot of dry yard. Once all the boats were moved we went back for dollies, they were in a tangle. We got all the dollies loose and then put the boats on them one by one. Then we went inside and took loooooooooong showers.

Then there is WAVE. She was the farthest boat out and she took the beating for everyone else. We saw her sideways against the post of few times.

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We were trying to restrain ourselves from going out to rescue her, but about an hour later she broke loose and I said "I'm going to get WAVE." Skipper said "I'm going too." and our Son said "Me too."

We grabbed WAVE, she was submerged to her deck but floating, and we towed her all the way to the Sunfish Shack, about 200 feet inland. Dropped her off then came back later and put her on the Work Dolly. Luckily no water was trapped in the hull.

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We have been finding bits of the debris field.

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She escaped when a section of her bow ripped off. But Capn Jack's bow handle repair held.

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She's tied up now...

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Now we have a challenge for you. The tiedown lines were attached underwater and I don't have a knife that I know would cut that, fast. So I took Skipper's kitchen scissors, I should have grabbed her Ginghers. If you have a knife that you know would have cut 5/16th inch diameter Sta-Set we want to hear about it, or send us one!
 
Our thoughts are with you! It must have been hard watching the carnage. We are glad that you all are safe and that you have kept your sense of humor. Thank you for the report.
It was Irma's four-foot "hurricane tidal surge" that destroyed the majority of my power tools. :mad: (Including every one of my drills, a metal-cutting bandsaw, a Lincoln buzzbox welder, etc).

I was absent during Irma, and resisted neighbors' pleas to return--for months.

Fortunately, knowing a tidal surge could take one of my two cars, I had previously sold my BMW track/race car.

Insurance against Florida's wind damage is too costly for my budget, and its absence would be the "correct call" for the majority of my neighbors. (Not sure about flood-damage insurance, which I don't have anyway).

Except for the bow handle "fix", (which I had previously admired on these pages), Sunfish WAVE appears to be a total loss. (Too much to tackle). Maybe use cut-out sections to repair other Sunfish?
 
Thanks Seaotter, we added a knife to the Bought Items list. It's like Christmas around here, we bought a 6x10 trailer to haul stuff out and haul stuff in.

And no boats need to be replaced!
 
Weston, thank you. we were distracted by contemplating potential carnage and physical security. We report so that others may glean Learning Lessons from our experience. Share thoughts on risk reduction strategies! We know that leaving a boat ties to a piling is a bad idea, next time we will figure out how to "moor" them somehow.
 
Poor Wave! A day you won’t forget, I’m sure. It is good you can laugh about it, and perspective is always important. Glad you and Skipper are safe. And we haven’t heard about your son- hope he’s learning from the best and will carry on the tradition of restoring the classics!
 
L&VW, sorry to hear about your tools.

"Sunfish WAVE appears to be a total loss." I thought you knew us better...there will be some cut out sections harvested from other donor boats that can be used to repair WAVE.

If anyone has trim bits etc... drop us a line :)
I knew you’d Save Wave!
What parts do you need? Make a list and post it, maybe we can all help a little to SAVE WAVE!
 
Breezebender, we'll have a few mementos...and our Son is one of the bravest people we know, and I say that after serving in the Marine Corps for 20 years, Desert Shield/Storm and flying helicopter Search and Rescue night missions through Arizona mountains, sand dunes and river rescues. He is our Consultant, he has Skipper's inner sense of problem solving and course of action development. He is the guy who did the detail epoxy work on BARBASHELA's bottom, syringes full of epoxy. He is also our photographer, he has taken most of the photos for our Small Boats Magazine articles, example this month's article on West System 207 Special Clear Hardener.

