Happens to everyone

Well, it was our turn.  We made an almighty balls of a bridge today.  We did avoid hitting it and no one was hurt, so all told, really just annoying.

Let's see if I can explain this.  We'd stopped to fill up with water on the side of the canal, about 50 meters away from the bridge.  We were facing downstream towards the bridge, there was current behind us and a fair amount of wind from behind as well.  To get the bridge to open you have to do some precision flying.  You have to bring your bow up the the end abutment and stop without hitting it so your crew can push the button.  The button and the abutment are about 2.5 meters from the bridge. 

Here's a couple of photos

The buttin is right on the end of that closer wall of piles.

Here's another view....

This is from on the bridge and hopefully gives a sense of how very close this all is.

Now, sailboats don't back up well under power (unless they have my beloved outboard!!!!) but that's the other boat. This one is powerful, but as is typical, you have very little steerage at all, so where you go as you back up is anybody's guess.

So.  We came off the wall, but I had no steerage as we were essentially being blown and swept down.  I gave it a juice in forward so I could steer, we got up to the button, stopped, but then started to swing side on, thank you current and wind.  I had a faint hope we'd hold it, so I reversed, but we got pushed into the channel for the bridge (now less than 2 meters from the mast resting in stands on deck) .  Gonna hit the bridge.

Reverse.  A good chunk harder.  But of course it was a crap shoot which way we'd turn.  Yeah, not towards the center of the channel as I'd hoped.  Nope, firmly towards the wall, at a right angle.  Briefly tried going forward, but we were pinned against the abutment.  Reverse as the stern was swinging down and we were now going towards the bridge arse first outside the allowed track.  Needed to get the bow up... Crunch into the wall, bye bye stern light, but we stopped swinging down towards the bridge.  A litte forward and we were (precariously) balanced beam on to the abutment. The bridge guys have cameras and let me tell you, he was banging that bridge up as fast as he could.  Thank you oh bridgemaster.  We were not in the best spot.  Back into forward as it went up and we glided round and through.  The man a little flustered, me a little less, I have a longer history of watching and participating in these kinds of screw ups.  We did have ginger cake before lunch when we stopped though.

It is a stupid system, most bridges have the buttons but usually also a phone number or a vhf channel.  The bridge before this one had the place to wait nice and far out so you can get some control before you get to the bridge and you can phone!!!!

Lessons learned.  I should have turned around and gone upstream before turning again and  approaching the bridge so I could have been better centered.  It still might have been an almighty disaster, but I'd have had more room to manoeuvre rather than been stuck up near the wall.  That said, the river there is only about  30 - 35 meters wide.  We're a bit more than 8 long and in perfect conditions need about 25 to turn.

In infinitely worse news.  Notre-Dame in Paris is burning.  An utter tragedy.