Join in the Yachty Gras celebration

JANUARY 2012 • SOUTH SHORE HARBOUR MARINA NEWSLETTER
Join in the Yachty Gras celebration
by Keith Emmons
What started out as a small boat parade
through the Clear Creek Channel during
Mardi Gras time has turned into a weekend long event for both boaters and the
public. This year’s Yachty Gras will happen February 11-19.
The kickoff party is Saturday, February
11, from 7-11 p.m. The theme for this
year’s event is Promise of the Sea.
Sundance Grill II at Waterford Harbor
will host the traditional kickoff party at 7
p.m., Saturday, February 11. The admission is free and open to the public. The
party will consist of hors d’oeuvres, cash
bar, live music and both live and silent
auctions. It will be a great evening of
entertainment and dancing to benefit the
Veterans Memorial building fund sponsored by the Seabrook Association.
Saturday, February 18, boats will
parade down Clear Creek Channel past
the Kemah Boardwalk, starting at 7 p.m.,
and revelers will be showered with beads
and doubloons. Boat owners are encouraged to form private Krewes and decorate
their boats to the theme. Originality and
good taste will be highly valued in judging. The Yachty Gras Boat Parade is open
to any well-found vessel that is insured
and has appropriately silenced exhaust
system.
There is also an after parade party at
Outriggers starting at 9 p.m. The awards
ceremony is Sunday, February 19 at 10
a.m. at the Kemah Boardwalk Aquarium.
The awards will be presented to all sail
and power boat categories and Best of
Show.
If you would like to participate, or
need information, visit the website at
http://yachtygras.com or call (713) 8824040.
Welcome new staff member
We are happy to announce Chase
Cobble as our new marina maintenance
manager. He’ll be working to keep the
marina in tip-top shape, from the docks to
the electrical system and everything else.
You can call him at the office number
(281) 334-0515 or email chase.cobble
@sshmarina.com.
Updates . . .
I wrote a story a while back about boat
alarm and monitoring systems. I saw this
on one of the boat forums and thought it
would be worth reprinting. Technology is
always changing!
A) Boat Sense Solution is working on a
new device. It will work via a 3G cell network (GSM). I will have some more info
soon. I might buy this one if I can find a
way to get a SIM card for data only from
Rogers at a reasonable monthly fee. Price
for the device is +/- $750. Quick answers
and good feed-back from the owner:
[email protected], (917)
226-0157 in New York area.
B) Spot Hug, from Spot Connect. The
system now has sensor alert capabilities.
The messages are sent via email or SMS
via satellite. About $500 for the basic
device, plus the price of the sensors, plus
annual fees, between $150 and $300 per
year. Seems very well built. Spot Hug can
also send an emergency message to Coast
Guard or authorities in case of emergency. Only turn-off: I had to call three
times and talk to three persons who had
no idea what they were talking about,
before having a knowledgeable person
who returned my call two days later.
Where to buy? West Marine, he told me.
C) Best follow-up, best information
sent via e-mail and time on telephone:
Paul Crosby, from Geneco Marine, for the
GOST series. I called Gost in Florida for
inquiries, talked to a real person who put
me in touch with Gemeco in Lake City,
SC. 2 hours later, I had a full documentation, a quote and a rebate from original
price. Expensive comparing to the two
others (2400$), but a high-end product,
obviously State of the Art. Needs a 3G
card with a national provider.
D) Many wireless home alarm systems
are adaptable to a boat’s needs. Cost
ranges between $150 and $400, plus sensors (water, smoke, movement, easy to buy
from third party). Many of those home
alarm systems will work via 3G connection to a central office which will alert
you by email if necessary. I’m not sure it’s
More Briefs, page 4
CO detector that works
by Keith Emmons
I’m sure most of you have at least
one carbon monoxide (CO) detector on
your boat. These are great safety items
that will alarm and let you know if
you’re being exposed to CO — which
can kill you. These are especially
important in gasoline boats since they
put out about ten times as much CO as
diesel engines. However, if you have a
diesel boat, you still have to be concerned. First, your diesel engine does
emit CO. Second, you may have a
propane stove or other sources of CO on
board. Finally, you may have a neighbor
with a gasoline boat in the marina, or
rafted up to you. Either his engines or
generator may be emitting CO that gets
into your boat.
