Author Peter Janssen

Cruising Life
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Coast Guard Rescue Swimmer Receives “Exceptional Bravery” Award for Rescuing Maine Fishermen in 20-foot Seas. See Video

A U.S. Coast Guard rescue swimmer will be awarded with the IMO Bravery at sea award for his role in the rescue of four fisherman who abandoned ship in a liferaft during heavy weather off the coast of Maine. A panel of judges decided that the rescue by Petty Officer Michael Kelly merited the 2019 IMO Award for Exceptional Bravery at Sea, the IMO’s highest honor for bravery. The decision was endorsed by the IMO Council at its 122nd session in London being held this week. Kelly is an Aviation Survival Technician Second Class stationed the U.S. Coast Guard Air…

Cruising Life
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Fire Extinguishers: Meeting the Minimum Isn’t Enough

Here’s a story about on board fire extinguishers that’s important to all cruising boat owners from Practical Sailor. It tells you how many you need, where to put them, and how to care for them. By Frank Lanier While portable dry chemical fire extinguishers are a common sight aboard any sailboat, their installation, upkeep, and use is almost sinful. During marine surveys I’ve asked boat owners how long they think a typical BC-I portable unit will last when fighting a fire and have received answers ranging from “about 20 minutes” to “until the fire is put out”—scary, when you consider…

Cruising Life
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Sabre Getting Ready To Launch New 58 Salon Express in October

Sabre Getting Ready To Launch New 58 Salon Express in October, Celebrate 50th Anniversary All Year There’s lots going on this summer at Sabre Yachts. The Down East builder just put the deck on the hull of its new 58 Salon Express in its factory in Raymond, Maine, and it’s also busy planning its 50th anniversary, with a big Sabre and Back Cove rendezvous next June in Portland; there will be celebrations throughout the year. The new Sabre 58 is scheduled to be launched for sea trials in October in Portland. Sabre already has several orders for the boat and they…

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Great White Shark Shocks Boaters Off Cape Cod

By Suzanna Heller On Saturday, a man named Doug Nelson and his son joined a father-son fishing expedition near Cape Cod, Massachusetts. It took an unexpected turn. At one point, Nelson took out his phone to record a member of the group catching what he believed to be a “good-sized fish,” told CNN. But it this was no ordinary fish — it was actually a great white shark. At the time of the encounter, there was actually a fish on the boy’s rod. The shark bit it clean off. The shark leaped out of the water, shocking the group. The…

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Somes Sound: A Classic Down East Cruising Destination, and the Only Fjord on the East Coast

If you’re heading to Maine or even thinking about cruising in Maine this summer, there’s still plenty of time to go all the way Down East to Somes Sound, the only fjord on the east coast of the United States and one of the prettiest cruising destinations around. The sound, about four miles long and often 150 feet deep, basically cuts Mount Desert Island in half and has the iconic boating communities of Southwest Harbor and Northeast Harbor at its lower end. And we’re approaching the best time of the year for cruising there, since that part of Maine generally…

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New, Easy-To-Use, DutchCraft 56: “The Ultimate All-Purpose Yacht”

The all-new, easy-to-use and easy-to-enjoy DutchCraft 56 will be launched at the Cannes Yachting Festival, starting Sept. 10. The minimalist-styled, aggressively designed DutchCraft 56 is nothing if not versatile. It can be used as an expedition boat, a dive boat, a fishing boat, a family cruising boat, a party boat (it has seats for 44 people), or just about anything else you can think of. Indeed, Sietse Koopmans, the head and founder of DutchCraft, calls it “the ultimate all-purpose yacht.” Koopmans is also the head and founder of Zeelander Yachts, and his family has been in the boating business in…

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High Water Creating Dangerous, Even Fatal, Conditions on Lake Michigan

Record high water levels have caused accidents and even a fatality in Lake Michigan, as they wash over breakwalls or make them difficult to see. One boat got stuck on top of a Chicago breakwall (see the picture above) after it hit the wall at night, sending five people to the hospital. The previous week another boat hit a breakwall, killing one person on board. The high water is covering jetties and breakwalls along vast sections of the lake, making them less visible, particularly at night.  The Coast Guard has advised boaters to be aware of the problem, and says…

Cruising Life
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New Portraits of Women Running Maine Lobster Boats

Here’s something worth looking at – and thinking about: A new exhibit of portraits of women who run Maine lobster boats. It’s called “Lobstering Women of Maine,” and it’s at the Penobscot Marine Museum in Searsport. As described in MaineBoats.com, the exhibit features paintings by Tobey White of Belfast, whose husband is a part-time lobsterman. It’s not a surprise that women make up a very small percentage of the Maine lobster fishing fleet. Indeed, only 215 of the 4,500 licenses for lobster fishing in the state are held by women. But another 305 women are students or apprentices in the…

On Watch with Peter Janssen
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The Clarkes: Living the Dream, Finally, on Their Nordhavn 40 Enfin

For Capt. Eric Clarke and his wife, Di-Enid, the name of their 2001 Nordhavn 40 says it all. The name is Enfin, and that means “finally” in French. He was born in France, and she is fluent in French. And Enfin, he told me, captures their dream. “’Finally’ would be the start of our dream, the means to do it and the great escape. We’d ‘finally’ be retired and enjoying life together. We’d ‘finally’ do what we want.” Right now the Clarkes and Princess, their Siberian husky, are cruising in British Columbia, north of the San Juans. They bought the…

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Yanmar Building New Flagship X47 Express with a Nod to Ferrari Design

Yanmar just announced that it is building a new flagship X47 Express cruiser that will have more than a fleeting reference to world-class automobile design. Indeed, Ken Okuyama, who designed the new Yanmar X47, also worked for Pininfarina for many years, and in 2016 transformed a Ferrari 599 to the customized kode57 (see picture above), although only five were ever built. The X47 Express is scheduled to be launched at the end of this year, and it already has been named the Official VIP Cruiser of the next America’s Cup in Auckland, New Zealand. It is Yanmar’s second express model,…

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