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Those hurricanes sure can cause some damage... but at least your home is still standing (and dry). I remember meeting some refugees & evacuees from Katrina in a hotel in Tuscaloosa, AL... the entire hotel was filled with folks who had lost their homes, or whose homes now stood in 9' of water. :(

Bring WAVE back to life, that'd be the best way to commemorate the occasion... important thing is that you're all safe and unharmed. Everything else can be repaired or replaced. As for bringing WAVE back to life, I can't think of any folks better qualified for the task, and I have faith in ya. :rolleyes:

Let's put things into perspective: remember the "billion-dollar twister" which killed something like 44 people in Moore & Midwest City (OKC), Oklahoma, back in May, 1999? My best friend & I were in OKC that very morning, but we left before the storm hit that afternoon. A matter of only a few short hours... :confused:

On our way up I-44, we saw the damage in Stroud where another twister had already struck... one small mall within sight of the interstate was a shambles, debris everywhere, a real mess. When we arrived at one brother's home in Missouri, we learned how closely we had dodged a bullet. :eek:

On my very next trip, I paid a visit to the site in Midwest City... a somber early morning inspection, the gray clouds overhead somehow fitting the overall scene. By that time, they had removed (or excavated) all the bodies, and salvage crews were stripping fixtures and whatnot from the buildings. :(

The damage & destruction were unbelievable... it looked like a f#%ng war zone. Whole apartment buildings destroyed, brick buildings annihilated, large trees uprooted and flung in every direction... it was crazy. That twister was at least an F4, might have been an F5 at times as it laid down its path of destruction. :eek:

I only say all this because, in the course of my lifetime, I've seen a lot of damage & destruction, loss of life too when I look back over the years, thus I never place too much value on material things... they can always be repaired or replaced, but human lives can't once they are extinguished. :(

So thank your lucky stars that the damage wasn't worse, and you didn't wind up like those poor folks caught in the maelstrom in OKC. Yes, WAVE took a beating, but she can be restored to all her former glory, while you, Skipper & your son are all alive & well. THAT is what matters most. :rolleyes:

Here are a few pics of the catastrophic destruction in Midwest City, Oklahoma... right off I-40, I think the twister jumped the interstate and then struck Midwest City with tremendous force, probably an F5 tornado at that moment, judging by the destruction. :eek:

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Just seeing these pics again and reliving that somber visit reminds me of why two things on this planet make me nervous: lightning & tornadoes. Look at that brick building... holy $h!t, it looks like an HE (or High Explosive) artillery round landed on it. Unbelievable destruction... I'll never forget that somber tour. :confused:

So give yourselves a congratulatory pat on the back, you're hurricane survivors who've lived to see another day, and it won't be long before you clean up that mess left behind by the storm. The mess you see above, it took well over a month to clean it up, and that was with heavy equipment. :(

Gotta run, best of luck to ya, I know you can bring WAVE back to her former state... it's just boat repair, and you're eminently qualified to do it. Maybe you should consider buying safety lines & harnesses for any future rescue & salvage work while the storm is still raging, as such work can be dangerous. :rolleyes:
 
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Bless you guys and that you wanted to keep us updated. As a professional boat tinkerer myself, we know that fixin' is as rewarding as surfing on a wave crest. My heart sunk seeing the shack submerged like that. My heart was warmed reading this thread that you guys are ok.
 
Btw....i just keep a pocket knife super sharp, that can cut thru 7/16 dbl braid with one yank. Razor blade knives work too, that I use when splicing. Blades only touch line, nothing else. Kinda like my sewing scissors....thread and fabric only.
 
L&VW, sorry to hear about your tools.

"Sunfish WAVE appears to be a total loss." I thought you knew us better...there will be some cut out sections harvested from other donor boats that can be used to repair WAVE.

If anyone has trim bits etc... drop us a line :)
Sorry...:confused:

'Would've thought the reverse—unless, of course, there's an emotional attachment to WAVE...

My neighbor gave me a free and complete "donor" Sunfish (beat-up from two boys and two hurricanes), but I'm putting it back in service. :cool: Come to think of it, that "donor" Sunfish completely survived Hurricane Irma in my back yard. (Along with two other Sunfish—ready to sell). :)

:( Yeah...my tools. :( 'Just thought today about the loss of my very first drill—bought myself at 16 years old. (A Craftsman full-metal, non-reversing...now vintage, well...actually thrown out—drill).

