Subic2Hebe Debacle
 

You Only Live Twice - rescued (again) http://www.pprune.org/images/blackline.gif
Last week we reported the rescue of two oarsmen and their boat, Sunny, who had set out to row from Subic Bay (Philippines) to Hebe Haven (Hong Kong) to raise money for The Sunnyside Club and Children’s Cardiac Care Hong Kong – and incidentally become the first people ever to make the 600 nm crossing in a rowing boat.

The attempt turned sour when unexpectedly bad weather – and even worse forecast weather - caused the voyage to be abandoned. After a full HKMRCC (Hong Kong Marine Rescue Coordination Centre) organised operation, the two rowers, Stu Pryke and John Graham, were rescued by a container ship and transported back to Manila. The boat, Sunny, was taken in tow at 16 kts or more but (not surprisingly) the towline snapped.

That really should have been the end of the story – big pat on the back for the rescue services, congratulations on top quality seamanship for the commercial shipping involved, bad luck lads, nice try, game over, sorry it didn’t work out, glad that you are alive and well.

But Sunny had on board a tracking device, put there for safety and PR reasons, and it was still transmitting. The temptation of knowing where the boat was, and a lull in the weather, proved too much for Pryke who chartered a 65’ sailing yacht, the Sailabout, complete with two Filipino crew and owner Jon Young, to go and look for and hopefully salvage the rowing boat.

According to the Subic2Hebe Challenge website (Wednesday14 May), 'Time (is) the essence as there is some pretty foul weather forecast in the area for Friday through to Monday with another warning from Typhoon 2000 that another Tropical Cyclone is assured in the next 24-48 hours.' At the same time they noted, 'In our favour the weather is bad enough for the Philippine fishing fleet to be safe at anchor so there are not many boats out there that could throw a line on her (and claim salvage).'

Then, knowing full well that there was some nasty weather ‘out there’, they sailed straight into the forecast bad weather that had contributed to the abandonment of the rowing attempt in the first place.

During Friday 16 May TD Halong (Cosme) continued to strengthen, and at 16.30 hrs Pryke made a satphone call advising that they were abandoning all attempts to retrieve Sunny, and asking that Hong Kong MRCC be advised of their position 'in case things got worse overnight' – and Sailabout started heading back towards the shelter of a Philippines’ port. Sunny was declared ‘abandoned’ in high seas and winds in excess of 50 kts. At 0650 hrs on 17 May, Pryke made another call: MAYDAY - two hatches had failed, Sailabout was taking on water, and boat and crew were in 'grave danger'.

UK authorities picked up a signal from an unregistered personal EPIRB and passed the alert on to HK MRCC, who were able to confirm that Pryke did in fact own a personal EPIRB. Then, as the position of the EPIRB transmission and the last reported position of the yacht were very close, fixed wing aircraft from Hong Kong and the Philippines were despatched to search. Two commercial vessels, the LPG tanker ‘Mill Reef’ and container ship Evergreen Uni Prudent were diverted to assist from about 100 nm away.

At 1645 hrs Mill Reef advised that they had rescued all four crew members from Sailabout, and were heading for Yantian port, Shenzhen, China on the north shore of Mirs Bay. Winds at the time were a steady 50+ knots, gusting 70 knots.

Sailabout was abandoned and has either sunk or is drifting. All the ‘rescuees’ travel documents were lost in the operation - arrangements were made for Pryke, Young, and the two Filipinos to be taken off the Mill Reef in Hong Kong waters as this entailed less complications than their landing without documentation in China. ETA, Monday pm.

We are, of course, delighted to hear that Pryke and his companions are (once more) safe and sound.

And (once more) a big round of applause for the HK MRCC, the HK Government Flying Service, and the Philippine SAR services. A vote of thanks, too, to the Captains and crews of the Mill Reef and the Uni Prudent who were there when they were needed, in the best traditions mutual assistance at sea, and who displayed seamanship of the highest order in responding to a distress call under ferocious weather conditions.

However, we are not prepared to be so congratulatory about the actions that caused the second rescue to be necessary. Being retrieved from severe weather in the South China Sea once is noteworthy, and definitely worth a few beers in the telling at the Club, but causing yourself to be rescued twice – from much the same place – in similar conditions - within a week – suggests a level of recklessness and lack of judgment that is hard to fathom.

We seriously question the wisdom of sailing straight out into the developing storm that had helped send them back to the Philippines in the first place. By doing so, a huge number of people have been massively, needlessly and expensively inconvenienced. Lives have been put at risk, and a great deal of money has been spent for… what? Nothing. Except that now there is a 65’ sailing boat missing, presumed lost, as well as an ocean rowing boat.

In some parts of the world such behaviour would be rewarded with arrest, and charges being laid against the perpetrators – Subic2Hebe Challenge should be thankful that this is not the case in either Hong Kong or the Philippines. We do not advocate mandatory charging for rescues at sea – that could lead to at least two very unpleasant scenarios: one, where a vessel refuses to render assistance unless (somehow) assurance is given that the bill is going to be paid; and two, that mariners in distress leave it 'too late' in asking for assistance because they fear the financial consequences – and by too late we mean that the rescue services are then exposed to even more severe risk than if the call had been made earlier.

However, since this was a fund-raising exercise in the first place, maybe the Subic2Hebe Challenge would like to reimburse the Hong Kong and Philippines rescue agencies for their expenditure, Jon Young for the loss of his boat, and the Mill Reef and the Uni Prudent for their inconvenience and lost commercial time?

