Anchor down

BARBARA and I on board our Adams 40 Goanna are often swinging to anchor. If a severe summer thunder squall blows our way, we had better be up to speed with anchoring technique to survive the twenty minutes or so of mayhem without any damage to our yacht or to another vessel we might drag into.

Thunderstorm, electrical storm, thunder squall, downdraft, line squall, rollcloud or supercell; all are names for intense weather phenomena. To a yachtsperson at anchor they all effectively mean the one thing: wind and, probably, lots of it! 50 to 60 knots is not uncommon, 80 knots is rarer and scarier; but 100 knots, though unthinkable, can happen.

Over the years we have experienced thunderstorm