KINGFISHER2
DISMASTS - ALL CREW SAFE - JULES VERNE RECORD
BID IS OVER...
IN
BRIEF:
 |
| Shot
of broken mast taken from front of boat. Photo
courtesy of Team
Kingfisher |
*
JUST AS KINGFISHER2'S LUCK WAS TURNING, almost
a full day ahead of Peyron's Jules Verne record
pace, with excellent wind forecast for the days
to come and with Geronimo virtually becalmed in
the South Atlantic, a phone call to mission control
confirmed the worst. "This is the call I
was hoping never to have to make...we've been
dismasted...20 minutes ago" a dispirited
Ellen reported.
*
AT 2222 GMT LAST NIGHT (SUNDAY 23.2.03) KINGFISHER2
DISMASTED - BOAT AND CREW ARE SAFE, NO INJURIES....
KINGFISHER2 was sailing in moderate conditions
of 25-30 knots of wind in a 1.5 metre swell under
full mainsail and spinnaker approximately 100
miles south east of the Kerguelen Islands (50
50'S 72 08'E). Suddenly without warning the mast
came crashing down, falling forward and missing
the 3 crew who were on deck at the time.
*
THE 39.5 METRE CARBON MAST BROKE IN TWO PLACES
- THE REASON FOR THE DISMASTING IS NOT KNOWN.
The mast fell forward and sideways over the port
(leeward) hull - the bottom 10 metre section of
the mast has been salvaged. But the remainder
of the mast, rigging and sails were all cut away
to prevent any further damage to the boat - a
broken section of the mast in the water punctured
a small hole in the port hull but the boat is
not taking on water and is now in a good and seaworthy
condition.
*
DEVASTATED OF COURSE, BUT PROFESSIONAL TO THE
END - BY 0230 THE CREW ALREADY HAD A JURY RIG
IN PLACE using the boom as a temporary mast...KINGFISHER2
is already making between 7 and 10 knots towards
their nearest practical safe haven, Perth some
2000 miles to the east. The 10 metre section of
the mast that remained on the boat was used as
a brace to leverage the boom into place.
*
ALTHOUGH JUST 100 MILES FROM THE KERGUELEN ISLANDS
the decision was taken to head east as there are
limited facilities on the islands, and ultimately
the giant catamaran will need to make to a port
with cargo facilities to return her to Europe.
KINGFISHER2 has not requested any assistance from
the Australian rescue services and is confident
that she can sail the 2000 miles under jury rig.
*
"WE HAVE HAD A LOT OF BAD LUCK ON THIS TRIP
BUT WE FOUGHT ON AND THINGS WERE JUST TURNING
FOR US - NOW TRAGICALLY IT'S ALL OVER"...
ELLEN: "We have had a lot of bad luck on
this trip - a lot of disappointing weather situations
which has put us continuously behind the record...
But everyone just fought on - there was never
any talk of abandoning this record even in the
slowest times... The crew were always positive,
just wanting to get back at the record and in
the last few days that started to happen... We
got ahead of Peyron's record and were catching
Geronimo who has got becalmed in the South Atlantic
- then, bang, all of sudden its all over..to watch
all that work drift away was so painful".
*
KINGFISHER2 WERE 332 MILES (approx 20 HOURS) AHEAD
OF THE EXISTING JULES VERNE RECORD SET BY PEYRON...
and had closed the gap on Geronimo to 2 days (859
miles) at the time of dismasting. Just as the
KINGFISHER2 crew were getting back on the pace
- this is a huge blow... NEAL MCDONALD: "The
look on the guys faces just says it all - total
doom and gloom...just silence...it's the end of
a huge attempt that could have been so successful.
Things were really starting to look good for us."
*
THE JULES VERNE LIVES UP TO ITS REPUTATION AS
ONE OF THE TOUGHEST ROUND THE WORLD CHALLENGES
- now 8 out of 12 record attempts have failed
since the first Jules Verne record attempt in
1993. The existing record is held by Orange (Bruno
Peyron) at 64 days, 8 hours, 37 minutes and 24
seconds. Whether Olivier de Kersauson and his
crew on board Geronimo, currently just over a
day ahead of this record, can better this time
remains to be seen.
