Comrade Willy
SchnoodleDoodle wholesome vibes
I’m still unironically on Team Orca here. Get sunk, scrubs.
I like the advice is basically
- Try to avoid them
- Try not to die
- Maybe try to take a photo for us while being attacked, we think they are neat
Well the pics are for identifying individuals. The science folk are trying to create a catalog and with that which pods (family groups) are involved, which aren’t, and if there are groups who aren’t involved, do they become involved in the future due to being taught/learning the behavior.
Also because they are pretty neat.
“Orca Gang Activity: Crips v Bloods in the Deep Deep Sea”
I’d go see that movie, but only if it’s the same crew who made Sharknado.
Just wait until Orcas get opposable flippers.
Yes Mr Sha, last name Moo, could you please sign on the dotted line? Next time you should think twice about swimming drunk.
The ability to manipulate objects isn’t really that useful underwater, I feel, apart from being an unprecedented adaptation on the flipper and almost definitely coming at the cost of efficiency while swimming. Everything you want to mess around with as an orca can be transported with your mouth.
Now, sonar loud enough to shatter human rib cages, that’s what’s going to be the next big step.
Sounds like something octopi would say.
I, for one, welcome our new orca overlords!
For context, not everyone who lives on a boat is wealthy. I live on a ‘yacht’, a 29 foot sailboat. Your walk-in closet is larger, yet because it’s privately owned and not commercial it’s considered a yacht.
Your hate is misplaced.
A 29’ boat isn’t small, what kind of walk-in closet do you think people have? Your comment makes you seem really out of touch.
29’ to live on fulltime 24/7/365 is small as fuck. 8 steps, that’s the entirety of my living space.
I’m not out of touch, you just have no understanding of small sailboats. From the front to the back on deck is 12 steps bro.
A quick google suggests a single mast sailboat can be had for around $50K. Which is a lot of money for a hobby. But it’s insanely cheap if it’s your house.
But how much does it cost to keep it at a marina per year? And repairs and such?
Don’t worry not asking to prove you’re rich and need to be eaten or whatever. Wanna know how much money I need to be able to say “fuck it” and quit my job and live on a sailboat.
Ok, I’ll break it down large, I want to see you out here.
1978 Bayfield 29, $11,800 (2018) cash cash, envelope full of bills. I put about another $10,000 into it since in upgrades. Larger anchors, chain, lines for everything, new standing rigging, upgraded electrical, home built LifePo4 batteries, GPS, AIS-B, LED lights, solar, wind, blah blah blah.
My dingy is a 2015 Riviera 12’ fiberglass $1500. My outboard is a 2009 Yamaha 2stroke 15hp $1600.
My rent is approximately ZERO. I pay jack shit to fuck all. I “live on the hook”. I have about $1600 in my mooring (3 anchors, 150’ G4 3/8 chain, crane swivel, floaty thing, two lines to the boat from the swivel).
If I was going to live here forever I would need to plan on replacing the chain, swivel, and the connectors every 3-5 years, just to be safe ($1500 just to be safe). I’m leaving after hurricane season but because I have a mangrove swamp I can hide in up to a Cat3 storm I’m here until Thanksgiving.
I have 550w of solar, a Honda eu2200i generator, a 400w wind generator, and live off of 400 amp hours of 12v batteries (2x200ah). Home built at less than half the cost of prefabs in 2020. I love them so much.
New sails will be about $4-6K. My sails are 8 years old and I’m fully expecting to get at least 5 more years from them. I’ve taken good care of them.
My car is a 2002 Toyota Echo that was $1000, I pay $100 a month to park it about a 1000yards from the public dingy dock, which 99% are free in the US. Down island is a whole other thing, lots of places charge.
I don’t have Starlink. If dickhole ever sells his interest in it, I’ll have it the next day.
You absolutely can do this, but you will need to become radically self-sufficient. I haven’t been to a slip or a dock ( other than fuel) in six years. I haul water by hand, I’m my own electrician, mechanic, sanitation worker, plumber, electric company, you name it. And paradise can fucking suck.
