News » Drama off Cape Horn

Time: approx 2.30pm Wednesday 5th January.

Position: approx  55:40S,072:34W roughly 180 miles from Cape Horn - British born cruising adventurer, solo circumnavigator and owner of Najad 380 ‘Nereida’, Jeanne Socrates, currently undertaking her second circumnavigation, suffered an unfortunate knock-down, whilst hove-to in winds of around 40 knots and 6m high waves.

As all long-distance sailors know, where the Pacific Ocean meets the Atlantic Ocean is one of the most notorious sailing passages known to man.

From the regular weather forecasts she was receiving,  Jeanne had been well aware for over a day or so that the weather was expected to deteriorate somewhat and was planning to heave to for a time while still well off the edge of the continental shelf to wait for better weather.

She did not want to be in the shallow waters near the Cape in anything but good conditions for a safe rounding.

Within a few hours, the weather had worsened and the decision was made to heave-to and wait for that particular weather system to pass before sailing on towards and around the Cape in the far better weather that was forecast to follow.

The good news is that following the knock-down there was relatively little external damage to the yacht, although she did suffer a broken boom, smashed spray hood and screen, damaged staysail furler and a cracked companionway hatch (changed over from wood to clear plastic when the yacht was on long passages).

Jeanne believes the broken boom was caused as a result of the weight of water that the heavily reefed mainsail must have scooped-up as the knock-down occurred.

Inside the yacht there was damage to some of yacht Nereida's lovely mahogany interior - a result of flying objects caused when the yacht  was laid over by (at least) 90°on her side.

Understandably, the yacht shipped a great deal of water in the process with the interior resembling the inside of a washing machine for some time after, with a lot of Jeanne’s papers and charts being damaged or destroyed by the water ingress.

With the fear of another knockdown imminent, Jeanne made the decision to alert the rescue authorities to her plight.

Thankfully, with a Chilean fishing boat standing by over night, Jeanne found she was able to start Nereida’s engine without too much problem when the seas calmed down a little on the morning of Thursday 6th and she proceeded to motor-sail under genoa alone towards Cape Horn and a safe haven, without the aid of the rescue authorities.

Now safely moored in Argentina, Jeanne is beginning the gradual process of effecting repairs to Nereida with close cooperation and assistance from Selden and Najad, with a view to continuing her ongoing adventure of a lifetime.

We spoke recently to Jeanne and she had this to say about her yacht:

Further information:

The amazing Jeanne Socrates is currently on her second circumnavigation onboard ‘Nereida’ - a Najad 380 which she took delivery of from new back in 2009. The yacht is fairly standard in specification apart from a cutter rig sail plan, which Jeanne specified prior to construction.

Passionate about the Najad brand, ‘Nereida’ is Jeanne’s second yacht having first owned a Najad 361 back in 1997 when she first started serious blue-water cruising.

Visit Jeanne’s website and read her web log at www.svnereida.com