one australia yacht salvage

America’s Cup: Sinking of One Australia

Published on March 5th, 2019 by Editor -->

The dramatic moments on the 5th of March 1995, when during round four in the round robin stage of the America’s Cup challenger series, and in a match race between One Australia and Team New Zealand, the Australian boat split and sunk within two minutes off San Diego, CA.

This was an unprecedented event, and while it occurred when the internet was new, significant commentary now exists online. Alongside this YouTube video is a post by King Cliff which seeks to offer closure to the speculation on how such a complete failure could happen:

I built this boat. Yes, the primary winch failed and they transferred the load to I think the running back stay winch. I’m not a sailor, just a boat builder. Either way, it’s like trying to break a stick with your hands close together and then moving them further apart. The boat wasn’t designed to take the load applied at such a distance.

Plus, these boats weren’t designed to be in conditions like this (18-20 knots). They are flat water boats. The race should have been called off. If it was flat it probably wouldn’t have broken even with the winch failure.

A design flaw? In a way yes and no. It only had two bulk heads. Mast bulkhead and a keel bulkhead and both were mealy ring frames and not full bulkheads. But that wasn’t the true problem IMO. The boat was as hollow as a drum. It sure was cutting edge but it had no longitudinal strength. No beams running fore and aft to stop it breaking in half.

I brought this up three times but was told I wasn’t being paid to think. All I wanted to do was put two short longitudinal beams running maybe a few meters fore and aft of the keel box. But no. Weight was the key factor and the order of the day. I think if they were in it may not have broken. It certainly wasn’t too thin a carbon layup.

Why did it go down so fast? The hull and deck finished weighed only 1.1 tonnes. Incredibly light for an 80 foot maxi. The mast was 135 feet long and the single longest carbon structure ever produced. The mast had 40 tonnes of load pulling down on the mast bulkhead. But the cause of it sinking so fast was the foil and bulb attached below had over 17 tonnes of metal combined.

The foil was solid stainless steel weighing 5 tonnes alone attached to a 12 tonne lead bulb below it with small stainless steel wings off of it. So a 1 tonne broken cork being pulled down by 17 tonnes of steel and lead. Down she went!

It certainly wasn’t badly built. It was a masterpiece of construction built to incredibly high standards. NASA standards. In fact NASA took interest in what we were doing as it was built to the same layup as the space shuttle and we were treading new ground and finding breaking points with new technology.

Why did the three fellas stay on the front for so long? Because there was confusion as to if someone was still down below. You can see one guy leaning down shouting through the forward hatch. Inside was full of sails and nothing else. Up to two people are down there at any one time feeding sails up through the hatches or dragging them back down below. Throw in a few hundred tonnes of water and a recipe for disaster for anyone below. Once they were somewhat sure no one was below, they jumped off. They had no choice anyway.

But the key point to make is that the Kiwi boat had the boat speed on us from the start. Even if nothing went wrong they were going to beat us hands down.

Tags: America's Cup , One Australia , tragedy

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DOWN UNDER IN THE WORST DISASTER IN CUP HISTORY, AN AUSTRALIAN BOAT BROKE UP IN HEAVY SEAS AND ALMOST IMMEDIATELY SANK

• Author: E.M. Swift

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ORIGINAL LAYOUT

A lot of people were surprised that the boats were on the water Sunday afternoon at the America's Cup trials. It was a rainy, blustery day in San Diego, with winds gusting to 22 knots. The seas off Point Loma were confused, if not especially high, topping out at about five feet. Several of the racing syndicates, wary of risking their multimillion-dollar International America's Cup Class yachts, which are as fast and fragile as thoroughbreds, had radioed the race committee to recommend postponement. Team New Zealand had called. So had France3 and Nippon Challenge. And so had oneAustralia, the syndicate headed by John Bertrand, a native of Melbourne who in 1983 became the only non-American to skipper an America's Cup winner.

Bertrand, whose 75-foot, $3 million boat had been launched only three weeks earlier, checked in, along with two other syndicates, barely a half hour before the scheduled start of the day's racing and told the race committee he thought the seas were unsafe. But race director Pat Healy, noting that the winds were forecast to gust no higher than 18 knots and were then blowing at only 12 to 14 knots, rejected all appeals. Before the regatta, the challenger syndicates had recommended that no race be started if the winds were 20 knots or more, and they were well below that limit as the 1 p.m. race start approached. Healy declared that Day 4 of Round 4 of the challenger selection series would go ahead as scheduled.

