Safety - Pacific Crossing Notes: A Sailor's Guide to the Coconut Milk Run - page 62

We specifically chose a self-righting life raft in order to have one less potential obstacle to
clear in this worst-case scenario. The life raft is mounted on the coach roof in a hard case.
It pays to carefully examine the contents of your life raft's survival gear. Most provide
only limited quantities of drinking water, for example. This concerned us, especially since
we would be heading into the Pacific where even in the best case, rescue operations run
over long distances and therefore long time frames. We had the option to have extra items
packed into the life raft; ideally, we would have liked to add a manual (hand pump) water
maker. However, the cost was prohibitive. Instead we settled for an emergency desalinator
which is part of our grab bag.
Q: What do you have in your abandon ship / grab bag?
A: Our grab bag is a red waterproof bag that is always in reach by the chart table. It con-
tains flares, a handheld GPS, handheld VHF, lithium batteries for both those devices, foil
blankets, a compass, paper and pencil, fishing gear with knife and small cutting board, en-
ergy bars, a hand-crank flashlight, and copies of key documents such as passports. All
these items are sealed in individual Zip-loc bags. We also have an abandon ship list above
the chart table to remind us to take the EPIRB with us, as well as the sat phone, the extra
water container we keep handy, plus the spear gun if we have time.
Recent additions to our grab bag are several emergency desalinators made by SeaPack at a
relatively affordable price. These are one-use, forward osmosis membrane filters that
provide an extra (though small) water reserve. The advantage of these filters are price; the
disadvantages are the bulk and finite quantity of water produced (one 3.2 pound package
produces four liters - a little more than one gallon - of water).
Q: Do you have an EPIRB?
A: We have an ACR Global Fix unit mounted near the companionway. Having initially
purchased and registered the EPIRB for an earlier trip, we were careful to check that the
registration and battery were renewed before we set off on our Pacific cruise.
It is our understanding that due to the relatively high number of false EPIRB alarms,
many maritime rescue services will only act on an alarm if they can confirm that the boat
in question could plausibly be at the transmitted distress position. For this reason, we
make sure that the emergency contact data registered with the EPIRB is up to date. We
also keep our contacts abreast of our cruising plans. In addition, we have spread these
across time zones, with one contact in North America, one in Germany, and one in New
Zealand. Lastly, we exchange EPIRB ID Codes with other boats on our route. This is a