*
FROM GERRY MURPHY, CEO KINGFISHER PLC, TITLE SPONSOR
OF ELLEN MACARTHUR AND HER JULES VERNE ATTEMPT
: "We obviously share Ellen and the crew's
immense disappointment at the dismasting of KINGFISHER2.
However, the safety and well-being of Ellen and
her crew has always been our main concern and
it remains the most important thing to us.
"The
Kingfisher group is extremely proud to be associated
with Ellen and her crew. Individually and as a
team. They embody all the quanlities and values
that we look for in our staff. Their determination,
talent and will to succeed are an example to us
all.
"We
are sure that they will overcome this disappointment
to continue their search for new and bigger ocean-racing
challenges."
***************
EMAIL
FROM ELLEN RECEIVED IN THE EARLY HOURS OF THIS
MORNING
I'm
sitting here at my chart table feeling quite sick
inside. I can feel the water running by the hull,
and feel the waves take KINGFISHER2 along - but
not at the 20 knot average of earlier. for now
our trip as we knew it is over. At 2222 on the
23rd of feb I was jolted forward on the chart
table seat whilst discussing weather with our
router meeno schrader. Jolts forward happen quite
often in these boats as we fire down waves - but
this was different, this was a gut wrenching ear
piercing crunching and snapping sound. I dropped
the phone and hurled myself towards the companionway
- looking round my feet as i went to check water
coming onboard from anywhere - nothing. As I reached
the hatch all became clear in a flash of nausea...the
39.5 metre mast which has powered us ahead of
the record over the past 24 days was no longer.
We
shall most likely never know the cause of our
dismasting, and in some cases you just have to
accept them for what they are.
It
would be very wrong to say that this trip has
not been a massive challenge so far, but equally
nothing, at any stage in this trip as brought
tears to my eyes. and the tears in my eyes right
now come with frustration and anger as I grit
my teeth together - not through struggling with
other issues, but with the anger that i feel right
now at having let so many people down. So much
work has gone into this project - so much energy
and commitment, each fitting sealed - each lashing
tied - and here we were cutting parts of it over
the side. it's so destructive, so final and so
over...
So
sitting here i feel empty and sad, above all so
relieved that no-one bar our boat was hurt, as
that would have been the winner in any one 2 one.
But at the same time I feel proud; i feel proud
of the strength of the crew - proud of their commitment
and humour, proud of their smiles and proud of
the way that they have handled their frustration
too. The strange thing is that suddenly, although
we are all disappointed we have shifted our focus
on getting ourselves moving, and to what looks
like Australia as soon as we can.
I
glance down at my notebook to jot down something
to remember - seeing the pages and pages of notes
preparing things for this trip. All of a sudden
our challenge feels like it was days away, as
if it's almost a distant memory.. Just three hours
ago I was having stitches put in my hand after
cutting it open, then an hour ago me cutting through
rigging as if there was no tomorrow - and now
even that seems irrelevant... no longer are we
living each day for our distance run, checking
the lines are leading correctly and, or thinking
about every aspect of boat speed. It's over -
our jules verne is over.
It's
a funny feeling sitting out here thinking about
all that has happened, and wondering what might
have been.. But then the "what if's"
will always exist in life. They will never disappear,
but you can choose to ignore them...what's done
is done - and however you want to look at it -
you learn from it, we have learnt from it. We
must just get up and on to the next challenge...
ellen.
Listen
to latest audio from Ellen, Neal McDonald and
Bruno Dubois recorded just hours after the dismasting...
ELLEN AUDIO TRANSCRIPT 0045 GMT 24.2.02
Communications Partner BT http://www.teamkingfisher.com/btopenworld
"I
was in the nav stations speaking with our weather
router Meeno Schrader on the satellite phone when
I heard an almighty crunching and grinding sound...
It felt like we had hit something as the boat
slowed so quickly but when I got on deck and looked
up the rig had gone over the side - it is the
last thing you want to see...
