RUNNING AGROUND AND GETTING OFFIn every sailor's life lurks
inevitability of an eventual grounding. If you're a sailor and you haven't yet run aground, chances are very good that one day you will.
WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU RUN AGROUND DON'T PANIC -- doing wrong thing can put you on harder.
Now that you're on bottom, take a minute to evaluate situation. Check bilge to be sure that you haven't holed boat and aren't taking on water. What is nature of bottom? If it's soft sand or grass, chances are good that boat is undamaged, and that if you need to motor or kedge off you won't grind a hole in boat.Your objective is to get safely into deeper water.
Motoring off -- If you have a motor or engine your first inclination will be to start it up and try to back out. This may work, but be careful. In sandy or muddy bottoms you are likely to suck sand up into cooling system and render motor useless. A powerful engine in shallow water can actually push sand from stern to under keel, making situation worse. If you're on rocks and you reverse hard, you may drag hull along rocks and damage or even hole boat.
Set out an anchor. One of first things to do is to set out an anchor to keep your boat from being pushed even farther onto shoal. If you have a dingy you can use it to carry out an anchor. If you don't have a dingy, and if conditions are calm, maybe someone wearing buoyant flotation gear can swim an anchor out. Be aware that this is not an easy task and a person can become totally exhausted very quickly. If your boat is a small one, your anchor is also probably small enough and light enough for you to be able to throw it far enough for it to work, but be careful if you do this. You don't want to go overboard with it. Keep as much tension on anchor line as you can. This alone may help free you up, especially if you have a rising tide, or if passing boats create enough of a wake to raise you up momentarily.
What is state of tide? If you've gone aground on a rising tide, you may just be able to wait a couple of hours until it rises enough to refloat boat. If you've gone aground on a falling tide, however, you need to get into deeper water fast, or you may be stuck where you are for an entire tide change. If this happens, and if boat is likely to end up lying on its side, close up hatches and companionways to keep it from flooding. If you'd be better off lying on one side than on other, try to kedge off an anchor from what you want to be low side. You may also be able to control which side ends up high by shifting crew and gear weight. Where is deeper water? It may seem obvious that deeper water lies behind you, but it might be even deeper beside you. Of course it's not directly in front of you -- if it were, you wouldn't have run aground in first place. To find where deeper water is, you have some options. If you have a lead line you can lower it off boat from all sides to get a measurement of depth. You can make a lead line by taking a light line and attaching a weight to end. You could also very quickly put a boat hook or an oar in water.
