Foncia capsize

We speak to Ellen MacArthur about what happened PLUS Yvan Zedda's photos of the rescue

Shortly after the upturned hull of Foncia had reached Lisbon late this afternoon, we were able to talk to navigator Ellen MacArthur to find out what had happened.

Prior to the incident, Ellen said, it had been going well. "We made the decision to go far west with a little depression that was there. We could have played it one of two ways and it turned not to be too bad. We ended up 20 miles behind the leader, which was fine. We still had a position further to the west which we were pleased with and we were just waiting for the next position."

But then disaster struck. "I was down below," recounted Ellen of the moments prior to sensing the 60ft wide trimaran turning over. "We were sailing downwind under genniker and full main. Everything was fine. It was a great day, we’d been averaging about 22-23 knots and then all of a sudden, we heard a noise and we’d obviously touched something. We were in the cabin while Alain was on the helm and Loik [Gallon] was in the cockpit. Loick put the genniker sheet in the tailer and went straight to the leeward side to see what happened."

On port gybe at the time, the collision had caused the rudder on the starboard hull to kick up. The rudders Foncia has on her floats are transom hung - like a dinghy's - and in the event of either stricking something solid they have a fuse which breaks allowing the rudder to pop up, thereby preventing damage.

Following the collision and with the starboard rudder kicked up the helm became very hard. The boat is then believed to have been picked up by a wave and slewed round, something which Gautier was unable to rectify from the helm. "The boat just wiped out basically," said Ellen. Trimarans when they fall over normally pitchpole - dig in their leeward bow and trip over it. This happens less nowaways because the foil in the float keeps the bow from burying. Ellen says Foncia capsized more over her starboard beam.
Down below the world was turned upside down. "We kind of flew across the cabin as did everything else that was with us but everyone was okay," continued Ellen. "The mast hit quite hard but it is not sandwich, it is monolithic so the mast sank quite quickly. But we did stop at 90degrees and the mast didn’t break, and then the boat went over." Only later did the mast break.

As the boat went over Loik Gallon managed to scramble below. Alain Gautier did not and found himself underwater trapped under the net. Ellen said that the moment the boat went over she scrambled through the escape hatch in the main hull in an attempt to find Gautier. Fortunately the skipper was able to swim out below the aft beam and up to the surface before being hauled back on board.

They were then subject to spending most of the next two days in the upturned hull of the boat, 24 hours waiting for the tug to arrive and another 20 as the trimaran, still inverted, was towed into Lisbon.

"So we found ourselves up to our knees in water for 48 hours with no electrics," recounted Elen. "It was extraordinary to lose everything. Everything goes. We had a few torches but most of it was lost down the hatch including the tool box." Under the pressure of water and the pounding the main hatch proved not to be watertight.

Fortunately for this fully crewed race the boat was fitted with two extra pipecots and the crew were able to sleep on the underside of those to stay out of the water.

The tug boat arrived with a diver who braved 3m seas to cut away the rig. "It was really rough. He was a very brave man," Ellen said of the diver.

On the boat when it was being towed. It was too rough to get on the tug. Even the diver when he ran out of air didn’t bother going back to the tug.

Ellen says she will stay with the boat to help right it tomorrow and sort out the mess before she returns to the UK.

Below: Foncia 's kick up rudder system. She is no longer fitted with a T foil on her port rudder, so this was not a contributing factor.