Whilst sailing on port tack in a 20 knot NE'ly wind, Tanguy de Lamotte informed his team on Saturday 12th November at 16h15 (French time) of damage to the masthead of Initiatives-Coeur. "I'm not sure how or why the masthead broke."
He managed to bring everything back (sheaves, hooks, halyards) without damaging the rest of the mast too much. From now on, the skipper of Initiatives-Coeur will be heading for Cape Verde - 150 miles from the coast. "Now that I've managed to get a headsail on, I'm going to go to Cape Verde quietly (editor's note: the incident happened about 150 miles north of the islands), I'm going to try and get rid of the piece of sail that's in the keel and see what I can do to repair it."
Stopping after only 6 days of racing is difficult for Tanguy de Lamotte as he sails to gain clicks to be able to operate on children, suffering from heart malformations, through the association Mécénat Chirurgie Cardiaque.
As he has proven on his previous races, he will do his utmost to repair and continue. In fact, he declared "It's all right to rack your brains!"
Before the accident, Initiatives-Coeur was in 10th position ahead of Jean le Cam and Jean Pierre Dick. News to follow...
He is currently heading towards the port of Mindelo (Sao Vicente Island) at low speed, which he hopes to reach before next night. He wishes to anchor in a bay for repairs.
"J' had been sailing "normally" for 24 hours under Code 0 and full mainsail: suddenly, the masthead gave way. I can't find any mechanical explanations since I recovered the part to try and understand. I had to lower the mainsail completely and the headsail went into the water and trawled. As she was pulling hard on the mast, I had to free her but she got caught in the keel sail. I dragged her and so I moved forward slowly: I unfurled another headsail at the reefing and went to retrieve the masthead, which was in the air, suspended by the halyard. So I've got the small section broken in my hands with the electronic aerials, the VHF antenna... All the elements are there: it's the carbon part of the tube which has exploded.
I'm heading to St. Vincent's on D-2. I couldn't dive to free the keel because there's too much sea, so I have to go to an anchorage. I'm 150 miles from Cape Verde and there's a bay in Mindelo where I can stop: I could extract the sail from the keel and climb up the mast to carry out repairs. I could then hoist the mainsail again, even if I'd have to take a reef all the time and I wouldn't be able to use the headsails (Code 0, big spinnaker, big gennaker). I could sail, but with less sail.
I wouldn't take any risks and I have to assess all this first before I leave. I don't know Mindelo but I have a person from my team who has already stopped there during a race: he told me that there was a well protected bay with anchorages and even buoys. I'm making about seven knots and I'm trying to get there before next night: I wouldn't take any risks as I have to arrive by day to do the manoeuvre."
