Today’s Photos of the Day are of the always
entertaining Warwick ‘Commodore’ Tompkins of Mill Valley, and
of the bottom of his highly-customized Wylie 38 Flashgirl.
We have no idea what that strange object is that he’s holding
in his hand, but a furtive-looking guy covered in bottom paint
sneaking around the boatyard whispered something about it being
a “new age cross for worshiping the ocean.” That might
explain the same shape in what looks like brass on the bottom
of Flashgirl.
Do you have any idea what it might be?
Photos Latitude/Richard
” . . . there were several more shots
fired . . .”
June 18 – Barranquilla, Colombia
In Wednesday’s
‘Lectronic, we reported that two West Coast cruisers were
attacked on their boat in Colombia. Today we have an edited firsthand
report from the victims, Bob Hudnall and Dana Cannon of the Long
Beach-based Force 50 Doña Lee. The couple did the
Ha-Ha last fall.
Dana Cannon and Bob Hudnall of Doña Lee
Photo Courtesy Doña Lee
“We were anchored in the Rio Magdalena
River at Barranquilla, Colombia – about 80 miles northeast of
Cartagena in the Caribbean – to work on a fuel problem we were
having. We’d just finished dinner, it was about 6:30 p.m., and
we were down below in the cabin. Having completed our repairs,
we planned on getting underway again as soon as I’d put things
away from dinner. For some reason Bob had locked the hatch to
the companionway doors – and it’s truly what saved us. I heard
a noise on deck, and at first believed it to be Bob. But at about
the same time he said, ‘What was that?’ I started screaming –
I’m not sure why, as no one was there to hear me or care, except
Bob, of course, who had come to the same conclusion as I: somebody
had boarded our boat. Eventually we would learn it was five men,
while a sixth stayed in the panga.
“Then someone was kicking at the companionway
hatch. I ran to the forward cabin, while Bob grabbed the bear
repellent, machete, and flare gun he keeps by our bed for protection.
Just as the assailant was able to kick in one side of the door,
Bob started spraying mace at the guy. But the pirate shot the
can out of Bob’s hand. He fired several more shots to keep Bob
at bay while he tried to break through the other side of the
companionway door. Bob unloaded another can of mace at him, and
then started firing flares in his direction. When Bob was out
of mace and flares, he started hacking at the guy with his machete.
Every time a hand or foot would come through the companionway
hatch trying to get into the cabin, Bob would swing at it with
his machete. The entrance to the inside of our boat now reflects
that it had been a battle scene. The whole time this was going
on, the guy was shooting his gun at Bob. When he ran out of bullets,
he took everything he could find on deck and threw it at Bob
through the companionway door.
“As this was going on, I was in the
V-berth trying to find a weapon of my own. Since it was dark,
the only thing I could find was the fire extinguisher. Bob later
yelled that there was another flare gun in the cupboard. I found
it, loaded it, and – avoiding the gunfire – got it to Bob. By
now the fumes from the nearly full can of mace that exploded
inside our boat were overpowering, and Bob was drenched in it.
I was trying to open a porthole for air when I saw the panga
the assailants come in speeding away from our boat. I waited
a second to see if they had left anyone behind. Not hearing anyone,
I yelled to Bob that they had left.
“He went up on deck and issued a Mayday
on channel 16. We have a VHF radio in the cabin, but it’s a handheld,
and the batteries were dead. Within a half hour of issuing a
Mayday, the Colombian Coast Guard was there. They escorted us
back to the navy base, and we side-tied to a frigate. Bob was
taken to the hospital for a cut on his finger and for an allergic
reaction to the mace.
“The thieves got away with our outboard,
liferaft, and our ditch bag – with credit cards, passports and
handheld electronics in it – and two jerry jugs of diesel fuel.
The Colombian Special Police – similar to our FBI – were able
to find an informant who knew where our belongings were and who
had them. They raided the guy’s house and found our outboard,
passports, and credit cards. Our electronics and liferaft had
apparently already been sold. The police claim they know who
has these items, but aren’t hopeful that they will have them
back to us before we leave Colombia. We’ll see. At least we got
the outboard and our passports back, both of which are more important
to us than the handheld electronics.
