News Around the World
In January we lost the brilliant Jerry Milgram, Emeritus Professor of Engineering at MIT and a pioneer of modern fluid mechanics. Milgram’s name was closely attached to some of the most successful as well as some of the most unusual yachts of the last century including the 1992 America’s Cup winner America3
, the twin-rudder 12 Metre USA of Tom Blackaller and of course IOR super-bandit
Cascade (right). Built for the 1973 SORC, the 38ft cat-rigged ketch rated less than a Half Tonner of the time – the loophole exploited by Milgram allowing the boat’s sail area of 800ft2 to be measured at just 300ft2. Though punished by IOR changes, Cascade still went on to win two races 10 years later at the 1983 SORC… the addition of a Star boat jib now allowing her to conform to new sail regulations. Milgram’s Cascade also prompted the 1976 cat-rigged Mini Tonner L’Effraie (left) – which waltzed off with that year’s Mini Ton Cup
became public, in August 2021, it quickly became clear that, borrowing from Shakespeare, ‘the course of true love’ was doomed never to ‘run smooth’. Despite presenting himself as a suitor promis- ing a handsome dowry, Dunphy’s opening gambit was hardly likely to set Emirates Team New Zealand’s heart aflutter when it came with the demand that Dalton quit the team he’s led since 2004. Even Dalton’s closest admirers recognise that his nature is
combative. His world is black and white. You are for him or against him, and the line between the two can blur very quickly. He does not forgive and forget. Despite that unpromising start and after Dunphy grudgingly
withdrew the Dalton condition, the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron and other parties urged the entrepreneur to meet ETNZ. The team itself repeatedly invited Dunphy to sit down and parlay. However, apart from a single phonecall with Dalton, he resisted
any formal talks and declined to present any detailed or documented proposal. Instead, he trailed his coat in the public domain, launching a Kiwi Home Defence website and commissioning the services of a Wellington-based lobbyist, Saunders Unsworth, which describes itself as ‘New Zealand’s leading government relations and public policy firm’. A number of full-page advertisements promoting Dunphy’s cause subsequently appeared in major newspapers and he gave several interviews to news outlets and national TV. He also found a strong advocate in Dr Jim Farmer QC, a successful
barrister specialising in corporate and commercial law, who has acted professionally on behalf of Dunphy’s oil business. Farmer is a member of the RNZYS and has campaigned a string of yachts called Georgia in events including the Admiral’s Cup, Kenwood Cup and Southern Cross Cup. He served as a director of Team New Zealand from 2004 to 2013. Farmer writes occasional blogs on his website and in that forum has argued strongly that ETNZ and the RNZYS owe a moral obligation to the New Zealand taxpayers to conduct the 2024 America’s Cup defence in Auckland. Much less public than his single phone conversation with Dalton
26 SEAHORSE
– and even less likely to cement relations –was another phonecall, this one between Dunphy and a member of the New York Yacht Club. The substance of the call was allegedly about filing action in the New York Supreme Court to unseat the Royal Yacht Squadron as Challenger of Record and install the NYYC in its place. (Presum- ably the idea was that this would break the mutual consent arrangement allowing ETNZ to explore offshore options and force a home-waters defence.) This followed on the heels of an email along similar lines sent
by Auckland lawyer and America’s Cup specialist Hamish Ross to the NYYC Commodore with the express intent to ‘disrupt the venue selection’. In the email Ross said he was ‘assisting a group of prominent New Zealanders seeking to keep the next America’s Cup event in Auckland’. Dunphy later denied Ross was acting on his behalf. Wanting no part of it, NYYC alerted ETNZ about the approaches. Furious, Dalton decried Dunphy’s ‘underhanded and deceitful attempts to undermine the RNZYS, ETNZ and Royal Yacht Squadron with his despicable actions’. By the time the Covid-delayed RNZYS AGM took place in
December much of this had already played out in the media. Posi- tions were so entrenched that chances of a rapprochement appeared unlikely. Nevertheless, Farmer, Dalton and Dunphy were invited to outline their positions. Opening proceedings, RNZYS Commodore Aaron Young restated
the club’s position that its 25-year partnership with Team New Zealand was predicated on a mutual arrangement whereby the team was left to lead, fund and deliver an America’s Cup campaign with the club indemnified against any liability, financial or otherwise. ‘We are a yacht club and now, more than ever, the America’s Cup is a commercial and professional undertaking well beyond a yacht club’s everyday activities.’ On the venue issue the club preference was for AC37 to be in Auckland. But to avoid compromising its viability ETNZ had to be allowed to consider other venues. Farmer called for a mediator to work with Dalton and Dunphy,
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