Anchoring at the Ft. Lauderdale Air and Sea Show - May 3, 1998

When we arrive a half an hour before show time, there are an estimated 1.2 million people already lining the beach.

By Sea Tow Capt. Les Hall

 If you’ve never seen a million or so people standing on a beach from a mile offshore, they look like row after row of multi-colored beach balls. Of course, standing in the Florida sun caused the entire lot to take on a reddish tinge as the day wore on. But this story is not about all those folks, it’s about the 5,000 or so boats that were anchored just beyond the buoy line that ran parallel to the beach four thousand feet offshore.

The Shell Air and Sea Show has become a major event in South Florida. Held during the first weekend in May, the show features the US Air Force B-2B Stealth Bomber, a US Air Force B-1B Bomber, a US Air Force B-52 Stratofortress Bomber, the US Navy Blue Angels, a US Navy F-14 Tomcat, a US Air Force F-117 Stealth, a US Marine AV-8B Harrier, the US Army Golden Knights, a US Army Apache Attack Helicopter, a US Air Force C-17 Globemaster, a US Air Force KC-1O Air Refueler, a USAF Para Rescue Demonstration, a US Coast Guard Air/Sea Rescue plus more. Aside from the aerial displays, there are land-based demonstration areas and, for those forced to attend, a Captain Morgan’s tent.

The wife and I were in our new boat, purchased only two weeks before – the first new boat we’ve ever owned. Needless to say, I am concerned about the variety of boats anchored, including a Coast Guard 210’ Cutter, a wide assortment of Megayachts, hundreds of Sport Fish up to 90’, a dozen commercial sight-seeing boats with the rest ranging down to 16’ aluminum rowboats. Of equal variety, I am certain, is the skill level of the individual boaters. Unfortunately, I am not proven wrong.

We find a good-sized hole in the flotilla four or five hundred feet further east of the buoy line, drop anchor in forty-five feet of water, keep the engine running and wait. The bottom out there is mostly sand and there’s usually a knot or two of northerly current. This day there is also a southeast breeze of 10 knots or so. Being surrounded by boats on all compass points, it is easy to notice that we are starting to drag. The wife scurries forward and hauls up the anchor while I power forward (hey, it’s good for her muscle tone). We reset the anchor and, again, wait. Yup, she’s holding. We shut down and get comfortable to watch the show.

I jump up as a 30’ Scarab passes not 10 feet from my bow. No, the anchor line’s not cut. Wait, here comes a 23’ bowrider setting anchor just off our starboard bow. The owner lets loose the anchor along with every inch of anchor line on board. He and his significant other go sit in the stern while I watch him drag by me, finally halting about fifty feet or so off my starboard quarter. As I swing on my anchor, I come within ten feet of his bow but then swing back. We’re OK. Astern we watch a wooden 26’ fishing boat approach, towing a 22’ fiberglass walk-around. He sets anchor directly behind us, drags a little as his flukes dig in and stops. We’ve got more neighbors than I’d like - but everyone seems to be holding.

I point out to my wife one of those recent New England Lobster Boat designs that are getting popular. She’s about 50’ long, beamy and headed in our direction. She passes between the wooden fishing boat astern of us and his starboard neighbor, stopping just alongside the bowrider. With the push of a button, the anchor drops. The owner shuts down the engines and disappears below. The pretty green faux lobster boat promptly drags into the boat directly astern of him, which then causes the bow to swing into the wooden fishing boat.  The wooden boat, and his fine, tethered friend start dragging towards the next row of boats.

There’s a stealth jet fighter flying 200 feet or so overhead generating a sound loud enough to cause the boat to vibrate – but you can still hear the screams coming from the group of tangled boats. The owner of the Lobster boat wannabe has reappeared, started his engines, and has a crewmember retrieving his anchor. One of the people on the wooden fishing boat has dived overboard and is swimming towards the 22’ walk-around tied to the stern to get that boat underway. Meanwhile, a 60’ sloop has entered our "zone" and dropped a 75 lb. Bruce Anchor and about 150’ of stainless chain in exactly the same spot that the wooden fishing boat and his friend had previously occupied, before being dragged away. They, of course, now need to find a new parking spot.

The Lobster boat, in a gesture of sheer arrogance, noses into the same spot he started from and resets his anchor. Of course, he’s fairly safe now because he has successfully cleared all the boats out the area astern of him. Some thong-clad women, a couple of whom are well beyond their thong-years, pop up from below to pose topsides. The wooden boat and his cuddy friend disappear to the south in search of a new spot to watch the show.

A 35’ cruiser, unaware of all the prior activity, drops anchor in a rather tight spot just to our north. He proceeds to back down directly over another vessel’s anchor line, veers to the north, hooks onto the other vessel’s anchor and provides him with absolutely free, no obligation tow.