You're going to "harvest" and attach an entire Sunfish deck? :eek:
 
Breeze Bender said... "What parts do you need? Make a list and post it, maybe we can all help a little to SAVE WAVE!"

We'll need the bow trim piece...actually we'll need two...we haven't had the courage to take the cover off of our 1982 AMF boat PHOENIX yet, a quick glimpse has us thinking she is not in as bad a shape as WAVE

2 bow trim pieces, can be cut for shipping and the
Trim rivets
Woven roving...a lot of it
THIXO - I bet Jamestown Distributors will donate that to us, along with primer, TotalFair and 2 part Marine Flotation Foam

Sandpaper, 60 and 120 grit...lots of it...

One potential course of action is to make a deck and hull mold off of our 1981 AMF boat MADISON and make a starboard bow section like Al and Cort would have done it, spray in gelcoat, lay woven roving, pop it out, graft it in.

Yes there is an emotional attachment to 1965 model WAVE, she has been in Skipper's family since at least the mid 70s with Aunt Pat, spent time in Hawaii, and WAVE was Skipper's first Sunfish, reporting for duty in 1994. Capn Jack restored her, painted the deck with the double stripe, found the 1984 Riviera sail. We converted the rudder a few years back.

We are pretty sure that this is WAVE... :) Looks kind of like me also...

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$486 USD back in the day. The dual diagonal red and blue racing stripes showed up in 1968 on the bow, Capn Jack liked those and added the dual stripes to both the bow and stern.

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Meanwhile at the Sunfish Ranch, we have been cleaning out the garage, it is almost back together with a clean floor and new cabinets, pressure washing the house, removing vegetation debris and gathering a yard full of dock bits that came in from the bay. There is about a dump truck load that is in small piles and needs to go to the street and make a big pile. Boatyard TETRIS is in full swing. Skipper scored a new John Deere 130 lawn tractor with dump cart, and we are back in the lawn care business as most of the lawn care folks are shifting to remediation. The Marine Construction companies are full up with removing dock debris, so we are rebuilding our dock as we can along with getting the Sunfish Shack back in order. That has been and exercise in creativity, and a sawzall has been the primary tool there.

3 large pilings from next door ended up taking out some of our pier, and the 30x30 deck from the same lot removed a chunk of our seawall cap. Yesterday we got the far piling cut loose and floated it to the beach, removed 2 wayward pier sections and gathered remnants of the electrical conduit and pier wiring. 24 ten foot sections of pier disappeared, with one section left, the section we replaced in the Winter. The cradle lift cover stayed intact, as did the dock cover at the end. And the flag got replaced Sunday, that is a story in itself. The water is a mess, a mixture of salt and fresh water that is flowing down from the rivers, populated by dead and live jellyfish. Yeehaw! One big score was recovering 60 feet of our seawall cap from the neighbors yard, 16 foot brutes of 2x12 Prime Ground Contact Pressure-Treated Lumber that ignored the 3 inch ringshank nails, Skipper's Gorilla Cart was involved with that evolution. If the neighbors didn't think we were crazy already, they definitely do now.

The pier pilings in this photo were under water during the surge, with 3 foot breakers on top of that.

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Skipper also scored a 5x10 utility trailer, we will have fun trying that out as a watercraft hauler. In the meantime it will haul stuff out and bring in new materials. Note to Self: When buying Paver Base and deck boards, load the deck boards first...

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...to be continued...
 
Very reminiscent of Hurricane Irma. :oops:

Huge piles of fairly new 2x PT lumber washed up on my modest 100-foot Florida lakefront property. Some, buried in sand, can't be retrieved from the treeline. :oops:

I examined the hardware to determine which fasteners were best for 2x. As the hurricane-experience turned out, nails were pulled out, and screws were snapped! :eek: (I use 1/4" x4" lag screws exclusively--because stainless bends).

Not letting this windfall go to waste, I built a number of projects with all the largess--and will build additional workbench space. (Is there ever enough workbench?) :rolleyes:

Hurricane Andrew, of 1992, was so destructive, nothing was left in one piece. :(

Concrete tie-beams ended up in neighbors' yards! :eek:

FEMA dragged everything to the edge of town and burned it--for months...:confused:
 
Andyatos, that's anchor is a great idea, drop that in the mail to us, ATTN: WAVE.