The featured race pitted the top two challenger boats, Team New Zealand's Black Magic 2 and oneAustralia 95. The so-called black beast of New Zealand was undefeated on the water, but one of its 24 victories had been reversed under protest. Bertrand's new, light-green oneAustralia 95, having been launched at the start of Round 3, was 7-1 and considered a potential America's Cup winner. Its lone loss was to Black Magic 2 in a match in which the boats were never more than six lengths apart. Both had already clinched a spot in the semifinal round.

On Sunday, Black Magic 2 started well and led by 15 seconds at the first mark. It was 21 seconds ahead when the boats made the second mark and turned back upwind. The breeze had picked up and was blowing some 20 knots. Halfway up that third leg, 45 minutes into the race, Bertrand, steering his boat through the heavy swells, heard a sound ``almost like a cannon going off,'' he would say later. The honeycombed carbon-fiber hull of oneAustralia 95 had hit a wave or a series of waves, and cracked dead in the middle, a few yards behind the mast.

At first no one was sure what had happened. One member of the crew, packing away a sail below deck, assumed that the mast had snapped. ``Then the boat appeared to fold like a sheet of cardboard,'' Bertrand would recall. ``And there was this sickening sound of the boat breaking apart. There was a tearing sound, almost like a zipper. Rod Davis, the helmsman, said, `I think we're going to sink.' He looked to Iain Murray, who was one of the designers of the boat, to confirm. Murray said, `Yes, we're going to sink.' ''

They were all very calm and collected. Bertrand told his crew to get their boots off. None of the sailors would have time to put on a life jacket before abandoning ship. Half the crew went to the bow, half to the stern, as the boat began buckling in the middle. The first men jumped into the roiling sea a minute and 10 seconds after the hull split and swam to one of several nearby support boats. A couple of crew members waited on the bow for another minute or so -- almost too long. Once the hull submerged, the 16-ton lead bulb attached to the keel dragged oneAustralia 95 to the bottom with frightening velocity. Twenty-one seconds after the last man leaped off and swam for his life and less than 2 1/2 minutes from the moment the boat cracked, the top of oneAustralia 95's 110-foot mast disappeared beneath the slate-gray sea. The yacht eventually settled on the bottom, 500 feet below.

No one, fortunately, was injured. Black Magic 2 abandoned the race to help with the rescue effort, and within a few minutes all 17 men who had been on board oneAustralia 95 were safe.

Meanwhile, out on the other race courses, all sorts of debilitating -- if less catastrophic -- breakdowns were occurring. France3 was dismasted nearing the final mark against Rioja de Espana. On the defender's course, Team Dennis Conner's Stars & Stripes broke a batten (one of the carbon-fiber strips that help give the sail its shape). Then it broke a batten car (the titanium joint that connects a batten to the mast). At the starting gun, the bottom part of its mainsail separated from the mast. Finally the Conner team limped along with only its headsail hoisted, a half hour behind America's Mighty Mary, which had cracked a forward ring frame (the lateral structural reinforcements to the hull) and broken its main halyard and would be forced to complete the race under headsail alone.

Bertrand refused to comment when asked if the race committee was wrong in allowing the boats to race in the questionable conditions. But he clearly was upset. France3 supported the committee's decision despite its earlier request for a postponement. ``If the defenders race, the challengers must race,'' said French skipper Marc Pajot.

Harold Cudmore, the French technical adviser, who served in that capacity for America in its successful 1992 Cup campaign, agreed: ``The race committee did the right thing. But the question from an engineering point of view is, Did [oneAustralia] build the boat too light? You take a risk, you have to pay the penalties.''

A more expensive and dramatic penalty could hardly be imagined. The sinking of oneAustralia 95 is considered the worst disaster in America's Cup history. The boat was not a radical design but, rather, a refinement of its predecessors. Seemingly neither more nor less dangerous than most of the other boats in this most delicate of fleets, the hull design of oneAustralia 95 represented, in the end, a search for speed that turned out to be the final, reckless breath of air into a balloon already fully distended. The envelope was pushed, and this time it tore apart.

As of Monday the Australians were coordinating plans with the U.S. Navy to conduct a salvage operation. Bertrand hopes that oneAustralia 95's mast, sails and hardware might be saved and still be of use as his syndicate continues its now highly improbable quest. Bertrand will race his first boat, oneAustralia 94, for the remainder of the trials. In the opening two rounds that boat's record was 8-4.