I dont have an oven, don’t have a toaster, I don’t have any heating or air conditioning. I do have some fans. I don’t have hot water unless I put a 20 l can in the Sun. Living this lifestyle is as much about sundowners sunset, bikinis and fun as it is about what you’re willing to fucking endure.
Marina’s will run you from $300 - $3000 a month. They are hot, noisy, you’re crammed RIGHT next to others and they are expensive.
If you want to get an idea of actual prices, take .25 up to .5 off the asking prices for pretty much anything under $80k. Search Tempest for Craigslist, search Florida.
If you decide yeah… I’ll absolutely help your effort and happy to answer any more questions you have.
[edit] Maintenance runs between $2-6k a year. If you preventative maintenance the living shit out of everything, you’ll spend a lot less a year. I do 90%+ of the work myself. I purposely bought a small boat because small boats are small problems with small bills comparatively speaking. And also when traveling to communities that are less fortunate than most Americans financially at least, it’s easier to interact with the locals on a small boat than it is on a large boat because they will accept you much faster than if you show up on a 50-ft plus.
Fascinating! Thanks for the impromptu AMA!
I couldn’t do half of the DIY stuff that you seem to put it. Just here to say that sounds damn impressive.
I guess you travel to follow warm weather? Or how is life in winter?
The DIY isn’t that bad, because some nerd on some boat or some board or some website already figured it out.
I’ve actually been travelling for medical reasons, and my time here in Florida is done. I’ll be headed to Colombia to get my mouth fixed at the end of the year.
In summer it’s hot, in winter it’s cold. Its easier to be comfortable in the cold IMHO.
What do you do for work? Your costs are low, but they aren’t zero. I imagine it’s nearly impossible to get work if you have to go out to your boat every day or you don’t have reliable internet.
Also, is it possible to get/run AC on a boat your size? Florida sounds like hell without AC. I don’t think I could manage living there for long without it. I guess you can get in the water to cool off pretty easily though.
Now that it looks like a storm is forming, I’ll be moving and securing vessels for the actual wealthy, and I charge a flat rate of $100/hr. (I’m the blue dot). There’s money to be made, you just have to hustle.
After 25 years in tech I’m starting to look for my “out”. I have a ton of experience with electrical (signals/rf too), plumbing, mechanical, woodworking, finishing, engines, etc There isn’t much I can’t fix. As far as nautical experience goes, I’m a novice but I recently went through a small boat certification course and planning on being a “trailer sailor” for a couple years or more to build up experience. I grew up near Charleston SC harbor, and I think the ocean is calling me back.
A couple of questions; how do you find work or how does work find you? Do you have a home base where your tools are located or are you doing these jobs in “random” ports you travel to? (You can message me if you don’t want to share your industry secrets publicly 😉 )
/edit Found your blog so I got some reading to do.
I quit being a FTE last year, I was in Infosec. Now I do short term engagements (under a week) in IT, and I fix laptops, phone screens, do electrical or Starlink installs etc etc for the water folk.
I have both T-Mobile & AT&T hot spots .
You absolutely can run AC, you either need a generator, or you need a shit tonne of solar and LifePo4 batteries.
I’m drowning in this text, I’d be dead inside a month.
Don’t sell yourself short. I guarantee you’re way more capable than you give yourself credit for.
Awesome info. Thanks for the write up. Have always been curious about the economics.
thank you for sharing… learned a lot
Depends on the marina, one of my local ones charge $50 per foot a year, plus membership of ~$600-$700 yearly. But this is on a river with no ocean access, not sure how that would change things.
That’s actually very reasonable. Yeah I’m sure it’s way more money on like the French Riviera, but I don’t want to go to places like that.
I gotta learn how to sail tho haha.
Believe it or not a large portion of learning to sail is Keep Air In Keep Water Out, so you already know more than you thought.
Dock fees generally range between $400-$800 a month, and that usually includes water and electricity. I think sewage is extra.
Best way to think about marinas is mobile home parks plus. Most folks there are just normals tryna get by on the cheap. Very occasionally you’ll get some landlord or HOA Karen type that thinks their shit doesn’t stink, but it always does.
