Yachts in a Hurricane
 

So hurricane Ian is here coming and the warnings have been going on for more than a week.

On the local news tomorrow, they will show all those beautiful muti-million-dollar yachts,
(I'm jealous), piled on top of one another.

Why didn't the owners take the time and get them out of the water or a safe harbor for the storm?
I sure some have.

Those insurance company's could be using that money to repair homes.

Thoughts?

Just something you might not be aware of. Not every large boat is just a pleasure boat. Many are homes for individuals, couples, families with children. Also, many large and impressive yachts can be purchased far cheaper then one might realize. For many it is the least expensive home they could buy. To move your residence out of the possible path of what may, or may not, become a hurricane in a couple of weeks requires planning, provisioning, and the ability to take several weeks off at a moment's notice. For the truly wealthy, they either let insurance cover any damage, or have the hired captain and crew move it, but only if the owner tells them when and where to go.
Moving the boat to a safe place is not a luxury most boat owners have, practically speaking.

I agree the family boat is 52 feet in Boston harbor it’s not possible to get a boat out on short notice and most of the time you can ride it out at the dock

Darn it was on my list of things to do and I forgot. Oh well.

52’? Wow.

You’re comparing apples and oranges. Quite often, those companies that insure homes are not the ones that insure yachts.

I can’t speak to your other comments.

Agreed. The hurricane was forecasted for days and days. Owners could have sailed them out of the area. On TV, I also saw a bunch of planes flipped over.
Couldn't they have just flown them out of the area?

Owners may not be here, some people do travel. ⁵

Only if they get the flight plan approved. You can't "just" fly a plane to another state on a whim, or without recording a flight plan.

You can but you could also get your license revoked

Actually you can.
Filing a flight plan is not mandatory for VFR flights nor interstate flight.
Got my pilots license over 50 years ago.

Vfr
 

Beg to differ. Under visual flight rules, one can fly anywhere that’s not restricted air space, without a flight plan.

Why do you think a $500k house should have priority over a $500k boat? If you know your house is in a flood prone area, why don’t you move the house? How many houses are built on a river that floods? On the coast that is 1’ above sea level? How about all of this homes in Louisiana that are below sea level? Why do we keep paying to fix these homes when they keep getting flooded over and over? Part of our insurance payments go to paying these policies

And if IF was a skiff we could row across the d@mn lake…

We have a 51 foot boat that is berthed on the St. John’s River in Jacksonville. You say we should just sail these boats out of the area. Many of these boats are slow movers, ours cruises at roughly 10 knots. That’s 11.5 mph. That means that in 12 hours, with no current running against you and no wind pushing you back, you could move your boat a distance of 138 miles. Now, which direction do you run? Do you run south, where right now looks as though you would be in the clear if you can make the distance in time? And if you do, what if the hurricane shifts and takes a turn south? You may have left a now safe location and put yourself right in the new path of the hurricane.

Others have said, “just haul them out of the water”. Our boat is 65,000 pounds, that is over 32 tons. You don’t take the family pickup to pull these boats out. The marinas have lifts that can remove these boats from the water, and they can even block them and place them on land. But in order to get all those boats out of the water and blocked on land, (assuming there was enough room for all them), would take a week at best. A week out, forecast landfall is almost worthless. So, if all the Tampa marinas had hauled all their boats out and found some place for them, but Fort Myers didn’t because the hurricane was going north, what good would it have done. Secondly, with strong storm surge, the water rises, all those “yachts” as you call them, float free from their blocking and now are completely free.

What we did with our boat, and it took a couple days to do it, was to remove all canvas from the exterior, add extra lines and fenders. Turns out that we probably didn’t need to.

Hope this all explains why people don’t “simply” sail away or haul them out their boats. Responsible owners will take every precaution possible to protect their property, but a direct hit will do what it is going to do, just like with a house.

Lastly, large boats have to be insured with yacht insurance. Those are marine specialty insurance companies, and any money saved by them would not be going to rebuild houses.