As the mooring ball turns...redux

The plan was sound:  Ian and Lesley were going out to Cousteau, anchor and snorkel the next morning.  I was going to delay a day then go out and join them.  I offered to cook spaghetti on Peregrine.  There was serious discussion of stepping off the day after for Fawn Harbor, about thirty miles to the east.

Ian and Lesley got out of Nakama Creek and hit big swells.  Thunderheads on the horizon - they said bugger this and came back in to their mooring.  Good thing - last night we had big rains.  The South Pacific Convergence Zone is having its way with us.  Cousteau probably would have been bad for visibility.

This morning after swimming, I look over to Fandango and see a white fender in the water.  I hollered over to Ian, "You have a fender in the water."  "I know," he yelled back.  "Our mooring let go."

WTF?

Hopped in the dinghy right away and went over to help.  The fender was holding up the mooring lines which, indeed, were no longer tethered to anything below water.  Ian had dropped the anchor.  A family on shore had seen Fandango dangerously close to the reef and came out in their bamboo raft (a 'billy') to warn Ian and Lesley.  When Ian started the engine, they could look down and see reef.  They managed to wrap the mooring line around the prop and Ian had to jump in to untangle that.  But they made it off without touching.

It turns out, as reported previously by your humble South Seas correspondent, that the mooring shackles were not seized with anything.  There was no wire preventing the shackle pin from working its way loose and coming undone.  It was a stroke of luck that it didn't happen during one of the many afternoon squalls:  Fandango would have been on the reef for sure.  

I helped move Fandango to another mooring - one that had been checked previously by a local diver.  This diver has 'promised' to show up in a couple of days to check the rest of the actively used moorings.   We're laying in stainless seizing wire.

Spaghetti dinner is still on for tonight.  Ian looked skeptical.  I don't blame him.   Man, I wish I could find the fixings for chorizo mushroom pasta...

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