Another Night of Squall Dodging
It was another night of squall dodging for many ARC Yachts. Most yachts seamed to take some comfort from the fact that there were plenty of other ARC yachts to talk to on both VHF and SSB. Most swapped weather information and discussed routing options as well as describing local conditions across the fleet. Those able to monitor the large weather systems on Radar attempted to describe what they could see to other yachts in the fleet. There was a true feeling of togetherness and friendship – the true spirit of the ARC had fully emerged and brought all ARC yachts reassuringly closer together. An indication as to the scale of the problems was captured by the attached photo. The red on the screen indicates severe heavy storms with winds up to 50kts surrounding the boat (boat's position at the centre of the screen) – just one of the many weather systems encountered last night and all this morning.
Having said this the Crew of ASOLARE are feeling quite smug this morning because of our talented Skipper and his ability to observe the weather and understand how the system is developing (in addition to his extensive sailing experience it also had something to do with his other passion for Gliding around these sorts of clouds looking for lift and excitement etc). Anyway – the Skipper cleverly navigated and weaved ASOLARE through the array of squalls and weather systems all night to ensure our safety and comfort. We even made it through the weather system contained in the attached photo relatively calmly, happy and with no boat damage! So now, labelled a 'Hero', he is sleeping soundly in the aft cabin and we the crew have turned our full attention to achieving some cleaning and husbandry chores to keep skipper happy.
At 1130UTC the ARC Radio network once again sparked in to life with a Fleet Wide Broadcast relaying a MAYDAY on behalf of Yacht SPAM. A network of VHF relay broadcasts quickly passed through the fleet alerting the yachts closest to the distressed Yacht. This was followed up at 1155 UTC when ASOLARE took advantage of the daily 1155-1200 listening watch on SSB ARC 4C and broadcast the request for assistance message from Cowes - the SSB proving to be a good way of dealing with this sort of eventuality. Yacht BLUE SPIRIT was most suitably located and took control of relaying all messages and managing the response from all offers of assistance. A few hours later it was reported that all 3 crew had been transferred from their Life Raft to the safety of another Yacht again demonstrating the major advantages of sailing as part of a large organised fleet of Yachts with a common communication network.
After a serious day of sailing we now concern ourselves with what food we have left and which vegetables are going to make it to St Lucia.
White cabbage does indeed last well – not least because none of the crew wants to eat it rather than its longevity properties. Tonight will be Spaghetti Bolognaise and Garlic Bread but no cabbage! All the Bananas ripened on the same day. J
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