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photo from Zeilen
Proactive vs. staying put: Isn't it safer to stay put and wait for rescue?
It's a widespread notion that it's safest to float passively in an inflatable liferaft, having signaled with your EPIRB, and wait for rescue. While this is sometimes the best thing to do, many experts in sea rescue agree that this is often NOT the best idea. For one thing, your EPIRB is not a guarantee of rescue. The EPIRB is a great invention, no question, and every blue water sailor should have one. However, they’re easy to lose, and if you have one, it must work, and the battery must be charged. It’s also very important to recognize that in many parts of the world, search and rescue is simply not available.
In the proactive Portland Pudgy, you can sail to safety. Many experts on survival at sea emphasize that this is critically important. As Steve Callahan, who spent 76 days adrift on a liferaft, points out, “Most of a long survival voyage is spent drifting slowly in moderate weather.” He goes on to say that if he had had a “dynamic” (proactive) life raft/boat, he “would have sailed to safety in a mere six or seven days” (from The Liferaft: Don’t Leave Your Ship Without It). A fascinating series of videos, Survivorman: Lost at Sea (particularly in episode 2), shows the frustration a sailor feels as his inflatable liferaft drifts in circles a few miles from the islands he sees in the distance. Back to top.
What are the Portland Pudgy survival system components?
The Portland Pudgy is a rugged, unsinkable boat that is much safer than just about any other small boat/tender. However, to get the protection and full benefits of the Pudgy lifeboat, the following components are recommended: the exposure canopy, sailing rig, boat cover (to cover the exposure canopy when it is pre-set, but uninflated), bailing pump, sea anchor, and safety harness eyes. The electrical system (with optional solar panel) is another feature that can greatly enhance your safety and chances of rescue. The Portland Pudgy lifeboat is self-contained: all of these components stow inside the hull storage chamber. (The rudder and leeboards stow under the rear seat.) For more detailed information about these items go to the Accessories page.
Note that we do not supply a ditch bag. It is of utmost importance that you make up your own ditch bag and stow it inside the hull storage compartment. The Pudgy has a huge amount of storage chamber space for provisions and other safety items. Here is a link to the Equipped to Survive website, where you can get detailed information on creating a ditch bag. (A discussion of the poor quality of ditch bags supplied with life rafts can be found at Yachting World and Latitude 38. Another video shows the waterlogged contents of the ditch bag supplied and poorly packaged by a liferaft company.)
Can you preset the exposure canopy so it is ready in the event of an emergency?
Yes you can. The exposure canopy is designed so that you can preset it. You should cover it with a boat cover so that the inflation cords are not pulled accidentally. Back to top.
Deploying: How difficult is it to deploy the Portland Pudgy, compared to an inflatable life raft?
The Portland Pudgy, a rugged, solid boat, is heavier than most life raft canisters, at about 128 lb. However, if you have your Pudgy set up on your deck so that it is easily accessible, and if you fit the life line with a pelican hook so that you can disconnect the line and slide the Pudgy off the deck, it can be easily deployed in an emergency. Bear in mind the old adage that you should not board your lifeboat (or liferaft) until you have to step up to it from your mother boat. You will not be lifting the Pudgy and throwing it down into the water as much as sliding it into the water.
The exposure canopy and sea anchor can be pre-set for emergency use. The exposure canopy inflates in about 17 seconds after the lanyard is pulled. It uses two inflation chambers, each with a CO2 cylinder and a high-quality valve. (The valves are approved by the Navy for their one-man life raft.) You can preset the exposure canopy and the sea anchor so they are ready to be deployed quickly. For detailed information on the sea anchor and exposure canopy go to the Portland Pudgy accessories page.
With regard to deploying liferafts—unfortunately, there are many tragic stories of liferafts being deployed and not inflating. The Pudgy is already a boat; you don’t have to hope that it inflates. Another difficulty in deploying liferafts is that in severe storm conditions they have been known to become airborne (and thus impossible to board) and to flip upside down. In addition, if liferafts hit the water upside down, they will inflate upside down. Watch this video (in it, the narrator says it easy to right it, but as you watch them right the raft, even from the safety of a dock, it doesn't look so easy!)
This video shows even more vividly both the potential tragedy of a liferaft deflating immediately after inflating, as well as the difficulties of the raft inflating upside down. Back to top.
Boarding: Is it easier or more difficult to get into the Portland Pudgy from the water?