L&VW you are having all the fun down there. Sally was bad but no where near Ivan. Hurricane Ivan reshaped the landscape in some areas. You have had some monsters. We will get a few new outdoor tables from the lumber, maybe a bench or two. I suppose I should build another Finishing Dolly to put PHOENIX on, and work on both patients at the same time. And maybe a few Carpenter's Trestles.

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So our favorite Out Of Body Experience so far has been shopping at Lowes for recovery supplies, and someone goes by with a plastic Frosty the Snowman yard decoration in their cart....Our Lowes BTW has a great group of folks and the reset of the store to create space for truckloads of generators, dehumidifiers, tarps, etc...has been impressive. They also brought in 2 big trailers with washer/dryer setups.
 
So our neighbor is coming back from a walk and he says "Hey Kent, I just saw something that might be right in your wheelhouse. There's a boat down the road in a debris haul off pile, looks like one of your small sailboats." The area he described was a few houses down from where we sold a Sunfish to a couple a few years back, but they pampered that boat and I told George that "She might be one of ours," meaning she might have been SUGAR 2 that we restored a while back. So I ran inside and grabbed Skipper and our Son, we jumped in the Outback that has Skipper's new 5x10 Toy Hauler, and we drove down to where the pile was. Turning the corner we could see the unmistakeable snout of a Sunfish poking out, 1960-1987 model year. We pulled over to look at the boat, she is NOT SUGAR 2, bow is in great shape, Skipper and Son note right away that the stern has a funny shape to it.

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Turns out she had been stored behind an old shed for years, not used, probably because of the damaged stern, and the seams are split in several areas. We dug her out of the pile, she is light and dry.

A pause for Debris Etiquette, Leave the pile nicer than you found it.

She's a 1978 AMF Sunfish

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Neighborhood Watch sign kinda funny. In other news the Carry On brand 5x10 trailer sold by Lowes is a great fit for a Sunfish. It would be very easy to make some bunks to give a boat a nice ride, or just throw some pool noodles or foam pad underneath, which is what we did, the pool noodles were in the pile also. Then you also have room for bikes, tents, kayak etc...the trailer rides nice on 13 inch tires, and it is nice that it is sold with a jack.

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Do you think the Great Spirit is helping us out?
 
"Hurricane Season" hasn't officially ended! :eek:

We know, there is a little hesitancy as we rebuild, and some PTSD when the wind picks up a bit or the heavy rain shower comes by. We saw what worked and didn't work with the storm, and will adapt our outdoor hardscape and landscape to better protect our property from future storms, one Duh moment was that wood floats, so it better be anchored or tied down somehow like the Sunfish Shack was with 6x6 pilings in poured concrete.

Sunfish Shack got cleaned out and I went around gathering bits of line that had been cut during dinghy SAR, found some pieces of the Shack ramp, and put the wooden Super Sailfish TRACKER out there, with wooden Sunfish CHIP and 1981 AMF MADISON. From right to left in the SHack the boats on the right, bayside, got the most damage, they took one for the team. On the far left was our Penobscot 14 ST. JACQUES, she has a rub mark on her gunwale and she didn't even get wet inside. TRACKER, CHIP and MADISON look good, a few rub marks but no water intake and they all held on to their masts, daggerboards and rudders which are stored on the deck under the SLO Sail and Canvas covers. MADISON is also an Ivan survivor.

Found the old set of floorboards from Skipper's Drascombe Lugger ONKAHYE, her Dad made those in the late 80s. She cried when she saw them. We had been using them to turn a boat trailer into a flatbed trailer, but it is now time to reassign them to plant watching duty on the back porch. We had added those cross boards under neath, and stripped those off.

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Skipper got a new ride, John Deere E130 with 8Y dump cart/wheelbarrow, we are going to take over lawn care duties again as the lawn care folks are going to be busy for months with cleanup and remediation. I got a weedeater and a leaf blower. Skipper also got a shovel.

