The "Tugantine," with spars or "gaffs" supporting its sails 



they're taking a little more notice." 



One of the people who took special 

 notice was Merritt Walter, a naval 

 architect from Norfolk. 



"He kept telling me my boat 

 couldn't sail, according to all the 

 rules," Briggs says. "But since it was 

 sailing, he said 'just think what we 

 could do if we had a boat designed to 

 use sail.' 



The old Steel Rebel did have a 

 serious limitation: because of the hull 

 design, she could not sail upwind. But 

 Briggs was so convinced the wind was 

 saving him money that he told Walter 

 to design a new boat. The vessel was to 

 be a diesel-powered, sail-assisted tug 

 set up to double as a commercial 

 fishing boat. 



Financing was the first obstacle. 

 Briggs was proposing a $300,000 risk — 

 a newfangled design with no track 

 record. 



"The bank took a good, hard look at 

 it, and decided to go along," Briggs 

 says. 



The keel of the new boat was laid on 

 April Fools' Day, 1978. Not since 

 Noah began his Ark had there been 

 such chuckling. 



The Norfolk Rebel, a steel-plated, 

 light tug, 51 ft. long, was launched 

 May 22, 1980. From the water line 

 down, she's a sailboat, trim, with a full 

 keel. But she also sports a 320-horse V- 

 8, assorted electronic gear, and a fish 



hold. The masts are designed to carry 

 1200 square ft. of gaff-rigged sail, in- 

 cluding a foresail that can be used with 

 a retractable bowsprit. 



Walters and Briggs had conceived 

 neither a sailboat nor a conventional 

 workboat, but a hybrid for which there 

 was no nautical term. They coined the 

 name "Tugantine." 



"We all held our breaths during the 

 first trials," Kathy Hill remembers. 

 "With a new design, you never really 

 know how it will perform. But it 

 worked beautifully. She was prac- 

 tically turning on a dime, and wasn't 

 squatting or digging in the way you 

 might expect a sailboat to do under 

 that kind of power." 



"Our idea is using sail to assist the 

 diesel," Briggs says. "It's not all sail. I 

 don't think that would be practical, 

 with the work we have to do." 



There are a few disadvantages to the 

 sails, Briggs admits. Getting under 

 some of the bridges is a problem. For 

 some of the deck work, the main boom 

 has to be raised out of the way. And, 

 Dacron sailcloth is expensive. 



But Briggs says that in the first year 

 he sailed the Steel Rebel, he saved 

 enough on fuel to more than pay for 

 the sails and rigging. He claims that he 

 can bid a job lower and make more 

 profit. And, the extra time devoted to 

 sailing, he says, is counted in minutes, 

 not hours. 



Based on his experience with the 

 first boat, Briggs expects to use the 

 Norfolk Rebel's sails about 50 per- 

 cent of the time he's working, saving 

 about 40 percent on fuel. 



"I feel I can sail to and from the 

 fishing grounds, and put less running 

 time on the engine," Briggs says. 

 "And, if my engine breaks down, I 

 don't have to pay somebody to tow me 

 in. I sail home." 



He'll try longlining and bottom 

 fishing, mostly, since the longer the 

 run, the better the efficiency under 

 sail. 



Rebel Marine has been awarded a 

 $72,000 grant from the National 

 Marine Fisheries Service to rig the 

 boat with sail. 



"Captain Briggs' project is the first 

 we've supported this way," says Ed 

 Loughlin, energy coordinator for the 

 NMFS office in Washington, D. C. 

 Loughlin says the government's back- 

 ing for the project is based on the belief 

 that sails offer some hope to the na- 

 tion's commercial fishing fleet, which 

 is being hounded, nearly to extinction, 

 by the cost of energy. 



Loughlin estimates that, for 

 trawlers, about 57 cents of every dollar 

 in overhead is spent on fuel. The 

 average shrimper burns a gallon and a 

 half for each pound of shrimp he hauls 

 home, Loughlin says. 



In exchange for the grant money, 

 Briggs has agreed to formally analyze 

 and document the performance of the 

 boat. He has gotten help in doing so 

 from the Sea Grant program at the 

 Virginia Institute of Marine Science 

 (VIMS). Sea Grant specialists at 

 VIMS helped Briggs write the grant 

 proposal. Part of the grant will be used 

 to pay a researcher on the project. 



"We want to see how the boat per- 

 forms over a range of wind conditions 

 and working conditions," says John 

 Lucy, Sea Grant's marine recreation 

 specialist at VIMS. "We also want to 

 find the optimum ratios of diesel and 

 sail assist, to spell out what combina- 

 tions might save a fisherman the most 

 money." 



"I think you're going to see a lot 

 more fishermen trying the idea," 

 Briggs says of wind power. "When fuel 

 was cheap, they just went ahead and 

 designed boats for brute power and 

 carrying capacity. But who can afford 

 the fuel anymore? Sometimes, you just 

 get to hurtin' so bad you have to 

 change, whether you want to or not." 



