Paul Meilhat, 3rd in the Vendée Globe aboard SMA, was also hit by the damage. A stroke of bad luck for this rookie with winning potential, who was above all looking to finish in the top ten. He contacted his team to report a problem with the keel actuator on Tuesday 20th December 2016 at 1515 hours UTC.
The jack was cracked over 40 centimetres and caused the keel to swing to leeward of the boat. Paul is setting up the system to try to get the keel back in line. To carry out this operation, he has felled the keel and is heading north.
It was in the early afternoon that he noticed a suspicious noise and was therefore found his keel well. He then realized that the hydraulic system oil had flooded the jack compartment. He first suspected that a hydraulic hose had ruptured, and then noticed a 40-centimetre crack in the jack itself.
SMA is currently in the Pacific Ocean, 2,000 miles east of New Zealand. This evening, at 2300 hours, the skipper managed to stabilise his keel thanks to a safety system. He was able to contact his shore crew on the phone to discuss his damage.
" I'd been reaching for two days, under D2, in around twenty knots of wind when I heard a huge bang. There was a little bit of sea, but I was OK anyway. I soon realised that the keel was going downwind. I fired straight away and noticed that the oil from the hydraulic system had spilled under the jack. I thought it was a broken fitting. I looked for the failure. A coupling was loose, but when I put the oil back in, it was leaking all over the place. This afternoon, downwind, I managed to secure the keel in the axis with a safety system. The entire hydraulic system of the jack is inoperative, so the keel can move 45 degrees from one side to the other if it is not kept in the axis. But this creates enormous stresses and if there is sea, there can be play. I'm trying to head north-west to get out of the strong wind zone. I'm having a bit of a hard time realising what's happening to me. I'm taking refuge in work, I don't want to think about it. My priority is to preserve the boat..."
