Rigging failure

How many skippers have run through in their mind what to do if they have a rigging failure and a shroud parts? I am a great believer in the “what if?” syndrome and always talk through the possible emergencies when teaching. One needs to be careful about being a doom and gloom merchant, but if crew have been talked through the major dangers of fire, explosion, man overboard, collision, grounding, mast down and abandon ship in a sensible and balanced fashion, they will be encouraged to follow the same guidelines when chartering or owning themselves. How many owners have a set of bulldog clips on board? A range of sizes to cover repair of stays and shrouds, cable controlled wheel steering systems and suchlike should be included in the inventory of the prudent boat owner. This way, if a check of standard rigging is made, a potential fracture may be spotted in sufficient time to rig the bulldog clips and prevent a serious accident happening. On a recent delivery trip, I was inspecting the standing rigging, prior to leaving, through binoculars and noticed from the deck that the wire halyard to the headsail was more than 50% chafed through. A quick hand swage repair prevented what could have been a serious incident.