A question of judgement

When something goes wrong on a yacht, at least in the UK, there can be an unseemly rush to judgement. The incident last Thursday when a skipper delivering a boat from Hamble to Plymouth fell overboard and was was lost was a terrible example. Before the man in question had been named, he was already being dubbed ‘inexperienced’, as indeed was his crew. No-one nowadays seems capable of using a once commonplace and sympathetic phrase: 'a tragic accident'.
 
Friends of the dead man are emphatic that far from being inexperienced, he had been sailing for 15 years and was a qualified Yachtmaster.
 
The yacht Past Times (pictured above after the rescue) was sailing in easterly winds said to be Force 7 and was between 11 and 16 miles off Portland Bill, depending on the report one reads. A Coastguard helicopter and five fishing boats took part in the search and Yarmouth lifeboat eventually recovered the body.