The catamaran that visited us during Earl left behind a mooring when it did and I took the opportunity to dive on it and take a look.
The mooring ball looks peachy-keen and while the line is a little frayed there is nothing that would make anyone nervous. Underneath the story is a whole lot different as the rope/chain is connected to a pair of bent sand screws that are no longer screwed into the bottom...
This, of course, is not going to hold anyone but I'd seriously doubt that anyone is going to be inspecting any of these moorings till after hurricane season if at all. So in the meantime it is an accident waiting to happen.
Last time we were in the BVI I dived on a couple of moorings and noticed they had serious corrosion issues with shackles worn more than 50% through... Again an accident waiting to happen.
A prudent sailor could do a lot worse than to treat all moorings and ground tackle that they have not installed personally with a healthy dose of suspicion and as a possible accident-waiting-to-happen. Sadly we are now being forced more and more often to use moorings here in the Caribbean as moorings-for-profit has become something of a growth industry (albeit wrapped up in the sheepskin of protecting our environment) and like most for-profit industries profit is the name of the game and upkeep on moorings cuts into profits...
