Then they're ignorant. Anybody who has and does spend time on the water won't say that. I always have felt that the best scenario is that you break even with the water, in other words if you come back and everything's cool then you have broken even with it, the only other direction is to lose, and the water doesn't give a sh!t about that, it'll suck you up and not skip a beat.

I hear ya, but you didn't travel east as we did. I'm not saying it was as severe as your picture, but we had no business being out there! If one of those engines or trans went down, either boat would likely have sunk....

Or maybe you're agreeing with me, can't tell from your grammar. Yep - sure keeps you on your toes!!! (Wear your jackets too)

Spring of 1986 I made a horrible decision to go out on a bad weather day and learned a lesson. Water always wins. Regardless of how well you're prepared or what the weather conditions are there is a very narrow margin for error once things go wrong. Always have a ditch bag with flares, handheld vhf & very good life jackets (or wear them). ed