Cold Cricket

Two sailors face death after capsizing in winter water

Article by Roger Martin

Shaking uncontrollably, my legs were becoming numb. I kept trying to remember the data in those hypothermia tables we’ve seen in sailing magazines—the ones with chilling columns of water temperature, time until loss of dexterity, time until exhaustion or unconsciousness, and finally, time until death.

I knew we were in water that couldn’t be much above freezing, but I couldn’t remember the times in those tables. What bothered me more was I had no accurate sense of how long we had been in the water; I was starting to experience brain fog.

It had been a gorgeously clear, cold Saturday afternoon in early February in the 1970s on Lake Anna in central Virginia. My friend Jay and I had been taking turns at the helm of Cricket, my mid-1950s daysailer. We were both experienced sailors in our 20s, although Jay was less experienced and not very familiar with Cricket.

The centerboard boat was a sloop-rigged version of the New England “Woodpussy” class of cat boats. It was 13-1/2’ long with 6’ of beamy round hull. It had a fiberglass hull and deck, plywood floor, and spruce mast and boom, with styrofoam blocks under the floor. It had a large mainsail and a small jib. I had owned Cricket since high school and had sailed her extensively in a variety of conditions. The boat had never capsized.