``[OneAustralia 95] represented about 20,000 man-hours of work, and it was quite sickening to see it disappear so quickly,'' Bertrand said. ``But as I said to the boys, we'll live to fight another day.''

That's one thing to be thankful for. Here's praying it's not a blustery day.

COLOR PHOTO:JACK SMITH/AP In less than three minutes, the yacht cracked amidships and plunged out of sight as Bertrand (opposite, below) and his crew jumped off and swam to rescuers. [OneAustralia 95 and its crew]COLOR PHOTO:DAVID MCNEW/REUTER [see caption above--headshot of John Bertrand]COLOR PHOTO:ACTV/PPL MEDIALINK [see caption above--close-up of crack in hull of OneAustralia 95]COLOR PHOTO:AP/ACTV [see caption above--OneAustralia 95 sinking as rescuers pull its crew out of the water]TWO COLOR PHOTOS:ACTV/REUTER [see caption above--two shots of OneAustralia 95 sinking as rescuers pull its crew out of the water]COLOR PHOTO:AP/ACTV [see caption above--crew of OneAustralia 95 aboard rescue boat]

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One Australia: the Titanic of yacht racing

• Thread starter Koeketiene
• Start date 1 Feb 2014

Well-known member

Lord High Commander of Upper Broughton and Gunthor

I missed the iceberg....  

J Neeves said: I vaguely recall, when it was still a jingoistic thing, that Australia did win the America's Cup. You might mock? Click to expand...

Did they ever salvage the yacht. Sails alone must cost a fortune? I google and came up with 500' of water was considered prohibitive!!  

J Neeves said: I vaguely recall, when it was still a jingoistic thing, that Australia did win the America's Cup. You might mock? Go for it Click to expand...

Sailfree said: Did they ever salvage the yacht. Sails alone must cost a fortune? Click to expand...

This is what happens if one dosen't have enough duck tape in the toolkit.  

Other threads that may be of interest

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Historical Video : Sinking of the One Australia in America’s Cup 17 years ago

Dramatic moments in the regatta between One Australia and Team New Zealand, of the Challenger America’s Cup series, the Australian boat splits and sinks after two minutes off San Diego, on March 5, 1995.

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Top Australian yacht salvaged

• April 2, 2009

A top racing yacht has been salvaged and its three crew rescued off the Queensland coast

One of Australia’s top racing yachts has been salvaged, and her skipper and crew saved, in a rescue operation off the south Queensland coast.

Dual Sydney to Hobart handicap winner Ausmaid (pictured) rolled and was dismasted this morning (2 April) after being hit by a massive wave about eight nautical miles northeast of Noosa Heads. Owner Bruce Absolon said it was only the professionalism of the crew that averted a major disaster. The boat was sailing in very light conditions with no forecast of heavy weather when everything suddenly changed.

“Within 10 minutes they were in three to four metre seas,” explained Absolon. “They dropped all the sails, lashed the mainsail to the deck and were in the process of lashing the boom to the deck when one rogue wave reared up. According to the skipper it was between eight to 10 metres and breaking.”

Ausmaid did a full 360-degree roll under water before surfacing – without the skipper.

“The skipper was washed overboard but he was still attached to the boat by his safety harness, and the other two crew members pulled him back on board. It’s due solely to the sheer professionalism and experience of the crew that there hasn’t been a serious injury – or worse,” added Absolon.

The skipper was winched to safety by a rescue helicopter and taken to Nambour Hospital with suspected back injuries. Apparently he escaped with some severe bruising, and was due to be released from hospital on tonight.

After his rescue the weather worsened and the helicopters were grounded. A coast guard boat was sent to find the yacht but by then Ausmaid had drifted several kilometres in the strong current.

When it was eventually located – much closer to shore – it was being pushed in further by the big seas. Despite the swell running up to five metres, the coast guard got a line on the racer and started towing her in to Noosa. Once a break in the weather came, the two crewmen were winched into a helicopter and flown to safety.

Mr Absolon said the boat would be anchored at Laguna Bay off Noosa overnight and he would assess the damage after it was towed into Mooloolaba in the next day or two.

“The mast is in three pieces, there appears to be damage to the steering, but the hull seems to be intact,” he said.