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Breezebender, we'll have a few mementos...and our Son is one of the bravest people we know, and I say that after serving in the Marine Corps for 20 years, Desert Shield/Storm and flying helicopter Search and Rescue night missions through Arizona mountains, sand dunes and river rescues. He is our Consultant, he has Skipper's inner sense of problem solving and course of action development. He is the guy who did the detail epoxy work on BARBASHELA's bottom, syringes full of epoxy. He is also our photographer, he has taken most of the photos for our Small Boats Magazine articles, example this month's article on West System 207 Special Clear Hardener.

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SC,
Great article, Signal Charlie.
I ordered and just received the West System 105/207 to seal my wooden Sailfish. It says on the can ‘Provides adequate working time’. What does that mean? Can I roll the entire top and sides with one mix before it turns hot? Then do same for bottom? And at a 3:1 ratio, how much hardener (207) is needed to cover top and sides?
I am guessing at (1) 10.8 oz can of 207 to 32.4 oz Epoxy 104. But this stuff is expensive, I’d rather not guess. I will need to order more 207 either way as it should get two coats before primer, then finally paint. Still thinking of colors. I’ve admired your wooden rub rail, SC, it really dresses things up and is functional, as well. But I’m getting ahead of myself! I have all mixing supplies and am almost ready to apply epoxy, just need to confirm amount for 75 Sf coverage.
 

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When you get a break, send us an update. Looking back at your pics I see Phoenix has severe damage, as well. Rebuilding will be project and a process, for sure. Hang in there, SC and Skipper!
 
BreezeBender

You can work the whole boat, keep a wet edge. I mix a small batch at a time and do about 1/3 of the deck per batch, then 3 sections on the bottom. Sailfish will go faster than a Sunfish. I think if you mixed all that epoxy for the top at one time it will cook off quicker.

Make sure you have the West System 800 roller cover or equivalent, so that the cover doesn't melt fro solvents. We cut the roller in half and use it on the small roller frame. And we use the West System pumps, with the pump designed for the 207 it is one pump resin and one pump hardener. There are instructions on how to mix without the pumps on the can. There are also resin and hardener cans that match up, 207-SA size matches a specific resin can so that you run out of resin the same time as hardener. It is not essential that the can sizes match, just convenient.

As far as coverage I'd suggest emailing or callingWest System Tech Help, contact info is on their website, they are very responsive. Let them know that the wood is sanded bare, and that it is still semi sealed from Alcort's primer way back when. We have not had any compatibility issues from old Alcort coatings.

I looked at our 2 wooden Alcorts that rode out the storm just 2 stalls down from WAVE and PHOENIX, the rub rails have paint rubbed off under the sunbrella covers but no damage.

In other news, the Dynamic Dollies are now Storm Debris Removal Certified, the dock guys and gals were here today removing debris. We used them to haul wayward pilings out of the water, I put one end on the dolly strap, tied it to the handle and then ran the line up to Skipper's new lawn tractor, and she'd pull the piling up the beach while I steered the dolly. Skipper then showed the dock crew how to use 2 to move the piling to the driveway where they could load them on their trailer, as the yard is still soggy from 30 inches of rain.

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I called Chris at Dynamic and he says those dollies are rated up to 300 pounds, some of their dollies up to 500 and they build one specialty dolly for the Navy to hold one of their submersible drones that holds up to 2000 pounds. So if you have pilings (telephone poles) to move, call Chris and Ben at Dynamic. At the end of the day the dock crew also used the dolly to haul their kayak, I think they are converts.

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We had a couple of piles of debris the size of minivans, and the dock crew had their trailer next door loading other debris. They didn't want to back down our driveway off of the busy street out front, so they took debris over by water to the ramp next door. At first we saw them making rafts but Skipper offered her Grumman 17 canoe SCOUT and boy was that fun to watch.

