A major incident

Last night I settled in to watch the BT Sports coverage of the semi-finals of the America’s Cup challengers’ tournament, which will decide the team that eventually goes head-to-head with Oracle Team USA in the America’s Cup proper. I did this at about 7.15pm – about an hour and a quarter into the broadcast – because, to be honest, I’d completely forgotten that it was on and had been channel-hopping, trying something worthy of my attention.

At that stage, in very tough, squall-like, sailing conditions Artemis (Sweden) was about to lose its second race of the day to Japan, to be left trailing by 1-3 in their ‘first to five wins’ contest.

Once that was over, it became apparent that Team New Zealand was about to race its second race of the day (already leading 3-0 in the series) against Sir Ben Ainslie’s Land Rover BAR Great Britain boat.

Things were a bit tense because – if Team New Zealand could win two more races, Team GB would be over and out of the event – something of a devastating result for everyone involved with Land Rover BAR after all the effort and money raised to mount Ainslie’s challenge.

Both boats seemed to be awarded penalties for entering the ‘Start’ box too early, contrary to the rules, before they jockeyed for position with the clock counting down to ‘Start Time’.

Ainslie, in typical ‘race mode’ style, managed to ‘hook’ Team New Zealand and force them away from their intended path straight to the Start line … before then suddenly bearing away and hardened up his sails to race off at high speed, trying to gain as big an advantage as he could before Team New Zealand, wallowing (unable to use the wind) and in some degree of chaos, could also swing round and ‘go for it’.

Within seconds – and, at the sort of speeds these boats can go, Land Rover BAR now already 100 metres ahead and rapidly going further away – Team New Zealand made some sort of error is ‘opening their metaphorical throttle’ – and their boat pitched forward in a terrifying episode in which lives could easily have been lost.

The next twenty minutes of television time was compelling watching as two of the crew were thrown straight into the water and then first the remaining four, and then three, were left in their cockpits about twenty feet or more up in the air. The rescue and support boats arrived as quickly as they could and worked frantically to confirm that all the crew were alive and safe before and then righting the boat.

It was a hairy episode – rather like a Formula One car attempting a corner at high speed during a Grand Prix and going straight on into a barrier.

See here for the local Bermudan TV station’s brief ‘highlights’ coverage of the incident, courtesy of YouTube – TEAM NEW ZEALAND INCIDENT