On my lunch break, went out for a cruise in a frigate in the West Indies. The black line is the apparent wind direction (wind was 30 kts out of the east), the grey near vertical line pointing upwards off the page is the ship's velocity vector (not exactly the bow heading as leeway was around 6 degrees, the bow was pointing more windward).
I was close-hauled west of Martinique heading east to Fort Saint Louis. The large radius circle represents 15 miles (extreme spotting distance for other ships), the smaller inside circle is a mile (long cannon range).
I made several tacks back and forth, beating against the wind and was feeling confident until I approached the anchorage NE of the Fort which presented a lee shore.
I underestimated the momentum of the ship and just backed the sails in time and came close to running aground, but with no speed the ship lost rudder steerage way and the wind pushed the ship westward.. in a panic i let the sheets fly but I had already started drifting leeward and into the shore I went.. it didn't help that I had no anchors aboard...
The captain may have been distracted, combing the beach with the scope. The sailing aspect of the program is getting to be a fun little challenge. I need to add in the current model soon.
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