I have a great story about this. We
were tied up to the bulkhead in Lake
Charles, Lousiana for Contraband days.
A couple of boats had rafted up to us,
and had their gasoline genset running
overnight. I awoke the next morning to
the sound of my CO detectors going off.
My friend had awoken before me, and
she was opening the windows and portholes since they had been closed
overnight. As soon as she did, the CO
from the neighbor’s boat started entering my boat, in dangerous quantities!
We shut the windows and everything
was fine. Thank goodness for the detectors.
Symptoms of CO poisoning are nausea, headache and becoming tired or
sleepy. It can literally kill you while you
sleep. When you breathe CO, it combines with the hemoglobin in your blood
instead of oxygen, and you die because
your body is getting no oxygen. A
strong concentration can kill you rather
quickly, but a very small concentration
over a long period of time can do the
same. This causes a problem for CO
detectors, which you’ve probably experienced — false alarms.
The alarm limits for CO detectors
have been changed over the years. Early
More CO detector, page 5
OJ’s
MARINE
Yacht Consulting
and Repairs
Donna Rogers
Marina Manager
[email protected]
Taylor Ihlefeld
Harbormaster
[email protected]
Keith Emmons
Newsletter Editor
[email protected]
Virginia Zelenka
Accounting Coordinator
[email protected]
Jeremy Dyer
Fuel Pier/Supervisor
[email protected]
Tyler Hawthorn
Marcus Barefoot
Chase Cobble
Maintenance Manager
Amber Moore
Receptionist/Leasing Agents
The Lighthouse is a publication of South Shore
Harbour Marina. Reproduction in whole or in
part is prohibited without permission.
Call today 713.8 28.14 49
Page 2
MARINA STAFF
FUEL PIER HOURS:
Mon.-Fri. 8 a.m.-5 p.m.
Sat. & Sun. 9 a.m.-5 p.m.
H Coast Guard Certified Fiberglass Repair H
1900 Ship Yard Dr. • Seabrook, TX
MARINA
2551 South Shore Blvd. Suite B
League City, TX 77573
(281) 334-0515 • Fax (281) 334-0288
OFFICE HOURS:
Mon.-Fri. 8 a.m.-5 p.m.
Sat. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. & Sun. Noon-5 p.m.
• Complete Boat Repair • Bottom Jobs
• Props and Shafts • Zincs • Woodwork
• Mechanical Repairs and more
[email protected]
Located at Seabrook Ship Yard
A Monthly publication of South Shore
Harbour Marina.
Published by
A Division of Waterfront Publishing Inc.
228-B Marina Bay Dr.
Kemah, Texas 77565
South Shore Harbour Marina and Waterfront
Publishing Inc. are not responsible for claims
of manufacturers or their representatives on
any items published.
For advertising information, contact
Mike DuBois at (281) 334-2202.
South Shore Harbour Marina Newsletter
January 2012
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January 2012
South Shore Harbour Marina Newsletter
Page 3
Briefs
continued from page 1
the way to go just to save a couple of hundred bucks. Not sure the units and accessories would resist to humidity and salt
environment. There is nobody to talk to if
something goes wrong. It’s a DIY thing.
As for now, I’m totally impressed by
the Gost series, have big question marks
about the Spot Hug, and would love to
encourage a small business like Boat
Sense, but I’m not yet excited by the look
of the product. I’m a MAC guy, not a PC.
Work in progress...
Bryan
PS: For those who have a PC, a GPS
and Wi-Fi access onboard, check
www.boatmonitor.com. Cost: $5. Quote:
“It’s a web application that enables you to
use your existing smartphone or computer
to track your boat’s position when left at
anchor. Relax and enjoy your time ashore
knowing your boat is still securely on the
hook!” Cool.”
