“I didn't want to abandon the boat,” said sailor Guirec Soudée. Jean-Marie Liot/Alea
A very high-risk operation that could have ended in tragedy.
Off Cape Horn, Guirec Soudée, a Vendée Globe rookie, had to dive into five-degree water to save his drifting boat. An operation that was as perilous as it was upsetting, even for this seasoned adventurer who has seen it all.
Wednesday had started perfectly for this young dad who, before the prestigious round-the-world sailing race, made a name for himself thanks to his many maritime voyages with only Monique, a red hen, as his companion, including a wintering on the Greenland ice floe.
In the early morning, after rounding the Horn, he took advantage of the mild conditions to climb his mast and happily film the southernmost rock on the American continent, proud to have finished crossing the Pacific. “This moment is always special for us. You tell yourself that you're done with the Great South and that you're finally going to be able to breathe”, he says.
But a breakdown spoils this rare moment of contemplation in an already trying round the world voyage. Anticipating heavy weather to come, the navigator must reduce the sails and decides to replace his “Code O”, the immense 200 square meter headsail. During the maneuver, the halyard – the rope that holds the sail at the top of the mast – gives way due to excess tension and the mishaps follow one after the other.
Action, reaction
The sail falls into the water and – one of the worst possible scenarios – will wrap itself in the keel under the boat. By trying to free another rope holding the canvas, the sailor makes the situation worse.
A parachute in the water
“The boat is crabbing sideways”, says Guirec Soudée. “I have a 200 square meter trawl moored to my keel.” The 18 meter sailboat is no longer maneuverable, drifting with what he describes as “a parachute in the water”, while the coast is only about thirty miles (about fifty kilometers) away, and the wind is starting to pick up.
200% Deposit Bonus up to €3,000 180% First Deposit Bonus up to $20,000“In my head, I quickly made this observation: I'm drifting, I'm in the Deep South, the water is super cold and the conditions are going to deteriorate soon. It really wasn't fun”, fumes Guirec Soudée, who sees only one solution: put on his diving suit to try to unblock the situation.
“I didn't want to abandon ship. I had to find a solution right away, not ruminate, I had no choice, it was “Action”.” In water at four or five degrees, hood on his head, mask over his eyes and boots on his feet, the sailor dives for the first time, without even tying up for fear of getting stuck by the jumble of submerged sails. For safety, he leaves ropes drifting to catch himself if he were to let go of his boat.
Shaken, but unharmed
“There was only one turn in the keel, but it was not possible to unblock it with human strength alone”, describes the adventurer. He quickly climbs back on board and improvises a rope pulley system that he manages to attach to one end of his sail, and dives a second time. Back in the open air, he changes, “freezing cold”.
But using a winch, he manages, after much effort, to unroll the submerged sail from the keel, and even then to bring it back on board: “It lasted several hours, it's quite physically demanding.”
In the 2020 documentary “From the North Pole to the South Pole”, which recounts his wintering in the Arctic, we could already see the sailor brushing against disaster, with growlers (drifting blocks of ice) threatening to tear off his mooring in the middle of the night and push his boat onto pebbles.
But in the bitter cold this year, the situation at Cape Horn was “particularly hot” for Guirec. “Just talking about it brings tears to my eyes”, he confides. Shaken but unharmed, he resumed his journey, determined. He was in 25th position on Friday, impatient to return to the more pleasant temperatures of the Brazilian coast and, in a few weeks, the arrival at Les Sables-d'Olonne.