40 Days and 40 Nights / Yacht Sara

Une histoire d’un couple d’anglais, qui ne voulait pas abandonner leur bateau au safran bloqué à fond, ils ont tenu 40 jours avant de demander assistance et évacuer et abandonner leur bateau

Je n’avais jamais pensé à ce genre d’incident, ca doit être insupportable d’avoir le safran bloqué à fond ‘un coté

Vraiment inhabituel

Leur bateau est à 300 milles des Bermudes, ils sont partis du cap vert

www.latitude38.com[...]y.lasso

40 Days and 40 Nights
February 23, 2009 – Atlantic Ocean

Sara as seen from the deck of Indian Point after sailing circles in the Atlantic for 40 days.
Photo Courtesy Indian Point
© 2009 Latitude 38 Publishing Co., Inc.

A British cruising couple were rescued last week after spending more than a month aboard their disabled sailboat in the Atlantic. Stuart Armstrong, 51, and Andrea Davison, 48, had intended to make a two-week transatlantic crossing from the Cape Verde Islands to Antigua aboard their 42-ft sloop Sara. But on January 9, six days into the voyage, the rudder jammed. Reportedly, all attempts to free it were unsuccessful. So were all attempts to counteract or ‘override’ it using drogues.
“In effect, we were sailing round and round in circles,” said Stuart.
The couple had plenty of food and a watermaker. They had fuel and the engine ran, so they had electrical power. They also had a satphone that they used to alert both the British and American Coast Guards, and to let their families know the situation. But at the time, the weather was good and neither Stuart nor Andrea — who had 11 prior transatlantic crossings between them — were particularly bothered, said Stuart, adding, “In hindsight, perhaps we should have been.”
Ten days later the alternator went out. That meant no watermaker. They still had solar panels and a wind generator, which supplied enough juice to run a few lights at night, and to allow them continued use of the satellite phone, albeit sparingly.
Coast Guard stations in both Britain and the U.S. monitored their position but — according to intial reports — because of their remote location, no rescue attempt was launched. (It seems hard to imagine the Coasties would not at least divert a ship to this obviously disabled boat, especially with storms forecast to hit the area.) So Stuart and Andrea just sat tight, played a lot of cards, talked to their families once or twice a week, and hoped they’d eventually drift close enough to the Caribbean or U.S. coast that a ship might intercept them.

Andrea needed assistance to get aboard the supertanker.
Photo Courtesy Indian Point
© 2009 Latitude 38 Publishing Co., Inc.

In the weeks following, they were at the mercy of several storms, each one seemingly worse than the one previous. Finally, 40 days after they had left the Cape Verdes, they were rescued by the supertanker Indian Point, which rendezvoused with the yacht on February 18 about 320 miles southwest of Bermuda. By that time Andrea was too weak to climb a rope ladder, so she was put in a safety harness and hoisted aboard. The couple were checked by the ship's medical staff and, save for a few cuts and bruises, given a clean bill of health. They were assigned a cabin for the remainder of the trip, and were due to have arrived in Amsterdam yesterday. The disabled yacht could not be hoisted aboard or towed, so they had to leave her.
“The boat had been our home for eight years,” said Stuart. “Although we have now lost her, at least we still have our lives.”

www.sailinganarchy.com[...]ge1.php

Spot On

There’s a thread here that says “Something not right with this story”. That’s spot on! This last weekend, a UK newspaper The Mail on Sunday reported that a British couple had been rescued from their “stricken yacht”, Sara, by an Italian oil tanker after spending “an incredible 40 days drifting across the storm-ravaged Atlantic Ocean.” Full story here. The paper described Stuart Armstrong, 51, and his partner Andrea Davison, 48, as being “tired, exhausted and grateful to be returning home after their six week ordeal in which they ‘stared death in the face’.”
Sky News reported a similar story, under the headline “Brit Couple Saved After 40 Days Lost At Sea”, and other reports appeared in various newspapers and on TV and radio stations. The gist of every story painted a picture of two people, on a yacht with the rudder jammed hard over, so that – according to the Mail and Sunday’s quote from Armstrong “In effect, we were sailing round and round in circles.”, with additional electrical problems which put them almost out of contact with the outside world, except for a once or twice a week phone call to their children.
Commenting on the Indian Point’s response to the couple’s SOS The Mail on Sunday story says that “No other vessel had responded because of the couple’s remote location and also because, according to shipping officials, many captains are wary of distress calls due to piracy fears.” That comment alone would raise eyebrows among anyone in the shipping industry, for the fact is that piracy is almost unknown in the Atlantic Ocean, but there is more. Armstrong also said, according to The Mail on Sunday “The coastguard said it was too dangerous for anyone to come out so we just had to carry on drifting in the middle of the ocean.” Having followed several incidents in which yachtsmen competing in trans-Atlantic races have been rescued thanks to coastguard intervention, BYM News found it impossible to accept the veracity of that statement and spoke to the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCGA) in the UK and the Maritime Rescue Coordination Center in Norfolk, USA (MRCC Norfolk).You can read their combined version of events here.
02/24/08

Clarification des coast guards