With both Pete Goss and Mike Perham having been knocked down in the Southern Ocean, perhaps it’s time for those of us who intend to sail in waters nearer to home to think a little bit about how we would cope with heavy weather. Perhaps you think it will never happen – yet forecasting is an approximate science, and a small low forecast at force 7 maximum can sometimes deepen quickly into something that brings force 10 or more.  So it’s worth making a ‘heavy weather plan’ for your yacht.

‘Heavy Weather Sailing’ is edited by Peter Bruce and is now in it’s sixth edition, which says a lot. With contributions from Dag Pike, Lin and Larry Pardey, Ewen Southby-Tailyour and others with equal experience of the real thing, it’s a ‘must read’ for any aspiring skipper, and a book to keep on the reference shelf to be dipped into at the start of the season.

This isn’t a big book.  It won’t take you ages to read.  And it’s one that you pick from, rather than read cover to cover.  But it repays the cost in terms of potential safety, and it’s packed with sound advice and first hand experience.

With chapters on Yacht Design and Stability, Spars, Storm Sails, Preparation for Heavy Weather (a chapter I found most helpful), Waves (and how to cope with big ones), as well as storm tactics in RIBs, power boats and multihulls, this is a comprehensive primer on how to prepare for what you hope you will never have to face.

Part two is equally useful:  a series of accounts of individual storms by those who survived them.

There’s a foreword by Ellen Macarthur, and a dust-cover quote by Pete Goss:  “If you buy no other book for your voyage, buy this one”.  

Heavy Weather Sailing is published by Adlard Coles at £35.00.