“We are now in Cartagena making repairs
to the boat caused by bullets and machete slashes. We’ve also
got to varnish, as mace eats right into it. We’ve been talking
to a delivery captain about taking the boat to Puerto Rico for
us, and meeting her there. We’re worn out and can’t do this trip
again.
“We’ve had many responses to our story.
Most people say, ‘Thank God you’re okay.’ But there are various
opinions on how we should have responded. Most believe that if
we had let the pirates inside the boat, they would have taken
what they wanted and left. We disagree, as they started shooting
at us before they said anything. In fact, they never said anything.
We believe they wanted to kill us and take our boat. A Colombian
man Bob met said he believes they would have kidnapped one of
us, sold us to the guerrillas, who would have ransomed us back
to our family. That’s not unusual here in Colombia. All I know
is that we both came out of it scared and nervous about being
anywhere in Colombia – except the Club de Pesca in Cartagena.
But we didn’t sleep the first night we were back here, because
we had to anchor out.
“Physically we were unharmed, and
that’s the most important thing to us. We always wondered what
we would do in the case of a pirate attack. We’d always hoped
thieves would just take things and leave if we didn’t fight back,
but we wondered if fighting back was the only thing that would
save our lives. In this case, it was very clear to us that they
intended to be violent from the start, and our passivity wouldn’t
have made a difference.
“Our advice is to stay as far offshore
of Colombia as possible. We were 10 hours behind a Puerto Rico-based
sportfishing boat that makes the trip all the time, and he told
us to hug the coast as much as possible. Bad advice! We have
heard of three other boats that have been pirated in that area.
One of them was 10 miles offshore. One of the boats was lost.
“On a positive note, the Colombian
government bent over backwards to accommodate our every need
and get our belongings back. They saw to it that Bob got free
medical treatment, and they got me to a place where I could go
online and cancel our credit cards. We didn’t keep all our cash
or credit cards in the ditch bag. We’d heard about the Japanese
couple who were attacked by pirates 100 miles off the Pacific
Coast of Colombia while on their way to the Galapagos, and the
pirates got everything. So just in case something like that happened
to us, I kept another stash hidden inside the boat. As such,
we’re not without money or credit cards until the new ones reach
us.
“We are bound for St. Thomas as soon
as our boat reaches Puerto Rico. We’ll feel much safer in the
Virgins under Coast Guard protection.”
For a few years, it seemed like the coast
of Colombia had become safe. To our thinking, cruisers should
consider it off-limits again – except for Cartagena. And as the
robbing of John Haste on Little Wing proved, you even
have to be careful there.
As for Bob and Dana thinking they can feel
safe in the U.S. Virgins, we think that’s true – as long as they’re
back on their boat at night. Places like Charlotte Amalie can
be dicey after dark. The British Virgins are much safer.
Oh No, Not Another Mast!
June 18 – San Francisco Bay
If you weren’t by the water, perhaps you
didn’t know how hard it was honking on Wednesday afternoon and
night. At Schoonmaker Marina in Sausalito, it blew a sustained
35 knots with lots of gusts over 50 knots.
It was in these windy conditions that Adventure
Cat 2, the familiar 65-ft sailing cat based out of Pier 39,
lost her mast for the second time in two years. Our good friend
Jay Gardner, one of the co-owners, reports it happened about
a half mile west of Raccoon Strait. It had been blowing about
32 knots, the cat was sailing upwind at nine knots with a reef
in the main, and there were 40 passengers aboard. There was about
a five-knot stronger gust, and according to the two people looking
up at the time, the mast buckled about halfway up. Nobody was
hurt.
Adventure Cat 2 a couple of weeks ago, mast intact Photo Latitude/Richard
Gardner is very disturbed because this
is the second mast lost on the boat in two years, and they had
the specs carefully gone over on the new mast, as well as the
installation. “We did everything possible to make sure it
was safe, as our primary concern is the safety of our passengers.”
They are having a diver raise the mast to try to find out what
failed.