Fortunately,
only the on-watch crew were on deck [3 people,
Neal, Bruno, Youngster, with Jason below temporarily]
- everyone is okay. We are very lucky if we had
been doing a manouevre or changing watch systems
it could have been a different story. It's pretty
frightening to see your world fall over the side.
We just cut everything away as quickly as we could
[it took about an hour] to get us free of the
broken mast.
As
soon as I heard the bang - I ran down the whole
length of the boat - thinking we had hit something
- to check there was no water coming in anywhere.
When I came up the hatch and looked up there was
not mast - one minute 39 and a half metres of
mast standing there, the next nothing.
First
reaction was to make sure everyone is safe, then
we just had to get on with cutting away the pieces
of the mast and sails that were floating in the
water but trying to keep as much as we could.
We managed to save 10 metres of the bottom of
the mast - everything else went - sails, rigging.
Just saw it all float away into the Southern Ocean,
along with the chance of breaking the record.
These
things happen so quickly - we don't know what
went wrong. No one was looking at the rig the
moment before it happened - we may never know
why, that is often the case with dismastings.
It was a brand new rig - the guys had worked on
it meticuously - and the issues we had in Plymouth
(replacing part of the mast track) are certainly
unrelated. We will probably never know why it
broke.”
NEAL
McDONALD AUDIO 0045 GMT 24.2.02: communications
by BT (broadband users check out video and other
high speed content at http://kingfisher.sportal.com)
"We
were running along in breeze 28-33 knots - few
hours prior to this the sea state had been pretty
unpleasant but it had flatterend out - and we
were sailing at between 18 and 23 knots straight
down the track. It happened alarmingly quicly
- just thankful no one around on that side of
the boat...
We
have a hole in the side of the boat from where
a broken section of the mast punched through -
if the sea state had been worse it could have
been a different story and perhaps a sunken hull.
The look on the guys faces says it all - we were
getting back in the money, now its total doom
and gloom, just silence..."
STATISTICS
8
OUT OF 12 JULES VERNE ATTEMPTS HAVE FAILED.
KF2
was ahead of Orange by 20 hours 46 minutes
KF2 was behind Geronimo by 53 hours 40 minutes,
but Geronimo’s worst leg was the next 7000
miles KF2 had covered 10254 miles (total of 24
hour runs) KF2 Distance to finish was 15135 miles
JULES
VERNE RECORD TIMES:
2002 Orange (Peyron) 64 days 8 hours 37 minutes
24 seconds
1997 Sport Elec (de Kersauson) 71 days 14 hours
22 minutes 8 seconds 1994 ENZA (Blake/Knox-Johnston)
74 days 22 hours 17 minutes 22 seconds 1993 Commodore
Explorer (Peyron) 79 days 6 hours 15 minutes 56
seconds
JULES
VERNE UNSUCCESSFUL ATTEMPTS:
2003 KINGFISHER2 (MacArthur)
2002 GERONIMO (de Kersauson)
2002 Orange (Peyron) a few weeks later Peyron
re-started and set a new record 1998 Royal Sun
Alliance (Edwards) 1996 Sport Elec (de Kersauson)
1994 Lyonaisse des Eaux (de Kersauson) 1993 Charal
(de Kersauson) 1993 ENZA (Blake/Knox-Johnston)
OMEGA
official timekeeper of KINGFISHER2'S Jules Verne
record attempt http://www.ellenmacarthur.com/omega
The Jules Verne record remains at 64 day 8 hours
37 minutes OMEGA : Official timekeeper of KINGFISHER2’s
record attempt
KINGFISHER PLC is the title sponsor to Ellen MacArthur’s
sailing campaigns
Kingfisher
plc is one of Europe's leading retailers operating
in the international home improvement and electrical
and furniture markets. Kingfisher employs around
90,000 people in over 1,397 stores across 16 countries
and includes some of the best known retail brands
in Europe: B&Q and Comet in the UK and Castorama,
Darty and BUT in France. http://www.diy.com
http://www.comet.co.uk
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