Inflatable liferafts are notoriously difficult to get into. (See this video of able-bodied men struggling to get into a liferaft in calm water.) There are many stories of heavy people or people with poor upper body strength or who are just exhausted or weakened by hypothermia being unable to board a liferaft.
The Portland Pudgy is easier to get into from the water than a liferaft is. When you board the Portland Pudgy from the water, even without the boarding ladder, the procedure is as follows: you get in position on the side of the boat at the exposure canopy entrance, holding onto a grabline, the gunwale, or the boarding ladder. Tip the boat toward you so that you can reach in and grab a hand-hold in the middle seat (the hand-holds in the middle seat allow it to function as a horizontal ladder). Kick out and pull yourself in over the gunwale. The boat tips down as you do this, but it will not capsize. One of our testers, a woman in her late fifties with a damaged, weakened shoulder, was sure that she would be unable to get in from the water, and was amazed at how easy it was. We had another tester who weighed 275 pounds climb in from the side easily, without causing the Pudgy to ship water or capsize. The boarding ladder makes it even easier: it acts like a stirrup that gives you “a leg up.” A video taken in a tank at a boat show, gives some idea how easy it is to get into the Pudgy from the water. (We will do a better video showing this in deep water.) Back to top.
Ballast bags: Don't you need ballast bags to keep the lifeboat stable?
Ballast bags on liferafts are not as effective as many sailors assume for the following reason: there is no resistance to a bag of water when it is in the water because it weighs the same as the surrounding water. You only get resistance when the bag is lifted out of the water, and by the time this happens, the liferaft is already tipped very steeply and can be capsized easily by wind or waves. The Pudgy uses a sea anchor to reduce the risk of capsize.
The USCG did a test of liferafts in hurricane force winds (created using helicopters and a C130 airplane). They tested several large liferafts, and all of them, with the exception of a 25-person buoy life raft, were quickly and easily capsized, trapping the occupants under the collapsing floor of the raft. Somewhere in cyberspace there is a video showing about eight life rafts in the test, and all but one of them flipping. Here’s a link we found to a much shorter excerpt showing just the buoy liferaft and another liferaft. (Bear in mind that a buoy liferaft, while probably superior to the non-buoy liferaft, still takes several minutes for the water chamber to fill. Until then, it is just as vulnerable to capsize as a non-buoy liferaft). Also, you still have to count on it inflating. Here’s a video of a liferaft that didn’t. In addition, a buoy liferaft, like any liferaft, could hit the water upside down and inflate upside down, which obviously makes it impossible for the water bag to fill until it is righted. The first episode of Survivorman: Lost at Sea shows how just about everything that can go wrong with a liferaft very well might. Back to top.
Sea anchor: What kind of sea anchor does the Portland Pudgy lifeboat use?
The sea anchors that come with most liferafts are notoriously flimsy and inadequate. The Pudgy uses a substantial and ruggedly-built Fiorentino sea anchor, made especially for the Portland Pudgy. The sea anchor attaches to the Pudgy’s rugged bridle, which in turn is hooked to two attachment points that are spaced on either side of the bow, for triangulation. The stainless steel attachment points are very solid and cannot tear off (as is possible on fabric liferafts, in which case they can rupture the raft).
A Dutch crew from the magazine Zeilen tested the Portland Pudgy as a lifeboat last year in the treacherous waters of the North Sea (sailing it 20 miles to shore), and they make it a point in their article to talk about how pleased they were with the performance of the Pudgy with the sea anchor. The bow held firmly into the oncoming waves and wind, thus greatly reducing the risk of capsize. You can see the article here. (Unless you speak Dutch, it's slow going, but the photos are great.) Zack Smith of Fiorentino Para-Anchor also tested the Pudgy with its sea anchor in 12 foot seas and dangerous currents off the California coast, and was very happy with its performance. Back to top.
A related topic: There are several sturdy attachment points for safety harnesses in the Portland Pudgy, including optional stainless steel safety harness eyes which are bolted to the wall of the boat and have strong backing plates. Any safety harness attachment point in a fabric liferaft is a site for a potential tear in the raft.
Capsize: What happens in the event of capsize?
