Looking back

I interviewed a survivor who recounted how the people on the beach heard a loud boom and saw a large wave forming. (The three waves that crashed ashore were later estimated to be 10 –15 metres high.) His description of a roaring mountain of water closing in on its prey in the dead of night was eerily close to what injured yachtsmen would whisper to me five months later, as they were carried to waiting ambulances …

“The waves, mate, I’ll remember the waves,” croaked one exhausted survivor.

Thanks to the Boxing Day weather briefing at the CYCA, we knew conditions would be very tough for the 1998 Sydney Hobart. I’d sailed the race before in 1987, but was shocked by what we encountered in Bass Strait 24 hours later.

I was fortunate that my ABC colleagues covering the disaster were chopper pilot Gary Ticehurst, whose consummate skill in manoeuvring meant the twin-engine Squirrel traced a kind of aerial ballet above the boats, and cameraman Peter Sinclair whose rock-solid dependability was matched by an exceptional eye for the right shot. They worked unstintingly over the next three days. Gary fulfilled the unofficial but critical role of relaying the position of stricken yachts and reassuring crews that help was on the way.

After filing my report for the 7 pm ABC News bulletin on Boxing Day in Sydney, I jumped on a light plane to join Gary and Pete in Merimbula. We were usually based there for at least a day as we flew over the fleet, shooting vision and doing radio interviews that would be fed back to all the major networks and international news agencies.

On the way down, they had filmed Sayonara and Brindabella barrelling along neck and neck, surfing at over 20 knots – big speeds back then. From the chopper, they could see the front way to the south.

When Pete drew Gaz’s attention to it, his response was typically understated: “Tomorrow could be a big day. Better get an early night.”

They went out early without me to get the dawn shots and picked up vision of the early retirements including ABN AMRO Challenge, but by around midday we were above Helsal II as they battled 50-knot winds and seven-metre waves that lashed the boat.

On the way back to Mallacoota for refuelling, I remember asking Gary whether he’d seen conditions like this before –

green granite lines of swell marching toward a beach. “Nah, mate,” he replied quietly.

A police car drove onto the tiny strip at Mallacoota and an officer stepped out. He said there had been a mayday from a yacht. It was decided to ditch me to save weight so Gaz and Pete lost no time getting in the air and headed out to where Stand Aside was wallowing in 80-foot waves, with half its cabin roof gone and its crew injured. Pete rolled the door back and started filming.

He remembers it like this.

I didn’t do much flying with Pete and Gaz over the next 24 hours. As the navy and civilian choppers deposited their cargo – battered, disoriented and painfully shocked victims of the carnage in Bass Strait – I tried to coax their stories out of them; convey the scope and quality of the massive rescue effort to an audience who were having difficulty understanding why a yacht race had suddenly turned so deadly.

Merimbula airfield was soon overflowing with all kinds of choppers and fixed-wing aircraft. Among them was the Royal Australian Navy’s Sea Hawk Tiger 70, which had been based in Nowra. They were the chopper crew tasked to lift sailors off the crippled Sword of Orion.

These days, Commander Marc Pavillard is the Executive Officer (XO) at HMAS Kuttabul, the navy’s historic base on Sydney Harbour. Back in 1998, he was a Lieutenant running the winch on Tiger 70 that had plucked five crewmen off Sword. Pavillard remembers there was a lot of trouble with the last of Sword’s crew,  Carl Watson.

Back in Merimbula, the Sea Hawk’s maintenance guys gave the wire – which had been damaged during the rescues – a quick tug, a snap load. It parted. Pavillard agrees that it was unlikely to have lasted one more hoist.

The tragedy that overtook the Winston Churchill weighed particularly heavily on Gary’s mind. That now-famous distress call still sends shivers down the spine, and it worried him so much that later on in the motel room we checked on the tape to ascertain exactly what time it was recorded, and then attempted to work out where the ABC chopper  was in relation to the fleet when the mayday came in.

Gary’s reasoning was that as the radio call was so clear and distinct, they must have been close – around 10 nautical miles. As Pete notes:

Once the immediate emergency had passed, we continued on to Hobart with very mixed emotions. We knew the race still had to be covered, but it was difficult to fly out over the sea each day knowing what had transpired and the terrible price paid.

But that was nothing compared to what sailors went through – like Sean Langman when the former round-the-world ketch Nokia was nearing the end of its ordeal by sea.