Salvaging stranded Sydney to Hobart yacht Huntress could be too big a job, experts warn

By Monte Bovill

Topic: Sailing

Sydney to Hobart yacht race competitor Huntress ashore on Christmas Beach. ( Twitter: Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania )

On remote Christmas Beach on Tasmania's truwana/Cape Barren Island, you would rarely see any evidence of human life.

Key points:

• Huntress washed ashore on Christmas Beach after its rudder broke off on the third day of the Sydney to Hobart race
• The crew was rescued and the yacht cut loose, with the owners questioning why it was not retrieved while at sea
• A salvage expert says it will take a lot of work to get the yacht off the beach in one piece

The waves that crash on the pristine white sand would normally bring shells and seaweed.

But a string of dramatic events has meant a much-loved yacht now sits lonely and motionless on the beach.

There are still many unanswered questions in the story of the 12-metre cruiser Huntress.

Its crew made an "extremely difficult and heart-wrenching decision" to abandon it after it lost its rudder during the Sydney to Hobart yacht race.

It was then left to drift for a week before it washed ashore.

Why wasn't Huntress rescued at sea?

Passengers on a cruise ship have told the ABC they spotted the yacht as they were travelling from New Zealand to Melbourne on January 2.

A ghostly Huntress appears through fog and bobbing around in the waves.  ( Supplied: Sylvia Hamnett )

The passengers said the cruise ship turned around and headed towards Huntress when there was no response from the yacht in case a rescue or assistance was required. 

Images and videos from onboard the ship show a ghostly Huntress appearing through fog and bobbing around in the waves. 

An alert issued by Marine and Safety Tasmania (MAST) said an at-sea salvage attempt was due to take place — but before that could happen, the vessel had gone ashore.

"MAST understands there was contact with a fisherman, but I'm not quite certain about that and why that didn't happen," said MAST's Peter Hopkins.

"Whether or not a rescue or a salvage could have been made earlier, that's one for the salvage company and the insurance to work out."

The Huntress crew ahead of the start of the 2022 Sydney to Hobart race. ( Facebook: huntress888racing )

After being rescued and taken to Flinders Island, the crew said a salvage operation was "already being planned for her safe transfer to mainland Tasmania".

But just days later, in a now-deleted post, the boat's owner said the team were "angry, devastated and at a complete loss as to how the hell it came to this, given she was floating around for a week now with ample opportunity to be towed to safety".

The race tracker showing the location (green line) of Huntress drifting before it beached on Cape Barren Island. ( Supplied: Rolex Sydney to Hobart )

Rod Chamberlain, who owns marine services company Hurricane Marine, said it "seemed strange" the vessel had not been able to be saved while still at sea, suggesting it may have been held up with the yacht's insurer.

"A salvor needs to be appointed by the insurance company," he said.

Huntress ashore on Christmas Beach, on Cape Barren Island. ( Twitter: Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania )

His company offers salvage services in similar incidents and said it was always going to be a tricky situation.

"A yacht without a rudder is one of the most difficult things to tow," he said.

"A yacht with no steering is about as useless a boat as you can get."

What happens now?

Images of the yacht show its mast has broken, but the hull appears to be intact.

But the clock is ticking on the salvage operation, with concerns growing that it could break apart.

Huntress in Queensland, before it sailed south for the start of the Sydney to Hobart race 2022. ( Facebook: huntress888racing )

Mr Hopkins described it as needing a "massive effort" to get it off the beach.

"It may have been easier to pick the boat up when it was in one piece when it was drifting around," he said.

"Now the boat has beached itself, it's going to be a lot bigger operation than just simply putting a tow line on the boat and towing it back to a mooring.

"The biggest threat is the boat filling up with sand and seawater and gradually breaking apart."

Mr Chamberlain agreed.

"Often you have to use excavators to help you in that situation, but that is not an option in this area due to its remoteness," he said.

He said the sooner it was saved, the better.

"The biggest danger with any vessel on a beach is that if the sea gets around it, they soon start to break up," he said.

"Often it can be too late, and you end up with a clean-up, which becomes messy and more expensive."

What's happening on the island?

Aboriginal sea rangers on the island were the first to report the yacht had washed ashore.

"It's a very important pristine piece of Aboriginal land, and we want the salvage to be successful, safe and quick as possible," said Vica Bayley from the Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania.