Since we often sail with a lot of folks
on Profligate, we’ve always shared Gardner’s number one
concern that nobody get hurt. And the primary source of somebody
getting hurt would probably be the mast coming down. As a result,
after two years, we made the decision that Profligate’s
original mast was not strong enough for our boat. So we dipped
into our pockets and bought a much stronger one. God knows we
would have preferred to spend the money on a wild party or something,
but the fear of someone getting hurt was greater.
Anyway, we’ve been much happier with our
new mast, which stays in column, and have sailed it upwind in
a horrible chop with full sail in gusts up to 40 knots. That’s
not something we plan on doing often or for very long, but the
mast has been up to the task. Having been impressed with our
mast, and having gone over the specs with Forespar, when Adventure
Cat 2 was new, it was decided to go with a mast virtually
identical to Profligate’s.
So what has gone wrong? We’re not sure,
but one factor we suspect is Adventure Cat 2 having a
34.6-ft beam versus Profligate’s only being 30 feet. The
extra 4.5 feet of beam means a tremendous increase in stability.
Whereas the much lighter 55-ft Adventure Cat 1 will heel
slightly in a big gust and accelerate, and Profligate
will do the same to a lesser extent, Gardner tells us that the
much more stable Adventure Cat 2 doesn’t heel or accelerate
even in big gusts. That means the rig just loads up. And with
a payload of 40 people, it would really load up – perhaps to
the extent the rig could no longer take it. Once again, this
is just speculation on our part.
We hope the cause of the dismastings is
found quickly and Adventure Cat 2 can get back to work.
In our mind, the Adventure Cats and their owners are a
real credit to the Bay.
Bermuda Race This Weekend
June 18 – Newport, RI
The 630-mile Newport to Bermuda Race –
the most important offshore event on the East Coast – is this
weekend, and shapes up as a battle between Hasso Plattner’s Morning
Glory, Roy Disney’s Pyewacket – both are MaxZ86s –
and the DeVos brothers’ Windquest, which used to be Bob
McNeil’s 86-ft water-ballasted Zephyrus V.
Morning Glory
A new record is expected for two reasons.
One, the MaxZ86s are incredibly fast. During a recent tune-up, Pyewacket was reported doing nearly nine knots in just
3.5 knots of true wind. Secondly, the weather report looks very
favorable. In fact, Novato’s Dee Smith, who runs the program
on Morning Glory, says the boats could easily do more
than 500 miles in 24 hours. As such, they are hoping to lower
the old Pyewacket’s 53-hour record by as much as 15 hours.
That would be something!
Pyewacket
Photos Latitude/Richard
Fourth Summer Sailstice This Weekend
June 18 – Northern Hemisphere
This weekend is the fourth annual Summer
Sailstice weekend, so it’s now ‘last call’ for you and the crew
to sign up. To be eligible to win the week-long BVI Moorings
charter, the Hunter Xcite sailing dinghy, and one of 100 other
prizes for sailors, you must sail this weekend and sign up by
midnight (PDT) Monday, June 21 at www.summersailstice.com.
Encinal YC rafted up at Angel Island last year. This year they’re
cruising to San Pablo YC. Photo Latitude/John Arndt
Summer Sailstice, a global holiday celebrating
sailing on the solstice, is for everyone – boatowners, captain,
family, friends and crew. You can help make this the biggest
Summer Sailstice ever by getting everyone who’s sailing with
you the weekend of June 19-20 to get on the site and sign in.
Another benefit is everyone signed up helps contribute another
$1 from a pool of funds donated by supporters to Seacology, a
non-profit dedicated to preserving island ecosystems. See www.seacology.com.
Rumors
June 18 – Newport, RI
The word on the docks is that Kiwi Russell
Coutts, the most successful America’s Cup skipper ever, is about
to part ways with Alinghi, current holders of the Cup. This with
Alinghi beginning their quest for a second straight America’s
Cup, by unleashing their new team against BMW Oracle in Newport,
RI, over the weekend in the UBS Cup. This is another version
of the up close, crowd-pleasing Moët Cup held on the Bay
last year.
