![\"\"](\"https:\/\/writer-insighter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/182985044_1282962062100899_4320362501203010167_n.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today’s sailing was good. I did loads of things wrong in the four and a half hours I got on the water, following yesterday’s three hours. It’s sunny again after a few weeks of not sunny at all, and 27 degrees on the car thermometer, so shorts and no sweater or coat for a change, and make sure there’s a bottle of water onboard. Which reminds me there isn’t now, so I’d better put one in the car for tomorrow’s sailing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A couple of days ago there was an odd lifejacket incident. I’d bought a new Crewsaver Hammar automatic lifejacket new last year and thought it was pretty good. Certainly it ought to have been better than the 20 year old manual inflation jacket I’d been using for probably far too long, the one that dated back to Drascombe Scaffie days. I bought that boat the year the Twin Towers came down along with Tower Seven, the one that collapsed because a plane didn’t fly into it. The night before sailing I went to check my lifejacket and found it was partially inflated. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I didn’t really understand how. It hadn’t got wet. The indicator was slightly off centre, suggesting the trigger had been pulled, maybe when I put the jacket in the back of the car, stuffing it tight against the back of the driver’s seat because I had the car roof down and didn’t want the jacket to fly away. But it was only partially inflated. Next morning it was fully up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
None of this made any sense. Nor did what happened next. I checked the jacket all over. On the Hammar trigger that sets off the jacket if it gets wet there is a date stamp. It said to replace the trigger in 2018 or if you can’t see a green dot in the indicator. I could only see half a green dot. And the jacket was bought ‘new’ in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The seller couldn’t be found. So far, so Ebay. What was odder was Crewsaver’s reaction when I emailed them with the serial number, asking when the jacket was made, describing the partial inflation of the jacket and how it took all night to inflate fully, which is a bit slower than I’d like if I fell overboard unconscious, even though my Drascombe hasn’t got a boom to smack me about and sweep me over the side, one of the things I like about Drascombes. Crewsaver<\/a> said…..nothing at all. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Nice website. All very straightforward and Ellen MacArthur used Crewsaver when she was wrecking boats and would I like to register for updates and all that blah. And when a customer has a query the response, as so often now, is simply nothing at all. Call me old, but I remember a time when Customer Service didn’t mean simply ignoring the stuff you as a company can’t be arsed to do. Answering emails asking why your product doesn’t work, for example. <\/p>\n\n\n\n