"A modern yacht like this, full of fibreglass, plastics, stainless steel and, obviously, diesel fuel, is a completely different kettle of fish and poses a much more significant environmental risk to that part of the island."

A salvage attempt is expected to take place this weekend.

"If the boat does remain in one piece and they can get her off, then there won't be any problems," Mr Hopkins said.

"Let's just hope they do get the boat off in one piece. She's a lovely boat and I can understand the angst the crew and especially the owners are going through at the moment."

The ABC contacted the owner of Huntress and the insurer for comment.

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Beached 24m Azimut undergoes salvage operation in Australia

A 23.7 metre Azimut 78 Flybridge model is being removed from Lammermoor Beach in Yeppoon, Queensland after it washed up on the shore on May 11. The yacht is thought to have foundered as the result of a heavy storm, which removed it from its anchorage. 

According to the local government authorities, the salvage operation will be completed by May 27. Work began on May 24, with photos showing the yacht’s superstructure being removed as part of the operation.

Maritime Safety Queensland stepped in to take legal responsibility of the stricken yacht on May 20, after concerns emerged that the yacht would create environmental issues along the beach and surrounding coastlines.

The vessel’s registration and insurance status is being investigated by local authorities.

“There is no pollution from the vessel, which had little or no fuel or other pollutants onboard when it grounded and sank,” said Brittany Lauga, local MP.

“Pollution booms are on site and ready to be deployed if necessary, but we do not consider there is sufficient risk to the environment to do so at present.”

She added that she and her team had been working closely with Marine Safety Queensland and local government authorities to “minimise pollution, clean up debris and keep the public safe.”

Launched in 1995, the Azimut yacht was built in GRP and offered accommodation for up to 12 guests in four cabins. She was equipped with twin MTU engines. 

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Two rescued from yacht stranded off Australian coast in 90kmph storm

Sailors survive 'horrible' night at sea after yacht loses power and drifts 70 nautical miles in extreme weather conditions, article bookmarked.

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A dramatic rescue operation unfolded off the coast of Australia on Tuesday after two sailors were stranded on a yacht overnight in extreme weather conditions.

The sailors, a 60-year-old man and a 48-year-old woman, were rescued in a multi-agency operation after their 19m yacht, the Spirit of Mateship, starting taking on water due to a mechanical issue.

The rescue operation was initiated at 1pm on Monday after the Spirit of Mateship sent out a distress beacon, and it took several hours for helicopters to locate the vessel. In the meantime, the yacht lost power and communication capabilities, and was battered by strong winds of up to 90kmph.

Ben Flight, duty manager at the Australian Maritime Safety Authority Response Centre, said a helicopter was able to establish radio contact with the yacht and fly above it but was unable to retrieve the passengers due to the challenging conditions.

A subsequent rescue attempt was also abandoned due to rough seas, leaving the sailors on board to endure a "horrible" night at sea, Mr Flight said.

“They were sort of just at the mercy of the elements. They would have been moving around uncomfortably. It would have been particularly windy, noisy, probably quite wet as well.

“I don’t imagine they would have got any rest overnight, so I imagine they’d be quite tired and very relieved to be rescued,” he was quoted as saying by CNN.

The NSW Water Police vessel Nemesis was able to make contact with the sailors at 1am on Tuesday, arriving at the scene at 3am.

However, extreme weather conditions prevented the crew from rescuing them.

Anthony Brazzill of the New South Wales  police described the conditions as "terrible”. The sailors had to jump onto a rescue boat one at a time, with Mr Brazzill praising the experienced mariners who executed the rescue.

"It’s a matter of just basically timing it,” he said. “Get the person to jump, as they’re coming in, get them to jump and catch, doing one at a time, obviously making sure that people have the life jackets on.”

The yacht had drifted 70 nautical miles overnight and the passengers were unable to bring the sails down, Mr Brazzill said.

“The yacht was running away from us as we were chasing it down the coast which obviously made it a challenge.”

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority said an emergency alert from the yacht was received on Monday, and a distress beacon was activated about 150km offshore from Nowra.

The sailors were rescued around 7.25am on Tuesday and were travelling to Sydney on board the Nemesis for medical assessment.

They were fatigued but uninjured and were expected to land at the NSW Police Marine Area Command late Tuesday night.

The Spirit of Mateship has taken part in several Sydney to Hobart races since 2013. The yacht was left in the ocean, with Mr Brazzill stating that their priority is to "save lives, not save boats”.

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