A few minutes later, aside from a few dozen jet skis buzzing around, a few go-fast types that cruise between all of the anchored boats in a "hey, look at me" kind of way (as if the above water exhaust didn’t generate enough attention) and the occasional bowrider with 10 kids on board, things seem to be calming down. It’s now 3 o’clock in the afternoon – the Air Show is almost over. But the Sea Show continues, judging from the quantity of VHF calls the Marine Patrol, the Coast Guard, the Ft. Lauderdale Police boats and Sea Tow are getting.

As I look over this huge array of boats, I think about the Port Everglades inlet. I need fuel to get back to Palm Beach. How can 5,000 boats all enter the same inlet at the same time? I envision each of the hundreds of big sport fish kicking up a six-foot wakes that will reverberate from sea wall to sea wall. I see the go-fasts leaping over those wakes in their attempt to emulate the Blue Angels. I see another hundred or so sailboats traveling at 6 knots amid all the confusion and being swirled around like bingo-balls. "Darlin’," I say, "How about we head in a little early?"

She runs forward to pull up the anchor (more muscle tone) and off we go. A short while later we are fueled and headed towards Palm Beach, up the ICW. We have a plan. We’ll go up the ICW to Hillsboro Inlet, cut back out to open water and miss all the traffic. Boy, did we ever screw up! The closer we got to Hillsboro, the worse the traffic. Apparently everyone else had a plan too – the opposite of ours.

When we got to Hillsboro, having been bounced around like those bingo-balls because of the wakes in the ICW, there was a steady stream of boats headed in. Five police boats were on scene directing the traffic. Luckily, there was a dive boat and a sport fish that wanted out as well. The police made us sit there until they could halt the traffic coming in. Not until we were out in open water, headed north away from all the activity, could I finally relax and enjoy the experience.

I am not a proponent of boater licensing or of mandatory boating education. The ocean has always been a sort of "frontier" to me where there are few rules and fewer restrictions. Freedom, however, brings with it additional responsibility. All of us who venture onto the water have the responsibility to educate and train ourselves or to take advantage of the courses offered by the Coast Guard Auxiliary and the Power Squadron. If not for our own safety, then out of consideration and caring for our fellow boaters. Maybe, if we all act like pros, those blue-lighted boats will become obsolete and go away.

Here are some basic anchoring guidelines:

1. Anchors are designed for specific bottom characteristics. Make sure that you buy an anchor designed for the type of bottom primarily encountered in your boating area. Even with a small boat, five or six feet of coated chain is desirable. Shackle the chain to the anchor. Put a thimble on the end of the anchor line and shackle that to the other end of the chain. Chose your anchor line carefully. A line that is too heavy will actually cause problems because you’ll loose the "elasticity" that absorbs the shock and keeps the anchor well set.
2. Pick your anchorage carefully. If there are other boats nearby, you will need to "guess" at their potential swing. A boat on a mooring will have very little swing but a Yacht at anchor may have considerable "scope" out and may swing widely. A shallow draft boat will be more affected, usually, by the wind whereas a deep draft boat will be more affected by the current.
3. Put your bow into the wind or current (whichever is having the greatest affect on your boat, power up slowly to or just beyond where you want your anchor to lie and check your forward motion with your reverse gear. Double check to ensure that the bitter end of your anchor line is attached to something sturdy on the boat. Most experienced boaters have watched at least one anchor with a few hundred feet on line disappear over the bow because they forgot to secure the end.
4. Don’t throw the anchor – it will probably get tangled. Release it by holding on to the chain or line, making sure that the chain and line are free, and dropping the anchor off the bow. If your anchor line was properly coiled, it will "pay-out" smoothly.
5. Once you see slack in the line, feed out the proper amount of scope as the boat drifts back. Hopefully, you’ve got your anchor line marked at 25’ increments. Average "recommended" scope is somewhere around 7 to 1 or 8 to 1 – that means that if you are in 20 feet of water you will want to pay-out between 140’ and 160’ of line. You also want to take into consideration the distance between the water line and the bow cleat and also any depth increase because of tides. If the tide may come in another 4 feet and your bow cleat is 3 feet above the water, you are, effectively, in 27 feet of water and would need to pay out around 200’ of line. Up to 15 to 1 scope may be necessary in strong winds or currents.
6. Once the scope is out, secure the line (cleat and chock) and "back down" on the anchor keeping your bow into the wind/current. Idle speed is usually sufficient to make the anchor "bite" into the bottom and "set."
7. Put the engine in neutral and get your "bearings." Find two points on each beam that form a natural "range" or line and a third either ahead or astern from which you may be able to judge distance. They can be other anchored boats, rocks, buoys or points on land. Sit there for a few minutes to make sure that none of the angles or distances to these points change. Any change would indicate that you are dragging and need to reset your anchor or pay out more scope – or both.
8. Now do whatever had planned to do when you decided to anchor and have fun doing it.