Weekend Update–The Perils of Cheyenne: It was a bad, bad 48 hours for the record-chasing crew of the 125-foot catamaran. On Saturday, as they closed toward Cape Horn, the mainsail started ripping the mast track off the mast in rough water. The crew got the huge sail down before it unzipped the entire track from the mast, which would have been instant end of game. But they were left with a damaged track which prevented them from hoisting the mainsail beyond the second reef. Plan A was to make do until after Cape Horn and then anchor in a calm spot at the Falklands and send people up the rig to dig out the damaged track and replace it with working track from very low on the mast. All the while, Cheyenne would be sailing slow and bleeding miles from her 2000 mile lead on Orange 2002, and giving miles to Geronimo, who is still chasing hard. The record hopes of the crew, so high as they overcame every obstacle to build a big lead, would be dwindling minute by minute. In other words, sitting around until after Cape Horn was sheer torture, so much so that the crew decided that going up the 150-foot mast in the depths of the Southern Ocean as it whipped through the air, was–somehow–doable. So Plan B kicked into action. Here’s Steve Fossett’s report:
“I can’t believe these guys fixed the mast. With a “Do it now” attitude, the Cheyenne crew mobilized on Sunday morning to make the necessary repairs. As reported earlier, a section of mainsail track on the mast ripped off early Saturday morning. The initial repair plan was to anchor in a protected bay in the Falkland Islands to attempt the repairs. The suspense of not knowing if it was repairable was too great – and the crew attacked the problem at sea 3 days from Cape Horn.
Justin Slattery and Dave Scully were up the mast for over 6 hours during the day. The first challenge was to remove the 13 screws which had sheared off. This required drilling and use of Easy Out tools. Then a similar section was removed from the Third Reef location and fitted to the more important First Reef point. All this while suspended from the Main Halyard of the swinging mast. Meanwhile Mike Beasley fabricated replacement Third Reef track out of damaged and miscellaneous spares. Mike and Damian Foxall went up the mast to install the replacement.
Without a successful fix, Cheyenne was limited to raising the mainsail only to the Second Reef, a restriction which would have made it impossible to sail fast enough to break the record of Orange. Sure, we lost a lot of time on this whole episode, but now we are again in the hunt for the record.”
Cheyenne lost about 200 miles of their lead on Orange 2002 (chart here). But their next major worry is getting around Cape Horn safely in a couple of days….and then surviving the 7,000 mile run up the Atlantic. Whether they break the record or not, this has been a heroic effort…
Southern Ocean Surfing: “Sh*t…I wonder what’s going to break next?”
(Photo: Nick Leggatt)
The Earthist Chronicles 