It was only 10 miles. A short run and one we would have to do by motor (west/southwest winds expected), but it would give us a better anchorage for the night with northerlies coming, shorten our next hop just a bit (critical with less daylight to sail by this time of year), and set us up nicely for the run to Port Jefferson. It would also bring the craziest weather of the season.

Storm coming

We knew we were going to get some rain from the forecast. I checked the radar regularly and thought we would only get rain, so I pulled out Trip’s foul weather gear. The skies started darkening, we could see rain out over Long Island, and lightning struck periodically. Then things got interesting.


I ducked down to double check that things were secure and port holes dogged down as the rain started. Then came the wind. Suddenly it was an onslaught of both. I had grabbed towels to mop up the torrent of rain pouring in through the open hatch. Trip cranked the rudder over as far as he could and held on. I watched in disbelief as the wind reading on our chartplotter climbed from the 20’s to the 80’s in a minute or less. Most of our electronics were already in the oven (acting as a faraday cage to protect from power surges during lightning storms), but I used my phone to snap a shot of the wind speed. The last reading I saw was 96.9 knots before the anemometer stopped reading and went into a free fall. I love the picture I got reading a wind speed of 444 knots, but even I don’t think we went through gusts like that. Winds in the nineties was more than enough thank you very much.

The whole storm probably only lasted 20-30 minutes, but it was the most intense weather event we’ve ever experienced onboard. Once it passed Trip went around and checked the boat to confirm that there was no damage. We were a little bit rattled by the experience, but otherwise fine ourselves. We made our way deep into Niantic Bay, dropped anchor, had a couple of stiff drinks with dinner, and then passed out for the evening.