Talk:Jackline

Oops. We ended up with two articles. One on Jack Lines and this one on jacklines. I think "jackline" is proper. Westmarine.com sells jacklines. Mrees1997 18:38, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes I believe you are right "The Annapolis Book of Seamanship" also uses "jackline". As soon as I have time and some images I will merge the articles. In the meantime if you know how to do a merge please go ahead. Thanks for catching this. Mierlo 19:41, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Citation Needed

"falling overboard is one of the leading causes of death"[citation needed];

I know this to be true, for the life of me I do not know where I learned it. I believe it came up in some of the sailing courses I took in France and the UK, if I am not mistaken, it was also mentioned when I took a week's course for my US Coast Guard's captain's license last fall.

A quick search on the web does provide supporting statistics:

California Boating Safety Report shows falling overboard to be one of the leading causes of death in pleasure boating.

A second report, this one from the US Coast guard, also confirms that falling overboard is a large problem in the Fishing industry.

Are these references good enough?

It is important to state this fact. Spreading this information can save lives, which was one of the reasons for me to write the article on Jack Lines!

Frank van Mierlo 04:24, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I may be a voice in the wilderness, but I prefer "jackstay" for this piece of equipment. "Jackline" has a definite and very different meaning in sailing, that being a line attaching slides or jib snaps to the luff of a sail that allows those slide to move away from the luff when the halyard is released. This is necessary in sails attched to a boom where the tack angle is enough less than 90 degrees that some slides or snaps are closer to the clew than the tack is. Were it not for the jackline, the geometry of the situation would not allow the slides to descend to the bottom when the sail was lowered.

I'm not sure of the proper form for adding this variation to the article... Any help would be appreciated.

--win 20:15, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

"Chapman" and "The Annapolis book of Seamanship" both call it a Jackline. Frank van Mierlo 02:36, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I am guessing that the books mentioned above are US books? all of my time at sea professionally and amateur has also only ever called these 'JackStays'. I believe 'Jack lines' is maybe a more recent American term for them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.56.109.199 (talk) 13:19, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I agree that "jackline" has at least two meanings, the other one being the one cited by Winfowler above. Note this citation from "The Sailmaker's Apprentice" by Emiliano Marino: "It is also a sailmaker's task to install jacklines in the lower luffs of boomed sails with tack angles of less than 90 degrees. The jackline is essential to raising and lowering the sail as well as protecting the cloth from excessive strain." Steve Krenz 19:55, 1 January 2007 (UTC)