All boats and liferafts can capsize. When most liferafts capsize, the occupants can be trapped under the floor of the raft. It is necessary for liferaft passengers to exit the raft to turn it over. The Portland Pudgy is a solid boat that is heavier than its exposure canopy. The bottom-heaviness makes the Pudgy want to right itself, and in fact, the Pudgy with the inflated canopy is self-righting when empty. The CO2-inflated 6-inch tubes of the Pudgy act as roll bars in rough seas. If the Pudgy capsizes with two adults inside and the inflated exposure canopy in place, the added 400-plus pounds of buoyancy in the canopy make the Pudgy lie partially on its side; the passengers can right the boat by shifting their weight or waiting for wave action to right it. Even lying partially on its side, because of the deep rigid floor of the Pudgy, a large domed air chamber is formed inside the partially-capsized boat (unlike the fabric floor of an inflatable liferaft, which can trap and suffocate passengers if capsized).
By the way, even without the exposure canopy in place, the capsized Pudgy floats high in the water and is very easy to right using the handholds in the keel, and because of the thickness of the double-wall hull, it picks up little or no water (no sitting in a swamped boat!). This can be life-saving. Hypothermia is a major cause of death in emergencies at sea. Back to top.
photo from Zeilen
Size and comfort: How big/comfortable is the Portland Pudgy inside?
The Pudgy has 16.1 square feet of floor space. The USCG requires 16 square feet for a four person liferaft. The Portland Pudgy’s middle seat is removable, and the flat floor is 6 feet two inches long, designed so that two people can comfortably stretch out to sleep.
Unlike a liferaft, the Pudgy’s floor can be kept dry. Sitting and lying in salt water for prolonged periods can cause serious sores and infection.
The floor is insulated. Because of the double wall thickness and the foam under the floor, the floor is not as cold as in most life rafts, and because it's a rigid boat, you can’t feel things like shark fins and fish bumping up against the floor.
Another important feature for your comfort: Although the exterior of the Portland Pudgy exposure canopy is safety orange, the interior of the canopy is blue--the color recommended by the USCG to prevent nausea. Most liferafts are orange in the interior (orange actually stimulates nausea). If you've ever sat inside a typical liferaft, you will appreciate what a powerful effect the color has. For a little flavor of what life is like in a typical liferaft in moderately heavy weather, see this video that shows a few minutes of a four hour liferaft test. Also look at the first few episodes of Survivorman: Lost at Sea for an even more vivid idea of life in a liferaft with air and water leaks. If you can read Dutch, look at the article documenting the test by a Dutch team who were set adrift in similar conditions in the North Sea and sailed 20 miles to shore in the Pudgy lifeboat.
Another thing: the Pudgy has a huge amount of secure storage room inside the double hull. This hull storage is accessed via five water-tight hatches. In addition to the Portland Pudgy survival system components, you can keep drinking water, provisions, your ditch bag, fishing supplies, a first aid kit, and much more inside.
Also, you can get the optional electrical system:
The electrical system illuminates the standard built-in compass, a LED reading light
(red for night vision), and an LED pole light, and perhaps most important, it has a
socket for a torch or GPS. You can recharge it with a solar panel.
Back to top.
The Portland Pudgy is an exceptional yacht tender. It’s a 7 foot 8 inch dinghy approved by the USCG for 4 people (twice the capacity of any other 8 foot dinghy). It's stable, safe, and rugged, and has huge carrying capacity. One Pudgy owner, who made it through the Northwest Passage with his wife and kids (on a wooden sailboat), credits his Portland Pudgy with saving his big boat when it ran aground:
"because it rows so well in rough weather and can handle two 45 pound anchors being dropped in it for kedging off a reef. It is a real workboat built for real world conditions. In the sailing we do a dingy can mean the difference between life or death, and this isn't in reference to the lifeboat abilities of the pudgy just its stability and durability."
Another Portland Pudgy owner was able to save the life of a fellow sailor, because the Pudgy was so stable and buoyant and handled so well:
"He had been in the water for almost 30 minutes and was suffering from extreme hypoxia. I reached him just as he let go of the ladder [of his own boat] and became a dead weight on the back of my dinghy. I had no choice but to try and haul him in over the stern and hoped that the dinghy wouldn't swamp with our combined weight of almost 400 pounds in the back of the boat. The Pudgy performed perfectly, I got a hold of his belt and pulled him aboard without taking on any water at all."
The Portland Pudgy rows beautifully—because of the long skeg it tracks perfectly, and it skims along because it's so buoyant. It's a fun sailing dinghy. We have improved the sailing rig so it's faster and comes into the wind better.
If you were to buy a good tender and a decent life raft, it would cost you more than the Portland Pudgy with its survival gear.
Another Pudgy owner calls it, "the best dinghy ever made!" Back to top.