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+--- Thread: Lost Hawaiian Sailors (/showthread.php?tid=18934)
Lost Hawaiian Sailors - randomq - 11-09-2017
What do you guys make of this? Sea madness? Making up a story to sell?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/apnewsbreak-lost-sailors-did-not-activate-emergency-beacon/2017/10/30/db264670-bddc-11e7-9294-705f80164f6e_story.html
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - PaulW - 11-09-2017
I thought that story was fishy the very first time I heard about it. Did they just want publicity? Or are they just a bit kooky. Time will tell.
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - Mimosa - 11-09-2017
The facts and statements from these two wahine just do not add up .
Maybe as Andy Warhol once said " They are getting their 15 minutes of fame "
The BBC had an article about this last week and picked it apart statement by statement .
Mrs.Mimosa
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - PaulW - 11-09-2017
The plan could've been to just drift for 6 months and then call for rescue.
More likely is that they hid out somewhere and then motored off to get into a believable position.
But then I don't know anything about seafaring.
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - leo - 11-09-2017
Everything about their story doesn't add up. I think they're more than "a bit kooky". A lot of people's time and resources have been spent into whatever they're up to.
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - Rob Tucker - 11-09-2017
Well, the Navy is constantly steaming around the Pacific for the purpose of protecting us. Picking up a couple sailors, kooky or not, is what they are there to do.
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - Guest - 11-09-2017
Something in the water ? Navy ships bump into things too.
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - Eric1600 - 11-09-2017
I don't usually doubt cases like this because really odd chains of accidents are usually what lead to disaster and long ordeals out on the ocean. But this story is really odd. Watch the video here: http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/31/asia/pacific-sailors-jennifer-appel-tasha-fuiava-questions/index.html
Their boat did look like it had been on the open ocean for at least 30 days based on the growth that is visible. However their mast does not look damaged in the video and they claim their equipment failed because of an antenna breaking. However I have personally known a demasted sailor who was able to still use their VHF to contact the USCG's high powered stations over 100 miles offshore. He could not hear them, but they were able to pickup his transmissions and triangulate his location. Depending how far these two were from shore, that might not have been possible, however an antenna is basically just a strip of wire and a new one is easy to build. They also failed to push the button on their EPRIB which would have brought immediate emergency help to their location.
They also made a bizarre claim that if they hadn't been rescued with they were, they "would have been dead within 24 hours." Yet they were very healthy, had plenty of food and water, so ... death by boredom?
Back to the mast though, the growth and its shape on both sides of the hull indicate they had been sailing on both tacks for extended periods of time. The images also show no reason why the mast couldn't be used. I've seen people manage to rig the most broken of boats and continue to sail them. Their boat looks like it is perfectly fine.
They claim a storm took out their antenna. She says something very naive, "They [all electronics] are dependent on the antenna. And when the antenna went out, everything went out."
First off the GPS antennas are not put on the mast and are often built into the equipment or mounted low to the boat (deck or railing). Typically only the VHF (radio) antenna is mounted high on the mast. If you look at their mast you can see the radar antenna half way up is fine, and I can see what looks like a small domed GPS antenna on the rail by the stern. The also have mast steps all the way up the mast, which while at sea it is hard, allowing them to make repairs to the rigging or electronics. They did say they had "radio and satellite communications" taken out because of the antenna loss but satellite antennas are not put on the mast either and are separate from any radio. If they had an HF radio like an SSB or HAM radio, the only type capable of reaching land (VHF is short range), it also would have had it's own antenna and it isn't on top of the mast, but usually just a simple wire that runs up from the deck to the top of the mast, dead simple to fix.
At the worst, they could have only lost their VHF radio maybe the HF radio. The GPS, EPIRB (emergency positioning beacon), radar all seem to be structurally intact. Even the mast looks properly rigged and supported (it has the tell-tail 5 degree rake in the bend which shows there's proper tension and no signs of problems).
Sadly they did not scuttle the boat, but left it adrift to become a hazard for someone else. Perhaps it will be recovered and the truth will be more apparent.
FYI -- The rescue happened because they flagged down a fishing vessel who reported them to the US Navy.
I would say these two are either epically ignorant or frauds.
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - DTisme - 11-09-2017
I have not heard a single person who believes their story. Here's Matt Lauer's interview from yesterday in which they claim, among other things, that they couldn't pull into Lahaina bc it isn't deep enough for their boat, etc.. He clearly thinks they're full of crap. https://www.today.com/video/2-women-who-were-lost-at-sea-answer-questions-about-5-month-ordeal-1091142211859
RE: Lost Hawaiian Sailors - MarkD - 11-09-2017
I don't know how many folks saw the two ladies on local newscasts, but the blonde woman was a crack up.
She is fairly composed on the above Matt Lauer interview, but on the earlier footage--shown repeatedly over some days--she reminded me of a 1960s flower child on a tab of LSD. (Make that 2 tabs.)
Very ditzy and humorous behavior. We laughed every time she came on air. Perhaps they originally left shore with quite the stash of LSD. (And seriously, that would explain a lot.)
I have a moniker: The Orange Sunshine girls