No doubt this tale will be rumbling around the bars for a while yet. There is certainly plenty of ‘comment’ being expressed that has come to my notice already.

Please note that these comments are specifically my opinion, and do not necessarily represent the views of Sail-World.com or its other Editors.

Guy Nowell
Editor, Sail-World Asia

http://www.subic2hebechallenge.com/index.php

17 May. 06:50. A call from Stu to Indy sets the next set of events in motion. Stu advises two hatches have failed and “Sailabout” is taking on water and they are in “grave danger”. Indy calls Roger and a mayday is called.

great planning
 

And...of course it wouldn't occur to two 20 year captains to attempt this valiant and noble effort in other than typhoon season...duh:ugh:

Quite a tale. The rescue bit itself would be pretty hazardous in a heavy seaway. Trust Sailabout was adequately insured.
Are Stu Pryke and John Graham Australian?
p.s. Not about to unflattering about their nationality :)

Both English, both excellent characters.

I cant believe they made it past the Star Chamber with that judgement :}

iLuvPX, my dear colleague, did you think the Star Chamber members is there because of their people skills, judgement abillity or anyexceptional achievements ??? NO my friends, it’s a club for the incompetent who need protection.

Back to the threat , I did training on the 400 with one of the rowers and he is a gentleman and one of the few real instructors in CX.

Blunderbus and all you other experts,

Before you go making comments from a news article(which is inaccurate), why don't you talk to people actually involved with the row. Maybe a little understanding on your part would be good. Both men involved in the row are upstanding individuals and gave alot of themselves for a great charity. At least they get involved and try to do something good.

Hobie5

Fool
 

Hobie please enlighten us with which bit is inaccurate.
What is surprising is that a great guy like John would get involved with a certified fool like Pryke.
An error of judgement I am sure he is regretting.

hobie,

what was inaccurate about the 'great' idea of rowin' during typhoon season? :ok:

gutter press and those who suck it in
 

The Nowell piece was based on sensational collective of titbit narrative, very soon after the rescue was made "public". Much of Guy's article was spun and did little to pronounce either accuracy or truth. Pryke, on solid weather and charter feedback, together with the TEAM decision at Hebe and the RHKYC, was ellected to make the supposedly quick search for "Sunny", assisted by the tracker device.
What became STS Halong, according to local knowledge and the HK Observatory, certainly on the wednesday, had shown significant weekening and had filled back to 1005hp. The window was good for search on a supposedly well found and safe boat, that in the end, turned out NOT to be insured, carried ONLY basic life jackets as safety aids and NOTHING else,(in retrospect, Pryke should have followed thru with a complete safety and integrity audit on the boat...he didn't due to the upstanding advice given by more than 4 respected individuals, all of whom are sailors). Pryke was the charterer but became crew very quickly by default. The owner skipper was negligent in many area and u;ltimately has to bare the responsibility of bringing his ship into a rescue situation, with no bilge pump, storm sails, shutters, rockets, liferaft, epirb, paper charts or reliable helm. A full report is in process, suggest you read it before you pass further judgement. In closing, if it wasn't for Pryke, 4 souls would have been lost at sea. Would your rhetoric have been the same then? possibly. Since morons like you chum. m89, have little else to feed their ligatured egos.

US what?
 

So how do we know that Nowell's piece was so spot on US Marine,(sic).? There was never a typhoon forecast, it was a STS and that only became public knowledge on the Friday. Also JG had almost over a year to assess the so called "lunacy" of such a venture.

Oh and hey big man, and I assume your handle means you wear those sexy fatigues that go with being such a fat arse hero...it would be encumbent to get the facts right before you fire those body shot blanks and then, just maybe then, you can pass judgement on what was and is a noble charity attempt to help a few kids less well off than many others, Sad git!

touche
 

Now that was "spot on".!!

Much as I admire your fighting spirit, Daisy, you seem to be having a conversation with yourself.
Are we missing some posts here, possibly edited or moderated?
ES

Quite a rant from Daisy pryke but still it leaves the original question - why row in typhoon season?

Daisy
 

Why bother?

You will only get wind up's on here

A noble cause and good on them !!!

Yeah, Bush's plan to liberate Iraq was a noble cause also...good on the USA! :ok:

Pacific typhoons per month, copy and pasted from Wikipedia.

Jan 28 0.6
Feb 15 0.3
Mar 26 0.6
Apr 39 0.8
May 64 1.4
Jun 96 2.0
Jul 215 4.6
Aug 312 6.6
Sep 262 5.6
Oct 219 4.7
Nov 134 2.9
Dec 75 1.6

Considering also currents and the winds (which are unfavourable in the wintertime), I'm sure they've done the research before they decided on the date. I just think they were unlucky, really, having two tropical storms and one typhoon within the space of a couple of weeks in the vicinity of the Phillipines.

A very noble cause indeed! Glad everyone is OK. :ok:

subic2hebe
 

I can assure you guys out there, the research was done, there have not been 2 STS in the S.China Sea since 1995 they were simply unlucky and guys I have the facts, I was supporting those 2 great guys and the children they were doing it for.So to all you spineless gits out there please wait for Stu and John to get back to work and then look them both in the eyes and call them fools.
Now please grow up and leave this thread here.

Please see: subic2hebechallenge.com:ok: