Seamanship Question- Inlets

[Rover1]

Hi All,

This is a general question and came up due to the Haulover Inlet videos I watched a couple of weeks ago.
The only major inlet I have near me is the Merrimack River inlet. I have never ventured through it because of the large standing waves at the mouth where it runs through two long jetties. It is highly trafficked on weekends during the summer.
The question is: When approaching or leaving inlets with any form of high surf what is the best way to do so?
Let's set the basic approach conditions as mid-tide(10' change from high to low), High current and large standing waves and moderate traffic.

I would love to go fishing in the area but entrance to the river just seems to risky for a 17' boat.

Rover 1

[fallguy1000]

I only know a few basics from reading and have not practiced.

The first thing to know is there are certain windows that are better. High currents and high waves are certainly not ideal. So, wind conditions coming off the sea are important; high offshore winds blowong toward shore make conditions much more dangerous. High currrents would be a variable factor, but the really dangerous bars post best times. Slack tides are the ideal and a small boat needs to use slack tides, low winds, typically morning low tide to exit and return on slack high.

Be prepared for a rough exit or entry. Batten down the hatches and vest the crew n pax.

Time the waves before the action. The best way is to ride on the back of them in, but out may stand you up.

Avoid launching off the wave top; excess speed at a bar may seem like fun, but plowing the bow underwater in a second wave is not. An ideal speed is one where you can get over the incoming without diving nose first into the next one. I believe you can even stop watch this if needed.

Always be prepared to skip it. There are times when every captain must say not today. I remember as a young man seeing a boat trying to exit Duluth Harbor. We could see it was far too rough to go out from our vantage on the highway. But that batshit crazy skipper misjudged the waves on the other side of the breakwater. We watched his boat get stood up more than 45 degrees and saw the fastest turnaround in the history of boating. It was an 18 footer. Conditions here are a bit different than a bar crossing. There is really not a breaking surf; if the sea is fast 4-6 footers; they are in that state no stopping. But somewhat like a bar crossing in that the sea state is worse beyond the breakwater.

It is a fun thread and I look forward to hearing from some experienced bar crossers. There are some.

[cracked_ribs]

For years I launched out of a big river that faced into the prevailing wind, and had extensive commercial traffic. On good days it was pretty calm, but on bad days it would look like the worst Haulover has to offer, only with car carriers and seagoing tugs running in and out. I kept my boat in the river and if I wanted to go anywhere, I'd head out the mouth, plus there was good salmon fishing just outside at some times of the year, so I have no idea how many times I have done this. Hundreds. I have done it a few times in conditions nobody would if they knew what they were getting into - like dinghy ripped off the roof of the pilothouse bad - but tons of times where it looked about like a bad haulover video.

There's not much to know, really...you just have to strike a balance between the amount of trim you need to keep the nose from getting buried, and the amount of speed you need to maintain control and get through the rough sections without getting airborne, and the resulting loss of control.

If you're heading into tightly spaced ten foot breakers in a 17' open boat you're going to have a bad day pretty much no matter what. But if it's not actually breaking surf, it just looks like Haulover type stuff? Just go slow, there's not really much to it. A boat like the FS17 will just kind of cork along in it.

Coming back in, you want to try to find a route that doesn't have big holes etc - some of these places have pretty predictable wave patterns where you can get on the back of a wave to cruise in, and on one side of the inlet it's reliable, and the other side the bottom is all over the place and the waves disappear and reappear pretty dangerously. That's just local knowledge - my old place had shifting bars so you never knew what the bottom was doing and that was more difficult aspects. But the people who run it regularly will know if there's a side you want or don't want.

Most of what people think is technique on running inlets, is actually just route knowledge. That's why I say there's not really much to know...having come from somewhere the bottom shifted on a weekly basis and no route knowledge was really possible, it's pretty much just slow down on the way out, trim up and park yourself on a wave on the way back in. If your wave becomes a hole on the way back in, you might need to gas it to get on the back of the closest one you can see in front of you, but in a boat with an open bow you're limited to how much power you can apply and when without it becoming a scoop and filling the boat.

So it's pretty much just down to basic boat handling, to be honest.

[OneWayTraffic]

First suggestion: Avoid high surf. Though not exactly the same conditions as you, I regularly launched a 3.5m Smartwave 3500 dinghy off Manu bay of the West Coast of NZ. Some days I'd just look at the waves and think 'not today', and stay in the harbour. The ramp launched into the sea nearby a famous surf break.

Second suggestion: Ensure plenty of flotation above the waterline. If I recall correctly, you were thinking of making the boat a tiller. Oversized thwarts, sealed with decent hatches will keep water out for a while: enough for the scuppers to clear it.

Third suggestion: Large scuppers on the sides or transom. They can't be too big.

Fourth suggestion: Modify your boat setup to launch off the beach. Large boat rollers or long towbar or something. My dinghy was modified to have two wheels at the transom and I could wheelbarrow it short distances on the concrete ramp. I dropped my boat on the ramp above the waves and walked it in.

