Team Adventure breaks port bow and abandons record attempt

Team Adventure's attempt to break the transatlantic west-to-east sailing record ended dramatically today at 5:30 a.m. when the port bow broke away from the hull with a loud bang.

At the time the 110-foot catamaran was 110 miles south of Cape Sable, Nova Scotia, and sailing at 30 knots in dense fog and pre-dawn darkness. After a fast and flawless overnight run from New York, the monster cat was 45 miles ahead of official record.

No one was hurt among the 15-man crew and the boat was not in immediate danger. She was proceeding back to the North American mainland under her own power and was expected to take 24 to 36 hours to reach land.

Sponsored by Monster.com, the big cat was 14 and a half hours into its attempt to break the 11-year-old record for crossing the Atlantic Ocean under sail from west to east.

The existing mark of 6 days, 13 hours, 3 minutes, and 32 seconds was set by French skipper Serge Madec sailing the 75-foot catamaran Jet Services V in June 1990. Madec and his crew averaged 18.42 knots (34.5 kph) for the crossing. Nine other multihulls have tried and failed to break Madec's record in the intervening years.

"This is a sad day for the Monster.com transatlantic challenge," said skipper Cam Lewis in a satellite phone call from his disabled boat. "We had all the elements in place. We were ahead of the routing schedule set by our weather forecasters at Commanders' Weather and looking at near to perfect conditions for the next five days.

"This comes as a big shock and a disappointment. We'll be doing our best to get the boat safely to port, to assess the damage more thoroughly and get a plan together to build a new bow and get the boat sailing again as soon as possible. The transatlantic record will remain one of our main goals."

Lewis said half of his 15-man crew was asleep and the watch on deck was maintaining a non-stop radar vigil in dense fog as Team Adventure sped through the pre-dawn darkness under full sail before a 25-knot southwesterly breeze.

Lewis said the cause of the fracture was unclear. One possibility is that the catamaran hit a submerged object floating just under the surface of the waves.

With the forward crossbeam unsupported on the port side, the forestay went slack and the 15-story high wing mast was in danger of toppling over the side. The forestay is one of three permanent stays that holds the mast erect.

The crew scrambled immediately to get the sails down and stabilize the mast, using the running backstays and halyards and ropes as temporary shrouds to support the mast.

Lewis reported that as they got the situation under control, they winched the broken section of the bow three feet in the air to keep it out of the waves as much as possible. The broken section is still aligned with the remainder of the hull, held in position by the forward crossbeam.

There was no danger of flooding or sinking because watertight bulkheads are positioned every five feet in this area of the hull.

Larry Rosenfeld, the navigator and Lewis' partner in Team Adventure, said the boat was under auxiliary engine power and headed north at 5 knots for Cape Sable, Nova Scotia. He said he wants to keep the wind and waves on the boat's beam and stern to minimize stresses on the damaged hull and rig. He estimated it would take 24 to 36 hours to reach port. Choices include Yarmouth, Maine; Shelburne, Nova Scotia; or Halifax, Nova Scotia.

George Caras, forecaster at the Commanders' Weather, the team's routing service, said prospects had been good for setting a new record when the boat broke. The boat had made a fast departure from New York and was set to sail in strong southwesterly flow for the next 36 hours before it would be overtaken by a cold front that would provide fresh impetus.

Team Adventure is commanded by two skippers. Team Adventure CEO and skipper Lewis, from Lincolnville, Maine, hadbeen joined by his Swiss/French friend and co-skipper Laurent Bourgnon.

The boat is flying the Monster.com colors and displaying Trumpasaurus, Monster.com's signature mascot on its biggest sail, the Monster gennaker. The giant catamaran recently finished third in the Race of the Millennium, a non-stop race around the world.

The nearly 3,000-mile course for the record stretches from the Ambrose Light Tower, to The Lizard Lighthouse, which marks the western end of the English Channel. The direct route takes the boat up the eastern seaboard of the United States, through the dense fogs of the Grand Banks and the gales of the open Atlantic.

Two years ago, Lewis and Bourgnon narrowly missed breaking the record when they sped across the Atlantic on Bourgnon's 60-foot trimaran Foncia Immoblier. They rode several powerful weather systems and sailed faster than Madec for nearly six days before they ran out of wind and were becalmed only 46 miles from the finish.

A prize of 200,000 French francs ($US26,000) and a beautiful trophy has been posted by Roger Caille, former president of the French courier operation Jet Services, for any boat that breaks the record of the boat his company sponsored.

Lewis and Bourgnon are already in the Guinness Book of World Records as holders of the east to west record. In 1994, they raced Foncia, then named Primagaz, from Plymouth, England, to Newport, R.I., in 9 days, 8 hours, 58 minutes. The record still stands. The same year, Bourgnon also set the singlehanded west to east transatlantic record aboard Primagaz, logging a time of 7 days, 2 hours, 34 minutes.

More Information:

• Team Adventure Website