Above:
monohull 75 feet in length. It was built in record time by Brooke Marine in Lowestoft and we were doing sea trials in the North Sea early in May. The boat was shipped to New York and then began the long wait for the right weather conditions. Every day I would study the weather charts hoping for that break in the weather that would promise a relatively smooth crossing. Finally, after weeks of waiting, it came – or at least we thought it was as good as it was going to get. We powered out of New York Harbour in the early morning light with hope in our hearts and fear in our heads.
Light Tower From the Ambrose Light Tower our course took us up the coast to Nantucket Island. Passing just 100 metres off the shore we rounded the island and headed across the dreaded Nantucket Shoals, a huge area of shallows where the depths are constantly changing. This was a gamble and we hoped that we would see the breakers on the shallow bits before we hit them. This route saved us two hours, the vital margin, as it turned out that we broke the record by.
Now were out in the open Atlantic and the fog came down. We spent half the night dodging fi shing boats in the fog for mile after mile but by morning we were at the fi rst refuelling stop off Halifax, Nova Scotia and well on schedule. Our great circle route would then take up well north up to Cape Race on Newfoundland before heading out across the ocean. Now we were entering iceberg alley where the icebergs come sweeping down from the Arctic. Combine the icebergs with the fog and a speed of 50 knots and there was little time for relaxation but we made our next refuelling stop out on the Grand Banks still on schedule. Now with over half the distance gone we could indulge if a slight feeling of confi dence. That was soon to be shattered when the refuelling ship gave us 4 tons of fuel and 8 tons of water instead of full fuel. They apparently fi ll their fuel tanks with water from the bottom as the fuel is taken out of the top. They had facilities for separating it out before use but we did not have that luxury. Even MTU diesels will not run on water and it took us 10 hours to drain the tanks, wash them out and fi ll up again. At this point we had given up hope of a
Virgin Atlantic Challenger
Insert: VAC 11
Nav station Left:
VAC 11 relaunch
cywinter 2011 41
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90