Safety has to be designed into the boat, not added on after wards... The aluminum cat that sank after being holed was strictly negligence by the designer... To say that the needs of the market didn't allow adequate flotation is a cop out... The rising tide of liability litigation in the USA makes ignoring flotation issues a highly risky endeavor for the designer, and the boat builder, and the yacht broker... I am deep into the design of a power cat... Construction to start this summer... Safety is "job one" in the design... The bow and stern have flotation compartments that double as crash barriers... In addition there are areas that will form flotation compartments between the inner liner and the outer hull.. The bridge deck material is a foam sandwich with plywood and fiberglass facings... With both hulls completely holed and breaching all the flotation tanks she will still float with the floor of the bridge deck awash (worst case)... One would wait out the storm in the pilot house six feet above the water level... In addition, should she overturn <unlikely, but god forbid> we have included emergency hatches that allow one to exit through the bottom onto the <now> topsides of the bridge-deck floor... Some of the other issues I am addressing... By designing a shallow draft hull we have no keel as such... This allows the hulls to slide sideways through the water easily when taking a wave on the beam... Being compliant allows the cat to act like a raft in a wild seaway, bobbing over the waves and going with the forces not fighting them... A keel boat, or even a deep draft power hull, will have more resistance to going sideways setting the boat up to be rolled... Also planned is to have a storm drogue ready to be deployed... These will be on each deck, in a compartment, fully rigged and anchored, requiring only to have the hatch opened and the weighted end of the drogue thrown into the water... Attempting to rig a sea anchor while being battered by waves and wind is not a good scenario... Having the equipment ready to deploy in a moment with only one hand, is much better.. denny Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com