Artemis’ keel pin which attaches the head of the keel to the hydraulics worked itself loose causing a certain amount of concern for Johnny Malbon and team as they headed up the west coast of Ireland this morning. Fortunately the wind was light and the team was able to resolve the problem. Crewman Paul Larsen tells the story:

“I was awoken last night by a persistent tapping noise and crawled out of the dark aft bunk to investigate. The boat was also slewing about, constantly loading up and unloading. Johnny and Gringo were either side of the Nav station in the keel box. Both of them had head torches on. Jonny had noticed a new noise that he couldn’t attribute to anything so he went and inspected the keel. The keel pin which attaches the head of the keel to the hydraulics had worked itself loose.

“Fortunately conditions had been light and Jonny had spotted it in time. Fraser was dialling Artemis up and down to load and unload the keel whilst Jonny and Gringo tapped away with the ‘persuader’ (hammer). Nothing was damaged and everything dropped back into place as it should be; remarkably unremarkable as far as keel issues go.”