Vendée Globe

There was a collective sigh of relief across the Vendée Globe fleet this morning, with the news that Yann Elies, who had broken his left femur two days ago on Generali, had been successfully picked up by the Australian Navy frigate, the HMAS Arunta.

Every skipper in this morning’s live radio broadcast expressed their excitement at the news, none more so than Marc Guillemot, who had been standing by Elies and gave a first-hand account of the rescue live on air.

Commander Stephen Bowater, Commanding Officer of HMAS Arunta, later reported that the rescue had been a huge success: “The procedure was that we sent across our 7.2 RIB boat, on board was a doctor and a couple of medics, and one of my crew is an experienced yachtsman. The yachtsman got on board first and put the yacht on a good course to allow us to board it, as we provided a lee.
“Once we’d stabilized the patient, we got him in a stretcher and bought him back on to the ship. He’s now comfortably ensconced in the supply officer’s cabin and being well looked after.
“It took about 45 minutes — probably took longer to find his passport, which he had hidden pretty well, but we got that! And we’ve got the boat set up, and it’s on its way ready for the salvage crew. So it’s looking good — less than an hour and we’re heading north with him on board.
“We do get sailed every now and again for racers, but that’s what we as mariners do, it’s the law of the sea,” Commander Bowater added.
HMAS Arunta may have one more Christmas present for another Vendée Globe retiree, as the frigate is hoping to rendezvous with the dismasted Ecover, and supply Mike Golding with additional fuel. Ecover is currently 420 miles south of Cape Leeuwin.
Relief too for Guillemot and Sam Davies, who this morning were both been stood down from their duties supporting Elies’ rescue and have since gybed south to resume a racing line. They will be recompensed for time lost in assisting the rescue effort.

But elsewhere in the fleet, after the battering the Indian Ocean dealt out, there were few signs that the skippers might be able to relax. Although some boats, such as Dee Caffari on Aviva, began to experience slightly more inclement conditions, others — including seventh-placed Jean-Pierre Dick, and Brits Brian Thompson and Steve White — are currently on tenterhooks hoping their recent repairs will see them through the second half of the race. With a new cold front forecast to bring severe weather through the second half of the fleet from tomorrow — winds of 55-60 knots, gusting even higher are expected — tensions will be running high for a little while just yet.
The one area of the fleet, of course, where the pressure is not easing up is at the front of the pack. The leading six have picked up the pace this evening and all are currently showing speeds of over 17 knots. Having built a lead of over 80 miles overnight, front-runner Michel Desjoyeaux is now holding at 60.8 miles ahead of Roland Jourdain (Veolia Environment)
Third through to sixth-placed Sébastien Josse (BT), Jean Le Cam (VM Matériaux), Armel Cléac’h (Brit Air) and Vincent Riou (PRB) had some small opportunities to gain today, able to make the most of a low-pressure area to make headway east and try to recover some lost ground to Mich Desj, who is temporarily slowed in a ridge of high pressure.  Jean Le Cam, in particular, has been putting his foot down and in the 16h (GMT) rankings, VM Matériaux was sailing at more than 19 knots towards the New Zealand gate.


From this morning’s radio broadcasts:

8th- Marc Guillemot, Safran (FRA): “The Navy brought me a box with some bread, fruit and some red wine.  I don't think I even have a corkscrew!  They also gave me a woolly hat, which I'm wearing.”

10th- Brian Thompson, Bahrain Team Pindar (GBR): “Well, the boat is smelling of epoxy and I’ve been on deck twice. I’m just going slowing and repairing the forward longitudinal, which is part of the forward ballast tank. There are four horizontal panels and two of them broke yesterday morning. I’ve been working all night and all day today to try and get it repaired, and I’m nearly there. It’s the structure that keeps the bow stiff, there are four of these beams going forward and with two broken I’ve got to stiffen it up. There’s a 45-degree crack from the base of the keel bulkhead, about 700mm on both sides, so I’ve had to cut holes in the tank to relaminate it.
"It’s a bit of a nervous moment because I really want to finish this race.”

11th – Dee Caffari, Aviva (GBR): “I’ve come out of a black and white scene where I’ve been sailing most of the Southern Ocean, into technicolour. The sky has blue in it, the sun has come out – momentarily — and even the sea looks a shade of blue in it. I’m on the edge of a high pressure, heading on a southwards gybe and it’s actually pleasant sailing! I’m in 15-20 knots which is almost like a little respite. As always, just when you think everything’s nice there’s a little monster on the way, but hopefully I’ll get as far east as I can and miss the worst of it.”

13th- Steve White, Toe in the Water (GBR): “It’s been awful, it really has. Over the last several days I’ve been either waiting for the boat to wipe out, or putting things back together again after it has wiped out. The boat’s always got a bit of weather helm, so what was happening was a pretty quick crash tack, and you end up lying on your side about 50 degrees from the vertical. If you’re in bed you finish up on the floor, your sleeping bag goes on the floor which is soaking wet because the boat leaks like a sieve! And you can’t just pull on the helm to get going again because the rudders are out of the water, so you’ve got to go and roll all the sails away and gybe back — it’s an awful lot of work.
“But we’ve had a bit of a breakthrough: I’ve put a new computer on the main pilot, so basically I’ve got two rebuilt motors now. Touch wood they’re doing fine.”

 

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