Rumiko rides out the storm

A dog wades through a flooded street next to a battered house after Hurricane Jimena hit Puerto San Carlos. (Photo source: Reuters. Click here to view other Reuters' photographs of Puerto San Carlos after the storm.)



















On Wednesday, Hurricane Jimena made landfall on the Baja Peninsula. Jimena pummeled the coast and inland towns with winds as high as 100 mph and torrential rains that forecasters said could cause dangerous floods and mudslides.

Communities in the northern part of the state of Baja Sur have suffered damage such as flooding, power outages, downed trees and roofs being torn off buildings. The organization Baja Bush Pilots has been monitoring the damage caused by Jimena in northern Baja California Sur, and continues to post updates on the extent of the damage in various Baja communities. According to the Baja Bush Pilots there has been considerable damage to the main highway (1) in the mid-Baja peninsula and some bridges have been washed out making travel difficult.

Last night, Jimena hit Santa Rosalia. By the time Jimena had worked its way to the marina where Rumiko is docked, it had weakened to a "Tropical Storm." The map above, which comes from Weather Underground, shows the location of the eye of the storm just west of Santa Rosalia last night. We went to bed knowing that Rumiko was being battered by hefty winds and rain, and woke up wondering if our little boat was okay.

This morning we received an email from our friends Richard and Krista of the sailing vessel Lilith. They reported that both Rumiko and Lilith survived the 50+ knot winds (> 55 mph) that hit the marina. The damage to Rumiko was minimal:

• All of Rumiko's fenders (i.e., air-filled tubes designed to hold the boat off of the dock) blew out, so Richard and Krista added a stern line to hold Rumiko off the dock, and as a result there was no damage to Rumiko's hull. Thanks R&K!
  
• The winds and swell put so much strain on Rumiko's dock lines that one of the lines split. Fortunately, we had doubled-up all of the dock lines before we left. Redundancy works.
  
• The constant stress on the docklines wore through much of the chafe protection that we had added to the lines. But as Lilith pointed out, "that's what chafe gear is for." It protected the lines themselves from being worn through.
• There were no major leaks or damage to the inside of Rumiko.
  

Needless to say, that email alleviated the anxiety that we were feeling about Rumiko.

Unfortunately, the town of Santa Rosalia, like other Baja towns such as Puerto San Carlos, suffered some losses from Jimena. According to Lilith:
"the town [of Santa Rosalia] is in quite a state. Power out, roads out, roofs gone, etc., cars buried by the mud, some cars in the harbour, some boats in the streets. Sadly, there was at least one fatality, and there will probably be word of more later."

We are so grateful to the folks on Lilith and others who helped keep Rumiko safe during the storm. We hope that the communities along the Baja are able to quickly recover from the damages wrought by Jimena.

One last thing: We've had word from Limerick that Jimena stayed to the south and east of Bahia de Los Angeles, the region where they and Isis are anchored. That is a huge relief.