the neighbor was a horrible sailor
Being a sailor myself I cant help but shake my head each time I watch the boating scene, even though its one of my favorite movies haha. In the event of a storm it is not wise to continue under full sail, the safe thing to do would be to lower the sails and turn on the engine. Also the part when the line for the jib sail beaks, the man tells Martin to go lower the jib, that jib is whats known as a 'roller-furling' jib and its meant to wrap around and roll up and cannot be lowered, which had they had done that they would have been fine, but its hollywood and its just a movie :D
Everyone's entitled to one good scare...