Masts not functioning after being taken down

A ticket was put in to rare by a crew mate but was curious to see if this happened to anyone else in the game. We were fighting a Skellie ship last night and during the fighting (possibly do to an over zealous crew member with a gpb) our mast were taken down on a Brig. After sinking the skeleton ship we pulled up the back mast and the sails would not lower. The front mast we could pull up but when we went to repair with boards it just stated use the ropes to pull the mast up. Could not place a board to repair. As soon as we quit pulling it would just drop again. The skeleton ship was firing rigging balls which is the only thing I could think of that was different than any other time we had a mast go down. Anyone else have this issue?