Socialization of manatees
By Allen Ames
Once you get into South Florida, there
are all kinds of Manatee Zones, restricting
Page 4
boat movement
in one way or
another. In
truth, boats
with their propellers can be
fatal to the
once-endangered manatees, but the reality is a bit
more political, me thinks.
Note that
the Summer
Manatees
must be
more agile
than the winter ones,
since they
apparently
can avoid boats going 5 MPH faster. Note
also that few people live in their winter
cottages along the shore in summer.
We have noticed in the past that manatees are upwardly mobile socially and
tend to hang out off the very expensive
mega-mansions and condos of the superrich. There are far more manatee speed
restrictions in these areas than off trailer
parks and undeveloped land. (I refuse to
believe that politics or payoffs would have
had anything to do with these designations for the betterment of these lovely
Rubenesque mammals.)
As upwardly
mobile as these
animals may be,
there are still
some areas where
they can only
afford to go on
winter weekends.
I haven’t yet read the research that shows
how they learned to read calendars and
clocks, but I am delighted that some government grant or other was able to furnish
them the opportunity.
Some new signs are beginning to show
up that weren’t
in evidence
two years ago.
Do they signify
a little less corruption in government and
governmentappointed
employees or the simple fact that scientific research has shown that manatees are
no longer endangered and that they better
find another way to restrict the speed of
boats off rich people’s winter homes?
Next year, we expect that all the manatee
signs will be replaced with ones that read:
FILTHY RICH PEOPLE HABITAT
Anyone throwing a wake of any sort
will be shot.
South Shore Harbour Marina Newsletter
January 2012
CO dectector
CO Experts
model 2010
continued from page 2
on, they were very sensitive, and alarmed
at low limits. The problem was that they
alarmed all the time and people ignored
them. Fire departments were called constantly because of alarming home units.
The government finally stepped in and
actually raised the limits to reduce the
false alarms. Of course, this also
increased your risk for exposure to low
concentrations for long periods of time.
This gets even more problematic for
boats. There are lots of things that can
make a CO detector false alarm on a boat.
For you new boat owners, that “new
fiberglass smell” is the resin continuing to
cure. Those fumes will also set off a CO
detector, and actually contaminate the cell
that measures CO. I went through three
sets of “marine” CO detectors on my last
boat, which was new when I purchased it.
I hate to say it, but there’s nothing you
can do about that. You may just have to
put a disconnect on the CO detector and
use it only when there are CO sources
around. If your CO detector goes off for
no apparent reason, check around you to
see if anyone else is running an engine or
genset.
Next, check the water in your batteries.
Batteries that are running low on water
and getting hot off-gas fumes that will set
off CO detectors. Other strange things
will set them off as well. I had a liveaboard friend making sauerkraut the old
fashioned way, by fermenting it in a
crock. That even set off his CO detector.
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The “marine” detectors aren’t much
better than the home ones. I also don’t
like the fact that at least some of them
have to be connected to the ship’s 12V
power. What happens if your voltage
drops? I much prefer self contained detectors with their own batteries. So I know
you’re asking by now (especially with the
title of this article!) “What do I use?”
The only CO detector on the market
that I recommend for boats (and houses
for that matter) is the CO Experts model
1070 (http://tinyurl.com/23eho9). This is
made mostly for airplanes, but works very
well on boats. It’s self contained and very
sensitive. One of the things that makes it
so useful is that is has five alarm levels.
At low concentrations it will “chirp” at
you and blink the light occasionally. At
high concentrations it will really let you
know to get to fresh air. It has a “hush”
feature that will silence the alarm for
awhile, based on the concentration of CO
in the air. You can check it out for yourself at the link posted earlier in the paragraph. There are also good articles about
CO poisoning and detectors there. It’s a
bit more expensive than the home models
at $172, but I think its well worth it. One
more benefit — all fires produce CO, so it
works as a fire/smoke alarm as well. Take
a look, get one or two and be safe!
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January 2012
South Shore Harbour Marina Newsletter
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Page 5
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