Electric Anchor Winches Options

[nimrod]

Fed. Was with an experienced skipper who swore blind it was best to pull the anchor
from the bow of the boat. 99.9 times it's OK but that .1 of a persent bought him undone.
As he was motoring forward with the buoy doing it's thing, and holding the throttle
controls the anchor stuck firm, the rope streatched to it's maximum and stopped the
front of the boat dead in it's tracks, as the boat stopped and started to swing violently to Port
it lunged the skipper forward with his hand still on the throttle, it went to full power.
With his face smashed up against the windscreen and broken teeth, he managed to throw the
shift into neutral. By this time the boat had done a full 180 and was now facing the way we came from.
Another person was thrown out of the boat and was very lucky he was thrown clear of the prop
which at that time was spinning at around 7000 revs.
I picked myself up from the floor and switched the motor off, got my mate back in the boat
and gave a clean towel to the skipper to stem the flow of blood coming from his mouth.
No Fed,, I will never try and pull an anchor up from the bow,, and as I said NEVER ever
under any circumstances TIE the rope off at the rear of the boat.
I have been using the buoy system since around 1965 or so LONG long
before it ever became popular and have told thousands of people never tie the rope to the rear.
Always wrap it around the bolard and hold onto it, if it wants to grab you can allow the rope
to slip while you slow the boat down.