Hydroptere is out. According to the website, last night the mega-foiler hit a UFO (Unidentified Floating Object) and Alain Thebault has been forced to abandon his east-west transatlantic record attempt. At least that’s what happened if my minimal understanding of French is correct (I hope it doesn’t really say “last night all the crew enjoyed a large roast chicken for dinner”). It’s a shame, because they were sailing well. But I can’t say it’s a surprise. Just think of the forces on the foils and struts when a wave or something hard smacks into them at 30-plus knots. You have to wonder whether they can be beefy enough to survive an ocean crossing yet light enough to keep Hydroptere flying (take it from here all you structural engineers out there).
[Update]: Here’s the summary from the website.
Departed from Cadiz on Tuesday morning for the Atlantic crossing, Alain Thébault and his crew are forced to give up after having struck an unidentified floating object yesterday evening, a little earlier before 8.00p.m. The brutal shock occurred while the multihull was progressing at 20-25 knots under the high Grand’Voile et the gennaker at 50 miles from Lanzarote. The crew deplores an impact of the port side foil, which caused a strong torsion in the connection arm. An difficult unfortunate event for the Hydroptère that was on the way to succeed its first Atlantic crossing. Alain Thébault and his team-mates called at Lanzarote and will quickly decide if they repair there or come back to France.
Account of the shock by Alain Thébault:
“ After a careful departure from Cadiz and a day on the sea in a light wind varying from 10 to 15 knots, the Hydroptère began lengthening the tread between 20 and 25 knots of speed under the the high Grand’Voile, gennaker and fore-staysail. The sea was then formed with 2 to 2,5 meters of hollow. We are positioned at 50 miles North from Lanzarote in the Canary Islands. Suddenly we felt a violent schock! Projected against the partition while we were asleep, Jean-Mathieu and I joined Jacques, François and Pollux on the deck. We could see the impact of the Foil and its consequences of the arm. Fortunately, these elements, built by Airbus Nantes, did not suffer that much damage. Only an aluminium vein and the torsion box set at the end of the arm are to be replaced”.
In the meantime, Thomas Coville and Sodebo are almost a 1000 miles into their solo run at Francis Joyon’s Route Of Discovery record, with just over 3000 to go. Coville is pretty much hanging onto Joyon’s pace, which is a good thing because Joyon had a pretty slow finish.
Joyon will be interested to see how it all turns out (poor guy can never rest; there’s always someone stealing his records). But he’ll have to keep track by satphone, because Joyon just set out early this morning on from New York in a bid to nail the west/east transatlantic record which has been held for a long, long time (since 1994) by Laurent Bourgnon and Primagaz. This is one of the Big Three (the other two being the solo RTW and 24-hour), and Joyon is hoping for a shot at the solo 24-hour (also held by Bourgnon and set on his 1994 crossing). The numbers Joyon is shooting for: 7 days, 2 hours, 24 minutes, and 540 miles. You can follow M. Joyon’s position and track here. I’m pulling for him because Bourgnon has held the record long enough. Plus, I love Joyon for his stolid, Old School approach to sailing and he’s going to need a new record if Coville gets lucky with the weather. The only question is whether he’ll be able to hang onto it. Ellen will be after this record in the fall, and Coville no doubt will take a crack at it when he heads back across the Atlantic. Solo record setting: it’s where all the action is these days…
“The chicken is almost ready, Alain. And you’re not going to believe what that idiot at Wetass Chronicles is reporting…”
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