[password] grace40

[position] 23 38.617s 178 53.599w

[status] 0930 25 May 2019. Boats are like living things. When everything is working, and the boat is moving as it should, the crew will know it and feel at ease. However, it there is a new, strange noise, or the boat moves unnaturally, the crew will immediately know, and jump up from wherever they are and dash around to determine the cause. Of course, problems usually happen in the middle of a black, dark, night, howling wind, pouring rain, and choppy, bouncy seas causing the boat to hobby-horse. That's what happened to us at 0100 last night. Both of us were sound asleep when we heard a loud bang, and the boat started to vibrate. I leaped out of my bunk in my sleeping attire and charged topsides. I immediately made my way to the bow to check the anchor system was holding. Confirming all good there, I returned to the cockpit and noticed horrible vibration. Quickly surveying the wind generator, which was spinning full speed in the wind, it was obvious one of the three blades was missing. I got the generator turned away from the wind, and sure enough one blade was gone. While climbing up on the top of the stern rail to reach the generator with a rope to tie off the the remaining blades, I accidentally hit the Iridium GO antenna, breaking the plastic cover off, exposing the actual antenna inside. Murphy's Law.

Being a well stocked sea-going yacht, I have necessary repair items. For the generator, I have 6 spare blades, so I can make two sets of blade changes (all 3 blades need to be changed simultaneously to remain balanced). Due to the bouncy conditions at Minerva, I will wait until I get to Fiji to make the repair. The blades are the same ones that were on the boat when I bought the boat 10 years ago. So they are over ten years old. Over time the sun and salt enviornment degrades the blade material. Coupling that with all the high winds we have had over these past 4 days, I believe the blade simply broke off. I discount it having been hit by a bird (which can sometimes happen) because I haven't seen any birds here since arriving. Although it could have been a flying fish.

The Iridium GO is our satellite modum used to text, and send & receive email with our computers. So it was essential I repair the antenna. For that repair, I have heaps of a general repair kit no yacht should leave the dock without: duct tape. I taped the cover back on and it works great. Once in Fiji, I may look to make a more permanent fix by using underwater epoxy putty to glue the cover on.

With the boat essentially well again, there is a good chance we will leave for Fiji tomorrow. Virtually all the boats here are of the same mind. We'll wait for a final weather report tomorrow morning just to confirm no negative change.

Now I'm going to catch up on all the sleep I lost last night. Cheers, John

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