Your Boat Toilets Professionals Know that Having the Right Ladder Could Make All the Difference
Raritan Engineering Company your boat toilets experts would like to share with you this week these amazing tips on how to choose the best boarding ladder for you.
Last year, we read a review of a Union 36, and the opening photo of the boat featured a unique folding ladder that I hadn’t seen before. The ladder, instead of hanging vertically, folded out at a comfortable angle in a way that seemed—at least in the photo—pretty practical for routine boarding. I was curious how it worked in bouncy weather, and the owner of the boat, PS contributor Frank Lanier, assured me that the ladder, which came with the boat, was as good as any other he’d tried.
The boat I cruised on for many years, Tosca, was a double-ender with the same sort boarding of complications as the Union 36. A stern boarding ladder didn’t work.
Shocked at the prices for a stainless-steel ladder and wanting a permanent means of climbing aboard that a person in the water could use without assistance, we settled on a modification that you see on many catboats—folding steps drilled into the rudder (look for our Marshall 22 catboat review in November).
Boat Boarding ladders can be for day to day boarding and also for emergency situations. There are two times you will need to get back onto your boat from the water. First when you are swimming i.e. intentionally going into the water, and secondly when you fall overboard.
Had we a boarding ladder or a plan, getting the MOB back aboard would have been much easier.
Your Boat Toilets Analysts Encourage Using Great Ladders to Prevent Drownings
Your boat toilets specialists feel that the RNLI says that people falling overboard (MOB or COB) is on the rise, with numbers almost doubling in the last year. In the US 2/3 of boating deaths are from drowning and 90% were not wearing a PFD.
Types of Boarding Ladder
-
Amidships ladders (self rescue)
-
Transom Boarding
-
Dinghy Boarding
Amidships ladders (self rescue)
Rescuing and boarding amidships is one of the safest places to board your boat or any boat. Transom boarding is fine in flat water but in seas the pitching is quite violent.
Warning; One problem with many amidships ladders is that they are too close to the hull. The reason this is a problem is twofold. first getting your foot onto a rung is hard of its next to the hull.
Save A Soul Emergency Ladder
This rope style ladder is fixed amidships and a line is left to hang close to the waterline.
A MOB can pull the line to break the Velcro and 9ft of ladder falls out.
The typical amidships ladder works. As with the top three options it will only work for a fully functioning person. If a MOB is tired and wearing a lot of gear climbing this type of ladder will be hard. To help the MOB get a line around them so you can take some of the weight.
Click here and visit Raritan Engineering for more information and assistance regarding boat toilets and any of your marine supply needs.