HPS Sydney to Hobart Race

Hobart fleet faces worst gales since ill-fated '98

By Sean Berry, Miranda Wood and Eamonn Duff December 26, 2004 The Sun-Herald

The Sydney to Hobart fleet will tonight sail straight into the worst weather faced by crews since the disastrous 1998 race, in which six lives were lost.

A strong cold front will strike the entire fleet in the early hours of tomorrow morning, dashing hopes that the super-yachts, including 30-metre giants Skandia and Konica Minolta, would beat the worst of the weather.

Australian Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Peter Dunda has told the 116-strong fleet that conditions will "deteriorate rapidly" as they sail down the state's South Coast tomorrow.

"By Tuesday it will be very cold at sea, and the south-westerlies will reach 40 to 50 knots, sometimes 60 knots in squalls that could contain hailstones,"

Mr Dunda said on the official race website. "It is likely to be so cold, there could be snow in the Tasmanian highlands and in the Alps on the mainland.

"At the peak of the gale, wave heights may average six to nine metres, with the possibility that some waves will reach twice that size."

The race fleet was devastated six years ago when it was hit with a giant southerly storm that generated winds of up to 80 knots and waves higher than eight-storey buildings.

Cruising Yacht Club of Australia (CYC) commodore Martin James said this year's race would be no pleasure cruise.

"We are still talking about gale force winds here - a gale is a gale," Mr James said. "It will be fairly miserable."

Rough ride ahead for Sydney-Hobart yacht race

Fri 24 Dec, 3:42 AM

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Sailors in the 60th annual Sydney-Hobart yacht race have been warned to expect gale-force winds of up to 60 knots and huge seas in a rough ride down Australia's east coast.  

Hail squalls were also possible and the wind could whip up swells as high as nine metres (29 feet), forecasters said on Friday.

"At the peak of the gale, wave heights may average six to nine metres, with the possibility that some waves will reach twice that size," organisers said.

Sydney/Hobart

December 26, 2004 - January 4, 2005

While the Skandia crisis unfolded, her arch rival for line honours Konica Minolta was also forced out of the race after falling badly off a freak wave.

Skipper Stewart Thwaites said: "We barrelled off a ginormous (sic) wave, crashed down the other side of it.

I was down below, I heard the boat crash, and it came to a stop. The boys said it was twice as big as any other wave." So severe was the landing that it creased the cabin top, but the most serious damage was to the keel attachment point.

Thwaites was worried that if they continued into the adverse southerly swell, the keel would break away from the yacht or that the yacht would even fold in half at the crease point. As the fleet crashes and bangs its way to Hobart in southerly headwinds gusting to 40 knots.

The race committee of the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia is receiving more retirements by the hour, with 42 of the 116-boat fleet having pulled out and another 11 waiting in the haven of Twofold Bay at Eden before deciding whether to continue.

2004 Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race: Disaster Strikes

By 6.30pm, December 28, a total of 54 yachts had retired from the race due to adverse weather conditions, gear and mechanical problems or craft damage. Nicorette, AAPT and Brindabella were maintaining their lead down the Tasmanian coast.

Skandia Capsizes at Sea,

Photo: Daniel Forster, courtesy Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race

Australian Broadcasting Corporation Broadcast:

28/12/2004

Half the starters drop out of Sydney-Hobart yacht race

Wild weather has forced nearly half of the 116 boats out of the race. The leading supermaxis - last year's line-honours winner, Skandia, and Konica Minolta - were two dramatic retirements this morning.

Skandia's crew had to be rescued in high winds and rough seas after the yacht's high-tech swinging keel was damaged. Another maxi, Targe, had already been forced out of the race by canting keel problems.

53 boats out of a starting fleeting of 116 had been forced out by late afternoon on Tuesday, another 11 were sheltering in ports, said race officials.

Australia's Nicorette grabbed the lead after the withdrawal of the two favourites.

Abandon ship: Skandia's crew are forced into a life raft.
Photo: Daniel Forster

By Sunanda Creagh

December 29, 2004

Bass Strait weather blows favoured super-maxis out of race

With a healthy lead and Skandia out of the race, things were looking up for 98-footer Konica Minolta, until it was beaten by a more formidable opponent - the weather.

The boat had survived winds of up to 60 knots, hail and mini-cyclonic water spouts until one massive wave finished its dream of line honours.

"We went over one nine-metre wave and dropped off the other side," said Konica Minolta crew member Melinda Aldridge. "Just as we were in the trough, another wave picked the bow of the boat up and tried to sandwich us in the middle."

James said he was disappointed, but not surprised, by the attrition rate, which he said was the highest since the disastrous conditions of 1998.

"The challenge is why people keep coming back to the race," he said. "They didn't come for a walk in the park."

Line honours to Nicorette

December 29, 2004 - 8:13AM

Super maxi Nicorette is escorted across the finish line in Hobart.
Photo: AP

Two-time Sydney to Hobart winning skipper Ludde Ingvall fought back tears today after his yacht Nicorette claimed line honours in the 60th annual race.

The 90-footer crossed the line at 5.10am (AEDT), finishing the 628-nautical-mile bluewater classic in 64 hours and 44 seconds, well outside the race record of 43 hours, 48 minutes and two seconds set by Nokia in 1999.

Nicorette sailed conservatively down the Tasmanian coast in seas of up to nine metres and south-westerly squalls of up to 50 knots.

An emotional Ingvall told reporters on Constitution Dock he twice considered joining the 54 yachts who retired, saying the race felt like it lasted three weeks.

"This was tough, very tough," he said.

"I'm very sorry for all the boats who didn't make it, it's not supposed to be this hard ... that's part of the sport, if you can take this then you've got to stick to other kinds of racing. "This is as hard as it gets.

Compared to the round-the-world races and the transatlantic race we've done it's the hardest two days you can ever spend on the water."

Ingvall said the yacht held up well despite needing consistent repairs from his 15-man crew through the race. Ingvall said luck played a part in sparing his yacht from more serious damage in the race's worst storms since 1998, when six people died.

AAP