"WATER police braved huge swells and freezing temperatures in the middle of the night to rescue to a skipper from his stricken yacht off the Victorian coast.

POLICE responded to a distress beacon on Thursday night, activated from the yacht that was struggling in five-metre swells off the coast of Wonthaggi.

The Latrobe Valley Air Ambulance found the eight-metre yacht, but were unable to winch the Geelong skipper, who is in his 60s, to safety.
A Williamstown water police crew then battled near freezing temperatures and the huge swell to rescue the yachtie just before midnight.
The yacht remains drifting south, 40 nautical miles off the coast."
Other reports say it is an 8 metre boat.

I just bought and shared a beer with John. His heartfelt thanks to the air rescue helicopter, tanker Captain and water police for a job well done. A testament to the bravery and generosity of seafarers. He appears to be very pleased that he will be able to relay the story to his granddaughter.

Good to hear that story ended well ... sad for his loss of his Yacht though.

cisco said..

frant said..
I just bought and shared a beer with John. His heartfelt thanks to the air rescue helicopter, tanker Captain and water police for a job well done. A testament to the bravery and generosity of seafarers. He appears to be very pleased that he will be able to relay the story to his granddaughter.

I am not one to discourage adventure on yachts and I am glad he has been rescued but I am at a loss to understand why a man in his 60s would be out alone on an 8 metre yacht off Wonthaggi when before he left port the synoptic weather map is showing a fairly high existing pressure gradient with a front coming through backed up by a 1035 hp high.

He is based in Geelong and his yacht is 8 metres long. Why would he ever go through the Pinch Gut???

Concur. We can all get into trouble taking risks at sea, but this was one that was waiting to happen. Glad he made it but he put himself and the rescuers at considerable risk. Having been both a yachtie and rescuer, I reckon he deserves a big rap over the knuckles with a sledge hammer.

@Cisco @Morningbird @spiggie, read between the lines in my post, but don't kick a man when he is down. All he has now are the clothes he was wearing. Thanks Frant

frant said..
@Cisco @Morningbird @spiggie, read between the lines in my post, but don't kick a man when he is down. All he has now are the clothes he was wearing. Thanks Frant

Hi Frant, are you able to fill us in on what the problem was that the epirb was activated, what type of yacht was it etc. They sounded like tough conditions. Glad he is alive & grateful for the efforts of all involved in the rescue.
cheers

frant said..
@Cisco @Morningbird @spiggie, read between the lines in my post, but don't kick a man when he is down. All he has now are the clothes he was wearing. Thanks Frant

Perhaps, 'he was sent these tribulations as a test of.....karma'?........it happened to theselkie.

spiggie said..
Hi frant
why was he out there and on his own ?
Okay fran reading between lines here's my take
He went single handed in bass straight were the swell has been building all week , forcast of NW force 6-8with a swell running SW ,wind against
waves with a confused swell of 3-5 metres,he carried an Eprb,no survival suit ,no life raft ,he is 60 yr old,wind temp about 6 degrees, into busy shipping lane ,from what I heard on the radio the tanker was the radio relay vessel I am guessing his VHF was playing up and he had insufficient water, also he went out in all this in small sail boat
he is embarresed. ,lost his possessions but will have a good story to tell his grandchildren and he probably been hit with a fine

I would have thought as a yachtie who decides to go single handed would have been a bit more safety focused than the rest of us .
Having sailed yachts all my life logged thousands of ocean miles ,also a professional mariner I wouldn't feel confident in sailing single handled perhaps I am too safety focused and know what could go wrong

Yes we have all been caught out when things got rough but this has been forecasted all week .
I can even understand if there were a couple off crew On board

He went out there as a liability ,most likely with insufficient safety gear with the mentality of I'll be right mate !!!
As a passionate yachtsman he gives us yachtsman a bad name
why was he out there ?

i will totally agree with your post spiggie ........... as my "reading between the lines" post , has mysteriously gone .

I think the point has been taken so please let's not have another bun fight here.

Hi Frant I only ask why is because everyone else on board the vessel I work on would like to know why ,also it annoys me when non yachties hang crap on yachties ,I would have liked to defend Bob if I knew the truth .
I admire single handed sailors it something I wish I could have had the guts to do but I am too safety focused .
We were out there , we offered assistant if we had to rescue Bob,no hesitantion I would have volunteered !!! I could have been out there dressed in an immersion suit ,driving the FAST Rescue Craft at Midnight most likely working at 18hr watch ,perhaps rendering first aid who knows what else.
One thing I do know is that If I was involved in the rescue I would have asked him myself.

