Tropical Storm Debby

The High Tide + 4' of tidal surge from Debby 

The dockmaster said they had never had a tide this high since the marina was built over 5 years ago, normally the water is 4' below this fixed dock at high tide.

It's blowin 20-30 and Wand'rin Star is heeled over 5 degrees+

All Sailors have a special name for the Inclinometer, when it was blowin 50-60 this guy was at 15 degrees.

There is supposed to be a really nice dingy on the Hydrolic stern lift of this 68' Irwin

But it is upside down after being blown off in the 50-60 mph winds.

We have been watching this building storm when the disorganized low developed below Cuba. We always goto our weather guru on Weather Underground to check out the predictions for possible tropical development. WeatherUnderground predicted a tropical Storm developing, making landfall at Tampa and crossing Florida to the Atlantic where it would become a Hurricane. That was nine days ago, Debbie has been pounding Florida for 4 days now and we had lots of rain bands come through for three days before that. Tampa has had 19 inches of rain so far, the last two days have been more of a wind event with 30 mph sustained and 40+ mph gust. Since our slip faces West we are taking the SSW winds on our beam which causes Wand'rin Star to heel 5 degrees with 20 mph winds and up to 15 degrees when the 50-60 came through Sunday night for almost two hours. It is easy to tell when the winds reach 50+ since this is when things begin to fall from the shelves. We have been through this drill enough to know how to properly secure the boat for such so we have just found things to do during the day on solid ground. The dock master told me the tides have never been so high at this marina since it was built about 5 years ago. Very happy to be on floating docks since you can just get the dock lines set and then ride it out instead of having to constantly go out in the weather to adjust lines as the tide/surge rises and falls as those on fixed docks. On the night we had the 50-60 I went out to just check things after it calmed to 30-40. I looked over at our neighbors with the 68' Irwin and his dingy had blown off and was upside down. It had fortunately become fouled in the dock line from his port stern to the center pilling. They have returned to Indiana for a couple of months so I considered getting the kyak down to rescue the dingy but I was afraid that if I made a mistake I could end up far away in the dark. I went back down below and called and emailed the dock master. They were able to lasso the dingy the next morning and save the craft. There is a technician there now trying to revive the outboard that was mounted on the transom and had been submerged in the saltwater overnight.I recently viewed a video on youtube that tells how to pickle a outboard that has been submerged in saltwater. Some say that it is just a matter of time before dropping your outboard in the drink will happen to you, kinda of like running aground,  so I watched the video just for the info. The video can be seen at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBxN5vXTVzc . I thought it might come in handy to help this motor out but the dockmaster sent out the technicians so I did not get to practice the salvage techniques.  Debbie is so slow moving that we still have a couple more days of wind and a few rain bands coming, Florida will be more than glad to show her the door out.