This isn't Bushcraft but may fall under the heading of 'difficult situations.' In June 2009 I was sailing from Falmouth to Southern Portugal. As I always sail alone the safest course for me is far offshore, this keeps me clear of the International shipping lanes and also the small coastal and inshore fishing traffic.
I was in about 10 degrees West longtitude North-West of Cape Finisterre when I ran into one of those summer sea fogs common off the coast of Galicia. Just before dusk in thick fog and with the sea flat calm I ran into a submerged object which momentarily stopped my 6 ton 32 foot boat dead in the water. I looked astern and just breaking the surface was what looked like a container or extremely large packing crate covered with weed and sea growth.
I checked below for damage and found no water ingress. The boat still steered correctly and there was no vibration indicating that i had a damaged propellor. (Not a breath of wind so on the diesel at the time) I decided to alter course and make land fall in Northern Spain to allow a proper check to be made as I still faced a voyage of many hundreds of miles. I eventually crept carefully into the Port of LaCoruna and into a yacht marina just inside the harbour.
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I lay in LaCoruna for a few days until the fog lifted and then sailed West out past Cape Finisterre and turned South about a 100 miles offshore and began the long haul down to Cape St Vincent and the Portugese Algarve.
Within 36 hours I was running under reefed jib before a hard Northerly gale, the seas coming from astern and building to an impressive size causing the boat at times to surf down them. In darkness in the early hours, with the vacuum flask once again empty I left the wind steering vane to steer the boat and went to the main hatch, slid it open and removed the wash board and was about to climb down the cabin steps when the boat broached violently to port and fell on her starboard side. I lost my grip on the hatch coaming and fell head first into the cabin hitting the galley stove with my face on the way down. I felt my front teeth shatter and I landed on the cabin sole on my left shoulder causing an excruiating pain in my left side. I rolled onto my back and a big sea crashed down the open hatch and I found myself lying in sea water. I scambled out into the cockpit spitting blood and broken teeth to find the partly reefed jib sail full of sea and holding the boat down on her beam end. I cut the jib sheet and she rolled almost onto an even keel while I held on as another big sea broke on board.
Looking aft my heart sank when I saw the wind vane steering gear moving from side to side, I couldn't believe that the 12mm stainless securing bolts had broken adrift. I wear a head torch at sea at night and this was now round my neck. In the light of the torch I saw the bottom bracket of the steering gear had come adrift leaving just the two top bolts holding it on the stern. I knew then that the earlier collision with the submerged object had caused an undetected problem, I also realised that unless I secured it somehow the big seas would rip it off and probably take part of her stern with it and I would sink in the gale, alone, a 100 miles offshore. I knew that I would have to climb over the stern to secure the steering gear and I admit the thought of doing so in the gale, in massive seas and alone in the dark that the idea was an unpleasant one. But without going into heroics, what do you do? Do you give up and wait to die, or do you switch to survival mode and do all in your power to cling to life? No contest really, is it?
I rigged a short ladder over the stern, tucked the end of a length of rope under my watch strap and climbed over the stern. Almost immediately her bow went down and I found myself clinging to the ladder being lifted far above the sea surface until her stern went down and I was plunged into the sea up to my neck, clinging to the ladder. I don't know if anyone has been submerged in sea water wearing a jacket, jeans and seaboots but just hanging onto the ladder was not easy with the pain in my ribs and unable to breath because my nose and mouth kept filling with blood and seawater. Three or four times I was treated to a sea bath until I finally secured the rope to the steering gear and tumbled back on board.
For the next hour, using the rope I had managed to secure I rigged other ropes round the steering gear and hauled it all taught with the sheet winches. By dawn and with the gale and sea abating but almost exhausted, the job was done and I started the diesel and laid a course for the Portugese coast and safety.
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Still a bit of a sea running, but life looks good with the dawn and I know I've survived..At least this far..
The next 16 hours were hard going, I'd been awake for almost 2 days, trouble beathing because of my ribs and face and as soon as I was able I had to file my broken teeth with the finest file I could find in the shambles of the soaking cabin, it was the one on my belt, my Leatherman. The teeth were lacerating my tongue because I had lost the feeling in my face. I crushed rather more than the stated dose of Aspirin and swallowed it with fresh water. Wrapped a crepe bandage around my ribs and the long voyage to safety began.
Desperate to stay awake, unable to sit down because I instantly fell asleep, shouting daft things, anything at all. Old stoppage drills from long ago, nursery rhymes, anything to stay awake until in the late afternoon I anchored in the safe lee of the big breakwater at a small port called Peniche, just North of Lisbon. I took more Aspirin, checked that my anchor was well dug in and fell into my bunk. Fouteen hours later I awoke feeling as if I'd just done three rounds with the whole of 2 Para..
I spent the whole of that day resecuring and setting up my steering gear, between doses of Aspirin, and orange juice with rich tea biscuits soaked in it as that was all I could swallow. I took the oportunity to take a few photos as I worked from my inflatable dinghy.
Sorry about the first one, I'd never make a Dentist..
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The last photos I hope explain what i was trying to do at night in the gale.
And finally the finished job and then my boat lying safely at anchor days later far to the South.
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So, back to our subject. How you deal with a 'Difficult situation' depends on many things but determination and the resolve not to be beaten or give up features high at the top of the list. I was fortunate because my working life gave me a good grounding on 'keeping going' and later in civvy life many voyages gave me the experience to sort out what needed doing to avoid being lost in the gale. You can read a thousand books on survival, even become a 'survival instructor' (that's worth deciphering) but survival starts between your ears and in your heart. It's surprising what the physical human frame can stand but a weakness in the invisible bit, like your resolve or will power, will definitely kill you.
