Let’s End This Silly Idea of Lehi Rounding Africa and into the Atlantic Ocean – Part III

Continued from the previous post, regarding the dogged insistence by Heartland and North America theorists to insist that Lehi sailed around Africa and across the Atlantic to the south or east coast of what is now the United States.
    In addition, for those who try to discount the Southern Ocean and its relative easy and simple course across the southern Pacific because they claim those waters would be too cold and Lehi and his people all freeze to death, a look at the comparative temperatures might be helpful. In the area of the South Pacific, which consists of some 30º north to south, including the Roaring 40s, the Furious Fifties, and the Shrieking Sixties, Lehi would have sailed in the mid 40s latitudes.
    While the water temperatures in the high latitudes of the sixties reach about 28º F., the water temp in the low forties is about 50º F., which is the same temp off Oregon and Washington, as well as the Massachusetts to Main coasts, and also England and Norway.
    The water temp in the Roaring 40s can reach as high as 62.5º F.—Columbus sailed from the Canaries to the Caribbean in the same water temperature as the Roaring 40s, and the Vikings actually sailed from their home to Iceland, to Greenland and to New Foundland in water temps much colder, from about 41º to 32º. So it is doubtful Lehi would have succumbed to such temperatures as critics of the southern route claim.

There are continual storms in this area of the Graveyard of Ships that have sent over 3000 vessels to the bottom with experienced crews on board

For those who have never been to sea during a raging storm, especially before modern conveniences, the experience can be frightening. This appears to be the attitude of Laman, Lemuel and the sons of Ishmael after four days of raging storm. Nephi wrote modestly of his brothers when he said, “my brethren began to see that the judgments of God were upon them, and that they must perish save that they should repent of their iniquities” (1 Nephi 18:15). Had they been rounding the Cape, with such a storm raging for four days, it seems most likely they would have been sent to the bottom to join the thousands of other vessels that have succumbed in this area.
    The point of all of this, is to show without a doubt the makeup of the Cape area of South Africa, and the tremendous dangers involved in sailing that area, particularly for ships driven before the wind, as was Nephi’s vessel. In such ships, steerage is limited, and without moveable yardarms to adjust to the wind direction and an experienced crew to maneuver them, the ships were slow to respond to the helm.
    Sailing in this vicinity in wooden ships driven by the wind and currents, with the currents not far off the Cape moving swiftly and powerfully in the opposite direction (west to east), and those close to the Cape being driven inward, toward land (east to northwest), the going in these waters was always dangerous. To add to the danger is the rocky headlands, from Agulhas to Good Hope, with the latter cape peninsula jutting out into the ocean 47 miles, blocking progress between the Agulhas and Benguela currents.

The Warm Agulhas Current retroflects back upon itself, pinching off large ocean eddies (Rings) and creating severe storms, conflicting ocean currents and dangerous circular waters

South of Cape Agulhas the warm Agulhas Current that flows south along the east coast of Africa retroflects back into the Indian Ocean. While retroflecting, it pinches off large ocean eddies (Agulhas rings) that drift into the South Atlantic Ocean and take enormous amounts of heat and salt into the neighboring ocean. This mechanism constitutes one of the key elements in the global conveyor belt circulation of heat and salt. While such eddies cause nutrients that are normally found in colder, deeper waters to come to the surface, providing excellent large ship fishing, they are circulating whirls with significant ones assigned names as they occur, that disrupt the waters, bring storms and create difficult passage.
    A current is obviously the movement of water, with ocean currents driven by several factors, such as the rise and fall of the tides, which is driven by the gravitational attraction of the sun and moon on Earth's oceans. Tides create a current in the oceans, near the shore, and in bays and estuaries along the coast, called "tidal currents." Tidal currents are the only type of currents that change in a very regular pattern and can be predicted for future dates. Another factor that drives ocean currents is wind as it moves over the ocean’s surface. Winds drive currents near coastal areas on a localized scale, and in the open ocean on a global scale
    To non-seamen, currents and winds at sea generally have little meaning; however, oceanic currents are essential for maintaining the existing balance of life on Earth. Unfortunately, they can be deadly as well. Especially, along such areas as the capes of the southern African coast. As an example, longshore currents are generated when a "train" of waves reach the coastline and release bursts of energy. The speed at which waves approach the land depends on sea floor and shoreline features and the depth of the water. As a wave moves toward the land, different segments of the wave encounter the shoreline before others, which slows these segments down. As a result, the wave tends to bend and conform to the general shape of the coastline, arriving at a slight angle, called the “angle of wave approach.”
    Because of the unique factors off the southern African coast, with the warm Agulhas Current passing the cold Benguela Current, these longshore currents are disrupted, forming the eddies and rings mentioned above. The shallow waters off the southern African coast also add to the problems, causing incoming currents to break and move differently, depending upon the shallowness or depth of the shelf, making up especially dangerous currents. Add to this the upwelling of water when the winds blow across the ocean surface pushing water away form an area, and forcing colder water to the surface.

The light blue shelf off the coast of South Africa is the Agulhas Bank, which adds to the wave and current action in these waters, helping to create the difficultconditions

The sea off Cape Agulhas creates extremely hazardous wave conditions; these are further exacerbated by the shallow waters of the Agulhas Bank, a broad, shallow part of the continental shelf which juts 155 miles south from the cape. These hazards have combined to make the cape notorious among sailors, and infamous for winter storms and mammoth rogue waves, which can range up to 100-feet high. In fact, Rogue waves (also known as freak waves, monster waves, episodic waves, killer waves, extreme waves, and abnormal waves) are unusually large, unexpected and suddenly appearing surface waves that can be extremely dangerous, even to large ships, including today’s ocean liners.
    All of these factors make sailing these waters difficult at best downright dangerous, even with today’s advanced sailing techniques, knowledge, and understanding. In 600 BC, with no experience at handling a ship at sea, Nephi and his crew would have been faced with overwhelming problems and be unable to adjust or counter them. Instructions from the Liahona as to which way to steer the ship, or where to walk along the more fertile parts of the land is one thing, requiring little preparation and simple obedience; however, the mere instruction from the Liahona would not have been sufficient when seconds count and can mean life and death.
    It should also be kept in mind that the southern coast of Africa runs 1,550 miles, across two oceans, with several conflicting currents in this unique area, where experience at handling a ship in difficult waters is all that stands between a crew and going to the bottom of the sea.
    For theorists to keep harping on such a voyage in 600 BC with a totally inexperienced crew dealing with such matters is completely out of the question and patently misleading. After all, and it should be completely understood, that the lack of ability of Nephi’s brothers and the sons of Ishmael when they encountered a “great storm—a great and terrible tempest” (1 Nephi 18:12-15). Nor was that storm one along this southern coastal area, since the Agulhas current does not blow or move backward during a storm in the same direction from which it had been coming, but is retroflected around sideways, toward the east where it picks up the main South Indian Ocean gyre.
(See the next post, “Let’s End This Silly Idea of Lehi Rounding Africa and into the Atlantic Ocean – Part IV,” regarding the dogged insistence by Heartland and North America theorists to insist that Lehi sailed around Africa