Ryan Finn Rescued From Sinking Trimaran

Remember Ryan Finn? We reported on the adventurous sailor earlier this year. He had sailed his 36-ft proa Jzerro singlehanded from New York to San Francisco Bay via Cape Horn, touching land at Richmond Yacht Club on April 21. The 13,225-mile course he sailed is called the Route d’Or.

This week, we read in Sailing Scuttlebutt that Finn has been rescued from a sinking 44-ft custom trimaran in the Atlantic Ocean. The boat, Buddy, was en route from Massachusetts to Puerto Rico. Finn reports: “In the early morning hours on December 4, we were close reaching at 8-10 knots with a staysail and double-reefed mainsail, with wind gusting to 30 but very manageable.”

Finn woke up suddenly at 4 a.m. He went on deck to find that the boatspeed had dropped to almost nil. The leeward, port ama was underwater, apparently due to a collision with a UFO in the dark.

“Buddy began to slowly capsize over the next four hours. During that period, we doused all sails, put on lifejackets, and began untying the rigid inflatable we had lashed to the port trampoline. Our attempts to motor Buddy under her own power were useless, as we could only make one knot at full throttle, and we had no steerage with the weight/drag of all that water on the port side.”

About 10 miles away, the J/133 Vamoose diverted from their delivery to Antigua to attempt a rescue. Vamoose arrived on the scene and pulled up to leeward. Buddy’s three-person crew took to the dinghy and drifted over to Vamoose. “Surprisingly, once drifting away, the 10-ft dinghy, with three adults, 25-30 knots of wind and 10-ft waves, felt more secure than being on Buddy. Next thing we know, the port bow of Vamoose was upon us, and we boarded safely aft with all of our gear. The dinghy was left to drift away with Buddy.”

Read Finn’s complete report on Scuttlebutt at www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2022/12/08/stepping-off-a-sinking-boat, and Vamoose’s report at www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2022/12/07/detour-to-bermuda-for-rescue. For more on Ryan Finn’s Route d’Or voyage, listen to our interview with him on Good Jibes.