I really don't see how this satistical analysis has any meaning at all in this situation.
Likely we all assume that the multihulls with their very shallow draft will park as close to the beach side festivities as possible, and particularly off of a sandy beach. In fact close enough to even get out and walk to the beach rather than dinghy. Come to think of it, they are racing in this event, and many of the vessels are likely not carrying their dinghys, but rather relying on the locals for rides to the beach. At any rate we all know how the surf picks up as it nears the beach. So I'm not surprised that more of the multi's were washed up on the beach.
But then, which of these vessels would I have wanted to be an owner of??
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(photos courtesy of Sail-World.com, Asia News,'Guy Nowell/Phuket King's Cup 2010')
I'd have thought that statistics are of great meaning when dealing with major issues, or else we can always just write off every lesson as a one-off.
Mainly, it's a matter of trying to get away from the multi v mono issue. Surely it is reasonable to point out the context of your post about the situation of the boats that ended up on the beach.
Yes, if I was one of the owners of the boats that hit the beach, I'd rather I owned a multi. But if I was one of the others of one of the boats IN THE EVENT, I'd rather it didn't hit the beach at all - and the chances of not hitting the beach were higher for a mono in this case.
Yes, the shoal-draft craft were probably anchored well inshore because they could be - that's great, it's an upside of shoal-draft boats (whether mono or multi). But if (as you say) in this case it comes with a downside (less room for dragging before hitting shore, more chance of being in the surf zone) then surely we should not just put our hands over our eyes and ignore it, should we?
My dreamboats are all centreboarders, so I don't think I'm biased against them, but can we ignore the downside when it is represented by an incident like this?
Note also that according to those who were there and posted on SA, many of the strandings were caused by a boat that came loose or dragged, struck anchored yachts and cut their anchor lines (which were often down to heavy anchors that were left on the bottom and buoyed while the boats raced). Therefore there is a very significant random factor that caused many of the mono strandings. If a single multi had come loose and cut the mooring lines of other multis that then ended on the beach, would you use that as example to show that multis faired poorly in that situation?
As an example of the issues about highlighting isolated situations, let's look at the recent strandings from Cyclone Ului at Airlie Beach, heart of Australia's greatest cruising area.
By my rough count, 21% of the boats anchored or moored to windward of the rescue base-marina area were multis. That's data from counting moored/anchored boats on Google maps, which may not be representative of the fleet that was in when the storm hit.
After coming up with that rough count, I then counted the boats pictured stranded or sunk on the SA thread and the linked news report. Eleven monos were pictured on the beach or the seawall or barge ramp, compared to five multis. One mono was in pieces after apparently being crushed by a maxi yacht, but no other mono has severe VISIBLE damage. One cat has a huge hole after hitting the rocks; another cat is pictured with just the vertical bows out of the water. A tri has filled almost to deck level.
So multis were disproportionately OVER-represented in losses and strandings (perhaps twice as likely to hit the bricks and be lost), according to the (admittedly scanty) evidence.
Am I saying that multis are more dangerous?
NO! NO! NO! I have and will sail multis offshore and greatly respect them.
The point is that there are major issues in trying to highlight what type went well in a mass stranding. Also, after the Airlie storm where arguably the multis may have come off worse, no one posted anything like "the monohulls faired very well".
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