As the medical teams were busy taking care of Yann following his accident, Generali     launched an operation to recover the boat. Two members of Team Generali arrived in Fremantle, Australia and identified a suitable boat to take them to where the Open 60 was abandoned.

On 23rd December, the Race Directors realized that the positioning beacon on the Generali was no longer transmitting. They were informed by the French Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre (CROSS Gris Nez) that the COSPAS SARSAT distress beacon had been triggered.  The Generali team was immediately informed.

Philippe Laot, the technical director of Yann Eliès' team and Jean-Baptiste Epron, a Generali crew member were able to set off in a fishing boat on Wednesday 25th December, but soon encountered very bad wind and sea conditions.
While they were on passage to the expected location on Friday 26th December, they were told by the Generali shore team that the distress beacon had stopped transmitting. It was therefore no longer possible to identify the boat's position.  The weather conditions worsened (7-8m high waves and crossed seas) and the team was forced to call off the search.

Since being capsized on Boxing Day Seb Josse has made nearly 500 miles north towards better weather conditions to try to make repairs to the rudder of his BT and see what can be done with the cracking on the deck of the British Open 60.  Derek Hatfield has made no official decision about retiring from the Vendée Globe and is making steady progress towards Australia preserving his rig which lost the support of two top spreaders after being knocked over late on Saturday night. Canadian Hatfield has had many, many messages of support sent to a skipper whose battle to get to the start line was never, ever easy. He painstakingly built the Owen Clarke design in-house and raised enough funding to start this race by finding more than 10,000 individuals and supporters to contribute. Even in Les Sables d’Olonne at the start his team were still seeking and receiving donations.

Sam Davies, GBR, (Roxy) still holds a strong eighth place. From being 606 miles behind seventh placed Jean Pierre Dick (Paprec-Virbac) she is now 263 miles behind this morning.

At the front of the fleet only Roland Jourdain (Veolia Environnement) has managed to stay within 100 miles of leader Michel Desjoyeaux (Foncia).  Jean Le Cam (VM Matériaux) is third at 280.6 miles behind, while the Le Cléach and Riou duo are now the best part of 500 miles behind the leader in fourth and fifth. Again last night the pair passed with less than three miles between them.