May 2009 - Caribbean Compass

MAY 2009 CARIBBEAN COMPASS PAGE 28
Guns on Private Yachts:
ARE THEY
WORTH IT?
This subject is debated ad infinitum. Despite the fact
that at one time I did have a gun on Iolaire, the personal
view I have held for the past 30 years is that the
average cruiser should not have firearms aboard, but
rather cruise in areas where they are not needed.
Because of the tragic death of my late wife Marilyn,
who was killed at our home in Grenada by an intruder
in the early 1960s, when I married my second wife,
Trich, 43 years ago, I got a gun for self-defense. It was
a waste of time.
Trying to teach Trich to shoot straight was a dead
loss; she always shut her eyes before pulling the trigger.
So any potential shooting would have to be done
by me. But when we were sailing on Iolaire, the gun
was useless for defense because whenever we cleared
into a new country the authorities would usually take
it and lock it up ashore until we cleared out — even in
places where you were legally entitled to keep a gun on
board. (The one exception was when I arrived in
Trinidad in 1968. In the 1950s and early ’60s thievery
and burglary against visiting yachts was so prevalent
in Trinidad that many US insurance companies would
not cover yachts in Trinidadian waters, or if they did
they charged a hefty extra premium. When I cleared
in, Customs said that they would have to seal my gun
in a locker. I pointed out that if it were sealed up in a
locker it would be useless to repel an attack. They said
by Don Street
After five years
of regular hassles
with the Customs,
I threw the gun
overboard. My advice?
Cruise where you don’t
need guns
no, they would put it in a readily accessible locker
sealed with a light wire that I could easily break if I
needed to use the gun. An officer added, “If you do
need to use it, please shoot straight and notify us as
soon as possible afterward.”)
After five years of regular hassles with the Customs every
time I cleared in and out, I threw the gun overboard.
If you are determined to carry a gun on board you
should have one with stopping power and know how
to use it. If using something bigger than a pistol, as
Sir Peter Blake learned so tragically, the gun must be
semi- or fully automatic. The best gun in the world to
repel boarders is a sawed-off, pump-action 12-gauge
shotgun loaded with heavy buckshot. However, it is a
short-range weapon so, like the men on Bunker Hill,
“don’t shoot till you see the whites of their eyes”. If
you show your hand too soon, the boarder may stand
off out of range and blast you from a distance that is
completely safe from your counter-fire. Also, since an
intruder might shoot back if he is not disabled by
your first shot (or if he arrived unarmed, wrest your
gun away from you and use it against you), you must
react as they did in the Old West: “Do not pull a gun
unless you intend to shoot, and if you shoot you
must aim to kill.”
But few Caribbean cruisers are that cold-blooded, and
the average sailor is not trained or prepared to act effectively
in a shoot-out with criminals, so most of us are
better off leaving the guns ashore. The vast majority of
sailors I talk to feel that the best defense is to avoid
trouble spots or, if you must transit trouble spots, figure
out other means of preserving your safety.
Editor’s note: We’ll present an article on “Security
Precautions for Real-Life Cruisers” by Devi Sharp in
next month’s Compass.
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