Another is a succession of waves that simply drives the boat under—“founders,” as mariners say. The dictionary defines founder as “to cave in, sink, fail utterly, collapse.” On a steel boat the windows implode, the hatches fail, and the boat starts to downflood. The crew is prevented from escaping by the sheer force of the water pouring into the cabin—it’s like walking into the blast of a firehose. In that sense, pitch-poling is better than foundering because an overturned boat traps air in the hold and can stay afloat for an hour or more.