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SCOUT... that's a good name for a canoe. Looks like those dollies are coming in handy... dual-purpose, one might say. Seeing these pics and also reading L&VW's account of Irma reminds me of a powerful storm we had in San Diego back in '78. Huge waves pounded the coast and demolished part of the I.B. Pier, and a coastal eddy brought much of the debris ashore in Coronado. The city used heavy equipment to clean up the beaches, and by the time they were done, there was a pile of driftwood, wooden debris, uprooted trees & bushes, etc., the size of a large house on North Beach. As high school teens, we'd often party down at the fire rings on North Beach, and this huge pile of wood was there for the burning... we wasted no time putting it to good use. :rolleyes:

I'm talking night after night of blazing bonfires with a bunch of us socializing and having a good time. We even burned the largest part of the I.B. Pier which washed ashore, it took a dozen of us to haul that thing to our fire ring, resting at intervals... flipped the thing up on one edge and let it fall atop an already-roaring bonfire with a shower of sparks. That pier segment took DAYS on end to burn, we'd just leave it every night and come back the next evening to stoke the fire underneath, around & atop it, pushing larger chunks in as they burned free. It was crazy, and that pile of wood tossed together by city workers must have lasted 2-3 months, with fires burning at every ring all weekend long, and often during the week. ;)

Funny what you remember from these big storms... at first, we were all excited by the big waves rolling in to various Coronado shore breaks, some peeling nicely due to bottom configuration (sandbars and whatnot), but then the waves continued to get larger until they were absolute monsters, huge crashing walls of water which were fearsome to behold... some had barrels you could drive a truck through, and I'm not joking. Plus the actual rainstorms kicked in and brought down all that debris from inland areas, washing it down rivers and storm channels till it hit the sea, where a half-knot coastal current carried it southward. So during the most intense storm periods, NOBODY was in the water, it was too damned rough. Same for the last day or two of the storm, the waves were just too big. :eek:

The only other time I remember waves getting that big in Coronado was in '83, but I can't recall if there was a storm in San Diego County that time, it might have just been a huge swell traveling from afar... but in that year, the surf became huge at Officer's Beach on NASNI, so big that surfers flew in from around the world to ride these waves, which were perfect due to the swell direction. A bunch of photos from that event made it into the surf mags, and I believe Mikey J. also had a shot or two during that time. Huge perfectly-peeling barrels just beautiful to see, whether you were there or just looking at a magazine. Somehow, I'll never forget those two years, but the storm in '78 caused more damage, or so it seems in retrospect. I mean, how big does a wave have to be to tear a huge fishing pier apart? :D

Anyway, SC, it's good to hear you're making progress with the cleanup and rebuilding... is that crew going to rebuild the dock with wood or concrete pilings? I can't remember if you already mentioned this. Mother Nature sure can do a number on man-made structures... gotta build something like the pyramids if you want it to last, just solid stone that'll take awhile to wear down, LOL. And even those won't last forever, but they'll last longer than an unanchored double-wide in a tornado, I reckon. Funny how tourists used to express fear of earthquakes in California, only to casually mention that they lived in 'Tornado Alley'---the main reason why I wouldn't want to live there, those tornadoes make me nervous, LOL. Lightning & tornadoes... always been leery around 'em. :confused:
 
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Thank you for the guidance, SC. We are expecting rain :eek: for most of this week so the epoxy work will wait for now.
Are you going to use the trim from your “new” Sunfish to restore Wave and Phoenix? Or are you adding the debris pile find to the fleet? Yes, I do think that Great Spirit has a hand in all of this!
I don’t have any trim to offer, but I will send you a box of trim rivets, though I know the finish work is a ways off yet.
You and Skipper sure know how to turn lemons into lemonade- one of the greatest life skills a person can have!
 
Here's our 1982 AMF boat PHOENIX, she was second in line behind WAVE in the Sunfish Shack. Our Sunfish buddy Tom at Lake Norman is sending us some bow parts.

