Feature image credit: US Coast Guard Pacific Northwest

#BreakingNews (1/2) #USCG crews responding to a disabled 143-foot yacht 45-miles northwest of Grays Harbor, Wash., with 7 people aboard. No medical concerns. Vessel cannot close transom door and water has entered the stern. Flooding is under control. Rescue crews remain on scene. pic.twitter.com/F10f7yYAiy

— USCGPacificNorthwest (@USCGPacificNW) May 7, 2022

At roughly 07:00 on the morning of Saturday the 7th of May, the 45m Benetti motoryacht Domani was disabled 45 miles north of Grays Harbour in Washington. Although seven people were on board, no injuries or medical concerns have been reported as of yet, however, the US Coast Guard did state that the incident was caused due to flooding of the beach club and the crew being unable to close the transom door.

The motor yacht is now being towed to a shipyard in Port Angeles where it will undergo the necessary repairs and insurance checks. The question now being asked is exactly what led to such an unlikely and bizarre occurrence. Both the REG Yacht Code and MI Yacht Code require that openings in the yacht's shell doors ‘May be manually closed and locked in the event of power or hydraulic failure’.

Providing the incident wasn’t a result of human error, an event such as this could spark review and debate on the leniency of regulations and seaworthiness of the current fleet. If the regulations allow for a manual hydraulic pump then it could be worth speculating whether or not the right hydraulic pressure had been maintained, or if there were perhaps any impurities in the hydraulic oil. Another angle to consider is whether the transom door was open before or after the yacht departed from the harbour - if the door was opened prior to departure then damage sustained while underway would provide a more obvious reason as to why the crew were unable to close it. 

47-foot Motor Lifeboats from Station Grays Harbor and Station Quillayute River can be seen in the first photo. There continues to be no medical or pollution concerns. pic.twitter.com/sygSNu0swj

— USCGPacificNorthwest (@USCGPacificNW) May 7, 2022

LinkedIn user Eddie Cashman commented on a post highlighting the incident saying, “ I've been on a Bennetti where we sometimes couldn't close the stern door under the power of it's own hydraulic system. The captain would rig a line from a capstan to a cleat on the door while I operated the hydraulics and sure enough, the thing would get up enough that the hydraulics would do the rest of the work.”

In the same thread, Cashman continued, “It only happened once to me but several times to the captain meanwhile the door was operated a huge amount of times. Hard to find the error from an outside perspective when it's hidden amongst many successful operations, particularly when the surveyor or whoever may arrive at a closed door, see it open, close then complete the check. It seems like the similarity of this incident and my own was a sea day where the beach club was open for an extended period, which would further exclude an outside perspective. Up to the crew to report the issue and who knows, Bennetti might know about the issue, wouldn't surprise me.”

Whatever the reason may be for this incident, the most important thing is that the crew are safe and the coastguards acted quickly and efficiently enough to resolve the issue and tow the yacht to a shipyard. Fortunately, no medical or pollution concerns were reported. 

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