Yorkshire crew members forced to abandon stricken race yacht

Alexandra Wood

A YACHT competing in a round-the-world race remained stranded last night after it struck a reef and forced its crew – including two from Yorkshire – to abandon ship in stormy seas.

The 16-strong crew from the Irish entry Cork, including 43-year-old Sarah Bell from Ripon and Keith Hale, 50, from West Yorkshire – had to take to liferafts after the ship was holed near the island of Gosong Mampango in the Java Sea.

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Another skipper described the weather as “awful”, with force 11 winds.

After landing on the island, the British, Irish, Australian and Chinese crew braved the seas to paddle out to two sister yachts, California and Team Finland, who were only a few miles away and arrived as daylight broke.

Yesterday Clipper organisers were assessing the damage with the help of video footage relayed back to the UK of the stricken yacht, which may now be out of the race for the next two stages. At the time of the accident, 4.10am local time, she was around 200 nautical miles north east of Jakarta.

Cork crew member Sean Coote said it had been an “unreal” experience. He said: “I'm feeling a bit other worldly at the moment on board California as a guest rather than a crew member.

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“After our evacuation and on reaching the island it was unreal to look back and see Cork on her side with waves breaking over the port beam.

“We are grateful to have escaped with no major injuries and proud to have rallied together as team and survived a harrowing ordeal and test of our resilience.”

Another competitor, Jan Ridd, skipper of Cape Breton Island, said: “We are all so glad to hear that everyone on board Cork is safe and that no one was hurt. We cannot imagine how terrifying it must have been as the weather was awful last night and at one point, we experienced wind speeds of 56 knots.”

Cork, skippered by Richie Fearon, 29, from Derry, Northern Ireland, has already had an eventful journey. She strayed off course along with local entry Hull & Humber on the first leg, last September. Leaving Cape Town in November, she had a second more serious mishap – “T-boning” Hull & Humber on the start line and causing her a nine-day delay for repairs.

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Ms Bell, a horticulturalist from Ripon, joined Cork yacht in Western Australia over Christmas and was due to complete two legs of the race to Qingdao in China and then San Francisco in the US. On her application form she stated: “I have a desire to leave my comfort zone…I expect my adventure to be arduous and at times uncompromising. Life is too short – do it or regret it!”

California is now making her way towards Singapore with eight of the Cork team on board. The remaining eight crew members, including skipper Richie Fearon, are on Team Finland yacht which continues to monitor the situation. She has been joined by Qingdao and Edinburgh Inspiring Capital, who have crew on board who can assess the damage.

Falmouth coastguard raised the alarm with international rescue services after being contacted by Team Finland at around 8pm UK time on Wednesday night.

A spokeswoman for Falmouth Coastguard said: “The crew had a lucky escape.”