Anchor Retrieval

[ORIF]

The recent stuck anchor thread made me recall this.

After hurricane Mathew I had some trouble retrieving my Rocna anchor from its hold on the bottom. It was dug in by the storm. Had the bow up to the line so it was vertical and eventually worked it out. There’s a longer story to that for another day but point is, I was relating this to a shrimp boat captain friend of mine who said his routine technique for freeing his Danforth was to back away from it after he had the rode vertical. Not drive over it as I and others in the current anchor retrieval thread would intuitively think and recomended. He equated it to a bad anchor set attempt with not enough rode out. Said it worked every time. He’s now retired and did that for his entire career.
I’m curious if anyone else subscribes to the same technique?

 

[syjos]

The recent stuck anchor thread made me recall this.

After hurricane Mathew I had some trouble retrieving my Rocna anchor from its hold on the bottom. It was dug in by the storm. Had the bow up to the line so it was vertical and eventually worked it out. There’s a longer story to that for another day but point is, I was relating this to a shrimp boat captain friend of mine who said his routine technique for freeing his Danforth was to back away from it after he had the rode vertical. Not drive over it as I and others in the current anchor retrieval thread would intuitively think and recomended. He equated it to a bad anchor set attempt with not enough rode out. Said it worked every time. He’s now retired and did that for his entire career.
I’m curious if anyone else subscribes to the same technique?

If it's really stuck, we pull the chain until vertical and go forward and reverse until unstuck.

There is no difference in the result whether the shrimp boat captain went forward or back if the rode is vertical.

 

[MurrayM]

We set our Bruce once and came to an abrupt stop. I thought it was going to be stuck for sure, so got out the Earl Hinz book on anchoring and mooring.

One method he suggested was reducing scope (can't remember how much) then slowly circling the anchor while keeping the rode under tension.

Turns out the anchor came up easily so didn't need to use the technique, but may come in handy one day.

 

[jleonard]

I go in reverse too break my Danforth free. At an idle.
Had to do that this morning at Three Mile Harbor, which is the best holding ground I've experienced in my 30 years of boating.

Anchor came up with about 15 lbs of mud on it.

 

[SteveK]

reverse in what direction? 180 to the direction of the set I imagine.

 

[syjos]

reverse in what direction? 180 to the direction of the set I imagine.

In the PNW, because of the multiple tide changes creating reversing current, there is no way to know which way the anchor is buried.

Even a Danforth will eventually turn or flip with the current reversals.

 

[SteveK]

In the PNW, because of the multiple tide changes creating reversing current, there is no way to know which way the anchor is buried.

Even a Danforth will eventually turn or flip with the current reversals.

I understand that. Saying reverse is rather vague. I was looking for the theory of doing so. I mean reversing could also further dig the anchor deeper. Coming to a vertical on rode and reversing opposite of the believed anchor set makes sense, pulling up on shank, avoiding rode into props. Reversing without knowing which way does not make any sense. Or are you reversing in a circle around a vertical rode until it pops.

 

[Comodave]

I believe that what the OP was saying was to go in reverse away from the anchor not 180 to the original set. With a 1:1 scope the anchor should break out as most any anchor will when set with a very short scope.

 

[jleonard]

reverse in what direction? 180 to the direction of the set I imagine.

I pull in the chain until it is vertical, then idle in reverse pulling it out in the same direction in which it was set. Bow stays into the wind.