[TomW1]

The Merrimack is a big inlet and the tides are also big. When doing an inlet you want to approach then 1. When the tides and river flow are going in the same direction. Preferably on fairly calm days in a 17' boat. Pick a wave and ride the back of it out as mentioned above. 2. Make sure you have accurate tide tables so you can come in on a slack tide so you can come in after about 3 hours of fishing. You don't want to fight the river and and a reverse tide. If you stay 6 hours and the tide reverses against the river flow it will get rough. The best time to go is the 1/2 hour or so when the tides are slack and you can go with just have the river to deal with and spend 6 hours our and come back in on the next slack tide. Here is a Merrimack River Mouth tide chart that shows highs and lows each high and low will have a period slack time that you can run the mouth. You will need to learn that from the locals. It is usually about 1/2 hour from the rivers I am familiar with. https://www.tide-forecast.com/locations ... des/latest I would never recommend going in or coming in with opposing river and tide.

I hope this helps you. I lived north of Boston for a few years and it is beautiful area.

Regards, Tom

[Evan_Gatehouse]

High slack is best. If you can't do that then you want a flooding tide close to slack tide.

If you enter on an ebb tide the ebb tide + river current is high and will collide with oncoming incoming seas. Do not go on an ebb tide unless there is very little sea outside.

Times of high and low tides do not necessarily equal the time of slack CURRENTS. If there are published current predictions use them.

Ask around. If strong incoming waves are happening give it a miss or you could end up on the evening news or worse, Youtube. Better to watch the waves on shore than to be in them.

Local knowledge helps. So does standing on shore or a rock jetty watching how waves are breaking. Often waves will break more on one side of an inlet where sand has piled up.

Don't get sideways to the waves. Do go in on the back of breaking waves, not in front of them.

I once entered the bar at Gray's Harbor, WA with 1 self righting USCG boat in front of me about 1/4 mile and one stationed 1/4 mile astern of me. Seas were AVERAGING 15' and breaking on either side of me. At one point the CG boat said "TURN TURN TURN" and I had to do a quick 180 to face the next set they thought was going to break on me. Needed a very stiff drink after that. Take them seriously, plan your day and you will be fine.

[fallguy1000]

High slack is best. If you can't do that then you want a flooding tide close to slack tide.

If you enter on an ebb tide the ebb tide + river current is high and will collide with oncoming incoming seas. Do not go on an ebb tide unless there is very little sea outside.

Times of high and low tides do not necessarily equal the time of slack CURRENTS. If there are published current predictions use them.

Ask around. If strong incoming waves are happening give it a miss or you could end up on the evening news or worse, Youtube. Better to watch the waves on shore than to be in them.

Local knowledge helps. So does standing on shore or a rock jetty watching how waves are breaking. Often waves will break more on one side of an inlet where sand has piled up.

Don't get sideways to the waves. Do go in on the back of breaking waves, not in front of them.

I once entered the bar at Gray's Harbor, WA with 1 self righting USCG boat in front of me about 1/4 mile and one stationed 1/4 mile astern of me. Seas were AVERAGING 15' and breaking on either side of me. At one point the CG boat said "TURN TURN TURN" and I had to do a quick 180 to face the next set they thought was going to break on me. Needed a very stiff drink after that. Take them seriously, plan your day and you will be fine.

Great post. Thanks. Jist to be clear, if you were entering, the CG asked you to turn around and face the sea?

[Evan_Gatehouse]

We were 3 days out of Neah Bay, WA. We were beating south in very big seas in high winds. Making about 35 miles a day. My wife was quite seasick so I had maybe 2 hrs of sleep per day for the past 48 hours. Was somewhat delirious I suspect. I called the CG for a bar report. "The bar is closed to vessels under 36' captain!"

I replied (somewhat fuzzily) "Oh thats' great - we're under 36' "

Long pause "Skipper would you like an escort in?" "Yes please!"

I think it was easier to send out the lifeboats than recover the bodies later.

Yes, we were heading in as fast as we could (6 knots) trying to avoid the big breaking surf on either side of us. One of the boats yelled on the radio "Turn Turn Turn skipper!!!"

We turned as fast as we could to face the wave and rode up, up, up and saw a lot of sunlight through the tallest wave. But it didn't break and again "Turn Turn Turn" and we headed in and got around the breakwater. It was rather close. The fishfinder was describing perfect sine waves. 30' - 15' - 30' - 15'. 15' waves in an average water depth of ~23'. Was very, very surprised they didn't break right on us.

[OrangeQuest]

We were 3 days out of Neah Bay, WA. We were beating south in very big seas in high winds. Making about 35 miles a day. My wife was quite seasick so I had maybe 2 hrs of sleep per day for the past 48 hours. Was somewhat delirious I suspect. I called the CG for a bar report. "The bar is closed to vessels under 36' captain!"

I replied (somewhat fuzzily) "Oh thats' great - we're under 36' "

Long pause "Skipper would you like an escort in?" "Yes please!"

I think it was easier to send out the lifeboats than recover the bodies later.

Yes, we were heading in as fast as we could (6 knots) trying to avoid the big breaking surf on either side of us. One of the boats yelled on the radio "Turn Turn Turn skipper!!!"

We turned as fast as we could to face the wave and rode up, up, up and saw a lot of sunlight through the tallest wave. But it didn't break and again "Turn Turn Turn" and we headed in and got around the breakwater. It was rather close. The fishfinder was describing perfect sine waves. 30' - 15' - 30' - 15'. 15' waves in an average water depth of ~23'. Was very, very surprised they didn't break right on us.

Even though the CG had your back seems something that also has a G in it and even stronger was watch over you that day.

[Evan_Gatehouse]

Yeah my wife yelling at me from inside the cabin through a porthole.