Last weekend we attended a safety course at Bosön sport facility, World Sailing Offshore Personal Safety course, which covers many good topics and exercises that can be useful to know in case of an emergency situation at sea. The course is a requirement in many sailing races as well as if you want to cross the Atlantic with the ARC. Even for those not planning to join a race, the contents of a course like this is incredibly valuable and the opportunity to swim around in a pool with all clothes and a life jacket is not something you want to say no to!
Some of the theory topics we covered in the course was VHF/radio, emergency repairs, crew overboard, fire fighting, emergency flares, hypothermia, basic medical treatment and many others. The practical exercises included fire fighting, firing a flare and crew overboard where we actually got to jump in a swimming pool with all clothes and life jacket to train in various rescue scenarios with and without a life raft. In other words, it was a full schedule!
It was a two day course with mixed theory, practical exercises and written tests. A lot of information to digest of course but quite a lot of common sense as well which helps learning and remembering everything. The course is definitely something I recommend others planning on sailing a longer trip or just want to increase their knowledge in personal safety (by the way, the written tests were super easy).
This course has taught me a lot about personal safety but perhaps the most important thing I will bring with me from this is the new insight that even a nice and calm sailing can very rapidly turn into a dangerous and serious situation and that we are in fact quite small in an environment with meter high waves, strong winds and cold water. Despite this I don’t feel frightened in any way, quite the opposite actually. We know a lot more now and are more prepared than ever which gives us the best chances for a safe and smooth sailing!
During these two days we collected a few short movies that we put together with some glue and duct tape. Have a look at it below and please leave a comment!
We also got our own logo as a stamp! It’s incredibly cool to see your own creating not only as a digital image on the website but also in physical form as a stamp. That’s a good reason to be proud I think! Imagine how impressed authorities will be when we arrive in a new country or port and get to sign all necessary documents 😉
