Port Hinchinbrook before and after cyclone Yasi

Of course, **** happens, entire harbours may be destroyed. ....but I can walk you up to the shipyard right know and show you millions of dollars worth of wrecked superyachts. Everyone of them was wrecked by operator stupidity...and covered by insurance.

 

Thats great
Until some other muppet with a crap anchor drags down onto you
or numerous other mishaps that can damage a vessel happen, none of which have anything to do with your better anchoring.

Rubbish
How many new marinas have built on the 2000nm coastline of QLD since 1985? Three maybe four?
How many of those were actually built in decent anchorages? (if they were such great anchorages they would not have needed the big rock wall built for protection.)

 

Re preparation: That one's efforts may be to no avail is a risk, but not an excuse for inaction. At least one boat which used "Port Hinchinbrook" as a jumping off place from which to take shelter in the Hinchinbrook Passage, along with 30 other vessels, all OK. At least one vessel inside "PH" moved off the public pontoons onto a private berth (taller piles) and survived (currently my neighbour). So even in extreme cases preparation can be rewarded.

Given that the height of the "PH" piles would not have withstood even a one-metre sea surge (at HAT), on a coast where Categories 2 and 3 are frequent, boat owners were simply relying on insurance and chance rather than seamanship, a trend which insurance companies seem to be accepting. Costly for all owners; and a good point already made (by Michael Pierzga), insurance breeds carelessness and abrogation of seamanship.

 

is preparation worth the trouble?

Re preparation: Judgements made after the event don't excuse lack of preparation. That one's efforts may be to no avail is a risk, but not an excuse for inaction. At the local scale, impending cyclone impacts are not so precisely predictable to justify abandonment (but other factors can intervene eg owner illness, vessel under repair etc.).

Even in extreme cases (eg "PH") preparation can be rewarded, as already noted in my earlier posts.

Given that the height of the "PH" piles would not have withstood even a one-metre sea surge (at HAT), on a coast where Categories 2 and 3 are frequent, boat owners were generally relying on insurance and chance rather than seamanship, a trend which insurance companies seem to be accepting. Costly for all owners; and a good point already made (by Michael Pierzga), insurance breeds carelessness and abrogation of seamanship.

Chance: some of the "PH" boats survived being swept ashore.

Here in Breakwater Marina (Townsville), some owners moved their boats to the new B pier where they expected quieter conditions - but on significantly lower piles. Some chained their boats to the piles, underneath the pontoons. They were just lucky that the sea surge came in soon after low tide, or they'd have been off like "PH".

 

Peggy, you will get no argument from me.

One must always prepare to the best of one's ability in order that the odds of survival are more likely. Not to do so would be sheer idiocy. Some events, though rare, will overwhelm, regardless.

 

In 1985 there were very few marinas compared with today. The following are some of those built or enlarged after 1985: Tin Can Bay, Cairns Marlin (enlarged), Mirage Port Douglas, Keppel Bay, Rosslyn Bay, Abel Point, Breakwater Marina, Magnetic Island Marina, Townsville Yacht Club (much enlarged), Mackay, Port of Airlie, Bluewater, Innisfail (Johnstone River), Gladstone. Manly (Brisbane) is now wall-to-wall marinas, most since 1985. More since 1985 in the Brisbane River. These are just the marinas that I can think of off-hand - and I'm not familiar with developments on the Qld coast south of Bustard Head.

Rivers and natural harbours are anchorages where marinas have taken over. Johnstone R, Bowen Harbour, Brisbane R, etc. Anchorages are not fixtures, like marinas, they vary according to the weather, and of course I was thinking of live-aboard cruising folk on the move, not boats left on anchor on lee shores by absentee owners.

 

Actually I find the proliferation of marinas full of yachts to be a seamanship challenge in my region. Many times Im forced to stand offshore and wait out weather because the natural shoreline profile, which in the past hosted an all weather anchorage, is now a 100 percent full marina development or has an intimidating breakwater nightime entrance.

 

Peggy
Some very good posts! Although low tide was a big factor, it does seem that there would have been a lot less boats damaged at PH with higher piles. What is the current status of PH? Is it operational, have pile heights been increased?

Looking ahead, perhaps more boats will do what the grey nomads do with their caravans - head south before the cyclone season. Not much help for local residents I know.

Perhaps insurance will increasingly look specifically at home port/normal place of anchorage and time of year there as part of their risk assessment and premium setting, discouraging the 'who cares, its insured' folk.

 

So not many new ones at all, most have been enlarged off of existing
and most not in previously good (certainly not popular) anchorages as you claim
There are still hundreds, if not thousands of great anchorages around for cruising folk to enjoy.
And no, I dont like marinas myself, but I have never found their locations to hinder my cruising as there is always "somewhere" to anchor nearby.

I still say that responsible owners would have moved their vessels out of "any" marina into a secure cyclone shelter which abound on the inside of Hinchenbrook, when those shelters are only a few miles away.

I spoke to a guy who was up there when Larry decimated Innisfail in 2006 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclone_Larry
He had his vessel jammed up a creek in Hinchenbrook and said that appart from weather reports, he didnt even know there was a cyclone at the time

 

Port Hinchinbrook - current status

Thanks for thoughtful response Brian.

PH: I flew over it yesterday and took photos - will post when I work out how to do it - marina and channel silted up (not cyclone-related), no marina repairs, floating pontoons piled up ashore, a few boats tied up in the marina basin, a few boats anchored in the Hinchinbrook Channel OUTSIDE the marina.

The PH "Grande Canal" (!) was once Stoney Creek, where some local boats were kept, before PH marina was built.

More house repairs at PH under way now, looking less abandoned.

Post-Yasi repairs in Breakwater Marina started last week, on F finger. Breakwater is in the process of being sold (again) - this time there are no more assets (land for units) to be stripped.

And yes, a good friend sailed yesterday for anywhere south - to escape the cyclone season. The trend might mean fewer southern boats are abandoned here for locals to deal with - or is that being too optimistic?

 

Latest news on PH. Not nice for berth owners, or house owners. TV news in the last week or so showed nothing but bare pylons - no pontoons at all. Not sure if the govt actually did what they said they were going to do - dredge themselves and bill the marina.

If story is accurate then berth owners are just scapegoats as far as the developers are concerned.

Insure boat -yes, insure house - yes. But would you think it necessary to insure a marina berth, and would you actually be able to do it?

 

Properties taking a hit

almost tempting

 

stopped believing the advert at the point of 'world class 200 berth deepwater marina'.

 

There is some cheap real estate there right now, but the realization that a block is vacant because the house got swept away is not a good selling point. Maybe sitting high on piles driven to bedrock you'd have a house to ride out the next one, but it is not something likely to be repeated in one lifetime at the same location. The last one that was stronger was Mackay in 1918, and that is hundreds of miles to the south.

 

For those whove never been thru owning a boat when cyclones approach, your best bet is to take it as far up the creek as your draft will allow and tie it up in the mangroves with multiple lines. My fathers 43ft catamaran has been thru many cyclones over teh last 20 years and never suffered any damage doing this, we can usually get it up so far in the creek that the creek is no longer wide enough for us to fit as its draft is only 2ft... safe as houses... try to pick a creek thats not going to see massive flood waters aswell, like an offshoot creek thats not in a main catchment delta - for obvious reasons...