Trimaran abandoned on Pac Cup Delivery

[donradcliffe]

This has been a bad year for boats, and the loss of the trimaran Transit of Venus on the way back from Hawaii adds to the toll.

Latitude 38 - 'Lectronic Latitude

The boat hit (or was hit) by something in the night which smashed the front of the starboard ama and cracked the main hull. After efforts to stabilize the boat failed, the delivery crew used the satphone and the epirb to call for help and got on a passing freighter.

Another bone for the armchair admirals to chew on....

[DoubleWhisky]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

Another bone for the armchair admirals to chew on....

They would be hungry
Not much to chew on at all...
Just a pity a boat was lost.
Just happy nobody was hurt.

Cheers,

Tomasz

[MarkJ]

A shipping container.... A flying one.

Moby Klingon?

"Whatever we hit had destroyed the front of our starboard ama. The unknown object then apparently became airborne and slammed into the starboard side of the main cabin with sufficient force to detach two cabin lights and knock much of the lining off the inside of the hull. We also noticed a 3-foot hairline crack that was dripping water by the V-berth. Two of the starboard windows were damaged, presumably from the flexing of the hull. The forward starboard tramp and forward starboard rigging were dragging in the water. The force of the impact even managed to dislodge the radar unit mounted several feet above the waterline aft of everything. Whatever we hit must have gotten at least 10 feet in the air and flown 20 feet back.

[donradcliffe]

They were in an area where Tsunami debris is expected.

Here is a slightly more detailed version of events from one of the crew:

Transit No More (Transit of Venus lost)

Its not clear from the story whether they had anyone up on deck watching when they collided with whatever they hit. Without a dodger and with enough wind and seas to be going 8-12k, I suspect whoever was on watch was down below.

After deciding that they could only do 3 knots the last 600 miles, they decided to abandon. I think Boatie would still be out there.

I was also interested in hearing that they were averaging under 100 miles per day on the first few days out of Hawaii when they were on the wind. Maybe that was less than 100 miles/day distance made good, as 4k seems pretty slow for a 37 ft tri.

[Sand crab]

That's a 2008 Corsair according to the Coast Guard Registry.

[s/v Beth]

Wonder if they left any way to follow that tri. I would have.