I will put this to rest
Sail safe

BlueMoon said..

frant said..
@Cisco @Morningbird @spiggie, read between the lines in my post, but don't kick a man when he is down. All he has now are the clothes he was wearing. Thanks Frant

Hi Frant, are you able to fill us in on what the problem was that the epirb was activated, what type of yacht was it etc. They sounded like tough conditions. Glad he is alive & grateful for the efforts of all involved in the rescue.
cheers

Yara said..

frant said..
@spiggie, "why was he out there and on his own ? " I assume that you ask this as a rhetorical question? Any answer that I might offer would, like both yourself and Morningbird be based purely on speculation and conjecture. We simply don't know and speculation is unlikely to add any value to the topic.
What we do know is that he was out there.
Perhaps as a result of the critics voicing their opinions without waiting for the circumstances to unfold the Seabreeze forum has lost any opportunity to learn from this event.
I did my SSSC refresher last time with some of the crew from Skandia and learnt a lot from those who have actually taken to a liferaft and been helo rescued. Similarly, have learnt a lot from first hand account from this incident.
Unfortunately as a result of the attitudes expressed on this forum I am not at liberty to disclose this information.

Sorry Frant, we don't want to upset you or your mate. However, when there is a void, something will always fill it, and in this case it is speculation. With no information this speculation is likely to include foolish observations as well as sage ones. We all want to know what happened, but for the grace of God, etc. Unfortunately innocents like me do not know how to read between the lines....

+1 Yara.

I don't care why he was out there, the fact is he was, he could of been on a non-stop circumnavigation for all we know. But I would still like to know of what events transpired, leading up to setting off the epirb. as a learning lesson. Thanks

Got this off another forum:


My lovely C28 is possibly no more. IO have been rescued by Victoria water police from Bass Straight after 2 days of 60 to 70 knots wind and huge 5 meter plus swells. My boat was in heave too when struck and nock down smashing everything inside the boat. I have activated my EPERB and fix wing aircraft appear inside 1 hr. Also near by container ship come to my location (around 40 miles south of Eastern Port, drifting south). Later on rescue helicopter arrived but unfortunately they cud not winch me out of my boat due to the trochees conditions and the diver in the water was near exhaustion. The container ship also cud not help is it was too dangerous to lunch the boat. Fix aircraft try deploy liferaft, but no help as the wind carry away the drop. They try 3 times and finally run out of the liferafts. My life raft was thorn out and swept away. I have been inform that water rescue police was on the was and will be with me in around 4 hrs time. THis was my longest 4 hrs ever. I has inside the boat pounded by waves blows and drifting fast, south. Finally, the police boat arrived (coordinated with the container ship) and try pick me up from my boat. The container ship provided guard against the waves and wind, which help a little. After some attempts, trying avoid being smashed two boats together i jump from my boat and was able to catch rail on the police boat. All this happen in freezing temperature and midnight pitch black. My life was saved by those man who risked they lives. Later on one of the senior policeman told me that during his entire 8 year work with Victoria Police Water unit, this was the hardest rescue ever. My boat Kryspen was left a drift in the south. Hopefully i will not have to fight my insurance company. Kryspen was my home as well, but in the end i did not become statistic of missing man at sea. During departure from Geelong the weather was mild and first day and night at sea was good, the the apparent conditions arrived. Wind was from the north and i cud not return to closest port (Western Port), as i would have head wind. Heave too was working great on the first day and night, but and the second day the wind overpower my main third reef. I have folded the main and used mini jib with heave too. So that a story so far. I miss my boat. :(

I'm surprised that no one from the Geelong yacht club gave the poor guy some good advise not to set sail in the middle of winter also now the fact we are receiving a constant series of winter low pressure fronts battering the southern parts of OZ.
On this particular weekend he depart there was a current front tracking towards Victorian waters and all South Oz charter vessels had cancelled there charters for that weekend.

I do feel for the poor guy , but it seems clear his decision to set sail in these present conditions has caused the loss of his vessel and he was lucky to be rescued without the loss of his own life.

John obviously loves yachting. Here is a series of pics he took of the Melges 24 Australian Open Nationals 2014 in Geelong;
I'm assuming it's the same John Kowalik
www.sail-world.com/Australia/Melges-24-Australian-Open-Nationals-images-by-John-Kowalik/118639

This kiwi used to work where i do
There radio weather warnings constantly when i was near refuge cove