Maintainence is the real killer for the wallet on a boat though. Mobile home units can’t sink, so maintaining the home isn’t as optional as it would be otherwise. You still get sea gypsies occasionally in floating wrecks anchored just off the docks, but that’s everywhere really.
Local classified right now has a 29 foot sloop with extra sails, recent bottom paint, and a 9hp outboard plus dinghy for $5700 CDN. It’s been up a while, you could bargain down, the seller seems motivated. It’s a 1978 boat so really skookum fiberglass on that.
A mooring buoy costs around $1500 to plop down but sometimes you can get one second hand for less. (Every Canadian is entitled by citizenship to a mooring buoy or two.)
An equivalent RV costs around $15k with nowhere to park.
People who assume that they are going to buy stuff new are just locked into a class-based mindset.
Yeah I’m too poor for a boat but I know a few people who live on them because they’re a cheap way to live a chill life. It’s very possible to be working class on s yacht, I’ve also known a few people who move and crew yachts so it’s very way for me to imagine the human tragedy these attacks can bring.
I hope we can devise a technology to keep people and marine life safe.
A 29’ boat isn’t going to have a 29’ liveable area.
First off, a boat narrows so much at the front that a 29’ boat is really closer to 25’ at best. Then it might be 10 feet wide, so you’re looking at about 250 square feet. Most of that is gonna be deck so cut that in half again if you want your living space to be out of the elements.
When you go under the deck you might think there would be plenty of room, but you need to have fuel, engine, generator, bilge, etc.
So in your remaining closet-sized space you need to be able to eat, sleep, cook, use the restroom, store your shit, entertain yourself, etc.
If they actually live on it instead of owning a house, I’d still not consider them part of the rich who should be eaten.
A 29’ boat is absolutely tiny to live on. The overwhelming majority is taken up by things the boat needs to be a boat
And the rest of the space taken up by shit that keeps me from dying.
But your back yard is infinite.
Boats are the original tiny home.
Around here you can buy a serviceable 29-foot sailboat for $5k, and a mooring buoy for $1k. It’s cheaper than a van by the river FFS.
People who live on sub-40-ft sailboats are usually just hanging in there. Source: that was nearly me before my fortunes changed slightly. Boats are underpriced because they are a lot of work.
My sister is a corporate executive. Her walk in closet is objectively larger than a 29-ft live aboard. Hell her ensuite bathroom is bigger than that and she lives in a duplex. You are lacking real world context I think.
For more context. This was a Oceanis 393. so about $100k boat. And it was in the Strait of Gibralter. Not the poorest area of the world.
For context that’s where the Orcas are
It’s unfortunate that the orcas can’t tell the difference between rich assholes with yachts, and normal assholes with yachts.
I guess maybe staying out of their tiny part of the ocean while they’re using it is the only thing a person with a yacht can do.
Every yacht is a rich asshole yacht.
That’s not a fair generalization.
I own a house worth x amount of dollars, where “x” is average for a house in my area, and not even close to “rich” amount.
If I sold my house and put that same “x” amount towards a seafaring houseboat of equal value (including all expenses for owning an oceanic home), I’m still not rich.
If I sail that boat into the small, avoidable swimming grounds of an endangered species (only 50 members of this local group remain) and then whine when that species attacks my boat, then I’d be an asshole. But still not rich. Probably even further from it - since I’m sure insurance companies wouldn’t cover my stupidity.
Wait, what do you mean only 50 living members remain? A quick (admittedly too quick) Google search yields the number 50000, did you forget a “thousand”? Or is the situation even more dire?
My mistake, I misread the data. It’s 50 members of the locally protected group off the coast of Spain. I’ve corrected the text above.
Thanks for catching that.
That is still worrisome. Thank you!
do you mean to reply to a comment instead of the post? If yes, can you add a link to the comment for context?
General post to the group at large. Lot of people including OP, happy about what they perceive as rich people getting what’s coming to them.
“your walk-in closet”
Lol your privilege is showing, tuck it back in
Grow up.
Because they know that if they kill anyone rich enough to afford a boat that some jackass will kill them back. So they keep it to property damage.
