David Glenn's blog on the eventful start to Antigua Sailing Week
We’re
one day into Antigua Sailing Week and already there have been three men
overboard, one from Sojana on the Yachting World Round Antigua Race, a
photographer from his RIB and the 28-year-old son of the owner of Passion 4 C
in Race 1 today.
All were recovered successfully- the man aboard Sojana within about 5 minutes.
The victim hit his chin as he fell – Sojana did well to retrieve him apparently
on the first pass.
The Passion 4 C man went through the guardwires when the boat rounded up
following a kite hoist in fresh 25 knot plus conditions. The skipper said they
returned to the place they thought he was and they couldn’t find him.
Frightening considering the sparkling, sunny conditions but with white caps and sea swell spotting a human head was clearly very difficult.
The man was eventually picked by Richard Matthews’ Oyster 82 Zig Zag and we’ll
let you know they achieved that when we’ve spoken to the crew.
The next (June) issue of Yachting World looks at the issue of man overboard and
retrieval in detail. As the bowman on Blackbird said yesterday when we were all
asked to don lifejackets : “Safety never takes a day off….”
Photo courtesy Tim Wright www.photoaction.com