You come up at 04:00 in a beam sea to a sound every stew knows: the sliding, then the crash. Six of a twelve-piece crystal set are on the pantry sole. What happens in the next twenty minutes decides whether this is a stowage lesson or a replacement crisis.
The breakage log
Every broken, chipped, stained or lost item gets written down. Not to assign blame — to protect the par level and the budget. A workable breakage log records:
- Date and location
- Item, with full specification — pattern, maker, size, so it can be replaced exactly
- Quantity broken or removed from service
- Cause — seaway, guest, crew, wear, laundry
- Action — replacement ordered / to be ordered / written off
- Initials of the person logging it
Why cause matters
| Cause | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| Seaway | A stowage problem you can engineer out |
| Guest | Normal; sometimes recoverable against the charter or APA |
| Crew handling | A training or process issue |
| Laundry / wear | Predictable attrition to build into par and budget |
| Unexplained loss | Investigate. Repeated unexplained loss is a control failure, not bad luck |
If every breakage is logged as "accident", the log tells you nothing and you will keep buying the same glass twice a year.
Storage in a seaway
The interior stows for the worst sea state the boat will realistically see, not the one it is in.
- Fiddles, non-slip matting and dividers in every drawer and shelf holding hard goods.
- Glassware in cellular inserts or padded crates, upright, never stacked rim to rim.
- Nothing on a countertop for a passage. If it is not stowed, it is a projectile.
- Heavy low, light high. Weight above shoulder height is both a stowage and a safety issue.
- Bottles horizontal, restrained, and separated — glass on glass in a seaway is a guaranteed loss.
- Latches, not gravity. Every locker that can open in a roll should have a positive catch.
- Secure for sea before you sail, as a checklist item with an initial — not as a memory.
Onboard Notes
- Clear broken glass with the boat's procedure: gloves, dustpan, no bare hands, and check the whole compass of the spill. Glass travels a long way in a seaway.
- Never dispose of breakages without logging them first. An unlogged breakage becomes a mystery shortage at the next stocktake.
- Report significant breakage or any injury immediately. Broken glass on the sole is a safety incident and may need to be recorded through the boat's safety-management system.
- Photograph unusual damage before disposal. A photograph of the maker mark on a base will save you an hour of hunting for a replacement.
- If the same item breaks repeatedly in the same place, the answer is stowage or a different product — not a bigger order.