Location: 14° 28N, 60° 52W
Sunday, 04.06.2008

The Schooner Maggie B was safely anchored in Cul de Sac des Marins at 14° 28N, 60° 52W, Martinique at approximately 1130, April 6th. The trip from Salvador was 2732 NM. We covered the 2046 NM from Fernando de Noronha to des Marins in 10 days. Antigua is about 160 NM away.

The last day was very eventful. At approximately 2130 last night, when we were about 25 NM off of Barbados, Thomas saw a distress flare. Rising from the surface to the base of the clouds at a 45 degree angle. Color unknown as he had his tinted sunglasses on (having lost his regular glasses). He called me and we checked the radar for any targets. We were then going about 10 knots in moderate seas. We watched for another flare for a while and then called the Barbados Coast Guard on VHF. They answered, but were impossible to understand, so we gave the report as best we could.

The clearest communications equipment we have on board is the Iridium Sat Phone. The question was: “who to call?” Despite having lots of reference material on board, we only had the number of the Barbados Port Captain, which didn’t answer. But New Zealand is really well organized for this sort of stuff and I had their Rescue Center number handy, and they answered immediately. They gave me the number in Barbados, which went right through. I gave the report and suggested a helicopter search. The weather was wind 20-25 with perhaps five meter breaking swells. About an hour later I got a call from a Barbados Government boat called the Lady D, which had been dispatched. About four hours after the siting, I got a call from a rescue helicopter doing a sector sweep in the estimated area.

Today, calling the Barbados Rescue Central, the news is that the searches turned up nothing. You never know. It would have been a tough night to be in the water.

We arrived in the safety of Cul de Sac in very sloppy seas - big and unkempt - and 20-25 knots of wind. The marina said that they could find a space for us, though they were full and we hadn’t reserved. Rather like a Headwaiter who doesn’t want to be taken for granted. French. The engine had behaved a bit strange on start up, but motored us in OK. The berth they had for us required a tight turn and then backing between tightly packed buoys about 50 meters. With very shiny boats all around. All primed for the landing, after we committed to the turn, it quickly became apparent we had zero reverse. We were able to bail out, missing a lot of expensive maritime real estate by a few hairs breath. When there was a clue that something might be wrong with the engine, I should have troubleshot the problem a lot more before committing to tight quarters.

After a few tries, we found a good spot to anchor. Once established, a dive on the prop showed that the feathering J-Prop would almost go into the right setting for forward, but reverse left the blades at zero pitch. Must be something screwed in the gears. We will seek advice and pull the prop to find out what is wrong. The is the same type of prop that came off two years ago somewhere between Barbados and Brazil. Perhaps there is something in the water here? We carry a spare non-feathering prop, which we can install if we need to.

It is very strange for all of us not to have the boat moving around a lot.

All is well.