Shh, nobody tell the orcas how many humans get killed/ruined to protect property.
They’re based
saved a click
Last I heard, they’re bored and rudders are fun to play with.
We need to give them some orca proof toys.
orca sinks yacht, we need to give them alternatives
Nah, I’m cool with them having the yachts
Well, a yacht is just a class of vessel. I think a lot of people are confusing them with LUXURY yachts which are way too big to be sunk by orchas.
Here’s one for sale, $59,000. I could actually buy this, I mean, yeah, it’s from freakin’ 1984… but still.
Yeah but don’t they all create a lot of harmful sound and disruption to marine life
I mean, no more so than other boats.
Sailboats are a thing too, you know…
Any reduction might still be beneficial to them, I doubt that’s part of their calculus. Boats so small they can drown it in a marina
You’re thinking Bezos yachts, these are $50-200$k boats people use as homes to see the world, not rich people. The word yacht doesn’t mean wealth, it’s just not a common mode of transportation.
The word yacht doesn’t mean wealth,
Yes, yes it does. It doesn’t mean ‘billionaire,’ but these aren’t subsistence fishermen we’re talking about here.
It was a $128,000 yacht. If you don’t think people who can afford such a yacht are rich, you are one privileged person.
It was a $128,000 yacht. If you don’t think people who can afford such a yacht are rich, you are one privileged person.
You’d be surprised how many people own a $128,000 yacht INSTEAD of a more-than-$128,000 house.
(Of course, there are even more people who live aboard full-time on much-less-than-$128,000 yachts. For example, Sailing Uma probably have a bunch of money now 'cause they’re relatively successful Youtubers, but they started out spending only about $10k total (purchase + initial refit costs) for their 50-year-old, 36-foot boat. There’s an entire subculture of people doing basically nautical #vanlife, and they aren’t any richer than the homeless-by-conventional-standards people doing it on land.)
It’s a dream I considered many times. It can be cheaper* than land life.
I’ve met them, they fucked up someone else’s boat in the marina I was at, they didn’t offer to fix or help pay, they just bailed. They definitely fit into the asshole category, in my opinion.
You’re literally attacking middle class people for having a small yacht.
Your concept of wealthy is really skewed.
“Middle class” and “small yacht.” Most middle class people can’t even afford a house. This is something that costs more than a luxury car.
Yea no one in the middle class can afford a house, a couple of cars and a small yacht.
It’s impossible without having billions in the bank!
Sorry, you think anyone under a billionaire is middle class?
TBH might have been a bunch of middle class retirees who sold the family home up in England for like 800k, bought something smaller for two to live in in Spain, and a small sailing boat. I don’t think about those people as “rich”.
Okay, but they are rich.
That’s their HOME. You know of a place in your home country you can purchase a home for $130k? Grow up.
I can point you to a place but I need to define all four dimensions including time.
Where did it say it’s his home?
Piss off sourpuss I’m not playing with you.
But… you were the one who replied to me…
And it wasn’t his home as far as I know.
These scientists say they don’t intend to sink the boats but they’re definitely doing it on porpoise.
Not to blow the joke, but I recently learned Orcas are in the dolphin family. I always thought they were porpoises myself
they’re definitely doing it on porpoise
Groan.
“Cause it’s fun.”
- Signed, the orca community
I think the answer to this question is in their name tbh. Should have named them Panda Whales instead.
Tell me you know nothing about pandas
pandas
Ugh those fucking fickle hostile, always pooping, weird extra thumb having, sexless weirdos.
I think I know too much about Pandas, and it makes me want nothing to do with their conservation.
Another article…
https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/orcas-sink-yacht-in-strait-of-gibraltar
This one has useful comments, like…
Rudders certainly look like a fin…best way to disable prey is to maim a fin. The orcas have learned power vessels are of sterner stuff.
Did they eat the rich? 🤑 Otherwise the plan is going swimmingly.
The article is about orcas, but that video at the top is not an orca and just happened to sink a small fishing boat while it was feeding. Pretty sure that incident was an accident and the whale wasn’t trying to sink it, it was just breaching and eating.
Answer: because they are fucking based
Nature is healing.