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Hurricane Delta was right behind Sally, so we stacked the Carriage House in prep for forecast surge. Luckily we only got the 1-2 feet forecast vs the 9 we got in Sally. L-R are 1950s Alcort Standard Sailfish WINNIE, 1953 Alcort Sunfish ZIP, 1963 wooden Alcort Sunfish CHIP, 1981 AMF Alcort Sunfish MADISON and 1950s Alcort Super Sailfish 14 Deluxe TRACKER (formerly ZSA ZSA, and 2017 Penobscot 14 ST. JACQUES. The stem, transom and deadwood for our Pascagoula 16 Catboat MARGARET ROSE are in there somewhere. The 2x6 lumber under ST. JACQUES was salvaged from the seawall Gun Deck.

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Debris removal is complete and we are finished reshaping the seawall cap, made a mini Gun Deck to mitigate wind driven waves splashing into the yard. We are on v4.0 so we'll see how this design works. We also started rebuilding the pier with salvaged 2x6s and new 5/4 deck boards.

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Skipper's Gorilla Cart(s) yes she has 2 now, have been put to work. They are very versatile, esp since the sides come off and they have big tires. One acts as a tool cart and the other carries bogs of dirt, gravel, sod or lunmber.

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As a joke we put a cone on the last pier plank as we planked out a bit more each day, and our anole Henry took up residence for a few days to entertain us. He lives along the seawall mostly and enjoyed his big orange teepee for a few days, made us laugh.

We had to put up some new fence, and turned the offcuts into tables, to replace the ones that are MIA.

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We repurposed some washed up lumber form the "Lagniappe Beach Lumber Company" into carpenter's trestles, they make good boat stands, extra seating and plant benches. They are made to a height that is convenient to place your knee on a work piece, with a lip left the end to clamp a piece. A notch can also be cut to act as a third hand holding a piece wedged into the dirt. 15 degree angle on the cuts.

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Part boat MOSSY testing out the trestles. Day Sailer II CYANE and Catfish SMEDLEY supervising. WAVE and PHOENIX snoozing in the background.

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We left Henry's orange con(e)do at the seawall and bought another cone for the end of the pier.

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Our Grumman 17 SCOUT has continued her duties as a work boat, she hauls tools whn I have to work in the bay.

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Marine Engineering feat here, we are missing a set of pilings so we made a 20 foot span from 2x6 lumber that sandwiches a strip of 1/2 inch marine grade plywood. It is temporary, pilings are on the schedule for later this week. But we did get piered out almost to the cradle lift, once we get the next few sections we can call the electricians out.

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Skipper ordered a little #4 crushed limestone to make a french drain along the seawall, since the bay hasn't liked dirt or sod or lumber that floats.

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Skipper let me load the cart to get a few test pieces out to the drain area. I rode in the cart unsupervised, even though the labels say specifically not to ride in the cart. I figured out that it is not riding in the cart that is the problem, it is getting out of the cart that is the issue with the flexible plastic sides.The Warning labels also say not to tow the cart down the highway, I wanted to try but Skipper put a hard "No" on that. Fun Killer.

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We were lucky to recover 1 out of 3 of our benches, 2 floated away, who knew wood floats? This one got tangled in the cradle lift 100 feet offshore. We got dirt down and are awaiting sod and a Toro Dingo to move the rest of the limestone.

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The amazing discovery was our son spotted Skipper's Anheuser-Busch burn barrel, we thought it was long gone. Can you see it?

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I insisted on going into the muck to retrieve it..."No, really, you stay here, I'll get it..."

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Things are getting back to the new normal.

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A keg burn barrel... awesome! LOL. The firepit is pretty nice too... ;)

Good choice on the rocks, I use bags of decorative "marble chips" on my property and they look good, though the bags add up at the Depot. For bulk, I'd definitely order from an outfit and have 'em deliver it in a dump truck... :D

When I was in Show Low, I ordered a truckload of good topsoil for my yard, just to spread around and kinda rejuvenate the place... grass seed as well for the lawn, wildflowers for the border areas. Totally worth the money & effort, I'll probably do it with this property once I get around to it... :cool:

Took me awhile to spread six tons of dirt using a wheelbarrow and a shovel... I think it was six tons, I have the receipt somewhere. But it was a nice day, and I had 21 tall Ponderosa Pines on that property for shade... sometimes I miss those tall pines, they were awesome!!! And the bird life was too... :rolleyes:
 

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