‘Spirit of Heineken’ : Belgian to Cross Atlantic in Beer Bottle

Fons Oerlemans has crossed the Atlantic on a raft, in a boiler and in a truck. This summer he plans to make the voyage in a green beer bottle.

The 50-year-old Belgian engineer has spent the last three years designing and building a bottle-shaped hydrofoil 36 feet long. It has a cruising speed of 4O knots.

He calls the craft “Spirit of Heineken.”

In June, Oerlemans plans to sail his steel bottle the 3,000 miles from New York to England in a bid to set two world records--the first Atlantic crossing and the longest distance traveled by hydrofoil.

He also hopes to make it the fastest Atlantic crossing, by completing the journey in 80 hours, to beat a record set in 1986 by British entrepreneur Richard Branson. Branson’s powerboat made the trip in 80 hours, 31 minutes.

Being ‘Unconventional’

“The most important thing for me is not the speed, but being unconventional,” Oerlemans said after his winged bottle was launched at Amsterdam.

Named for the Dutch brewer sponsoring his expedition, the 10-ton vessel resembles the familiar green beer bottles sold worldwide, complete with a Heineken label and metal cap.

Oerlemans had planned to make his voyage three years ago, but financial problems delayed him.

After proudly watching his creation lowered into the water before a cheering crowd and photographers, he was confident nothing else could go wrong.

“We’ve already done tests across the harbor, using a scale model, and it works splendidly,” he said.

‘I’ve Never Failed Yet’

Dismissing skeptics, he said, “This is my sixth unconventional Atlantic crossing, and I’ve never failed yet.”

Oerlemans’ fascination with the Atlantic began at age 14, when he told his father he wanted to cross the ocean on a raft.

It took 20 years, but he achieved his ambition. Two more trips followed, each one on a different homemade raft.

For Oerlemans, the challenge lay less in crossing the ocean than in devising a more eccentric vessel for each expedition.

In 1981 he and his, wife, Kee, traveled from the Belgian port of Antwerp to the Caribbean Island of Barbados in a semi-submerged sailboat made from an ordinary steam boiler.

“It was like a submarine. We had underwater windows, so we saw amazing things,” said Oerlemans, “but it took six months, which is probably one of the slowest crossings ever.”

The next object to capture his imagination was a truck.

“A truck won’t float, so I had to attach special cylinders to to make it seaworthy,” he explained.

Almost Arrested

As Oerlemans and his wife set off from New York on their 52-day voyage to Lisbon, they were almost arrested by U. S. Coast Guardsmen who thought they had picked up a Soviet submarine on radar.

It was in the middle of the Atlantic that Oerlemans decided on a bottle for his next design.

“We often saw bottles floating on the sea, so I got the idea to use one for my next crossing,” said the adventurer, who now lives and works in Amsterdam.

Most hydrofoils are suited only to the calm waters of rivers and lakes, but Oerlemans’ invention has two special wings fore and aft that enable it to cut through waves. The vessel will carry all its own fuel.

Two-Man Crew

The Belgian and his two-man crew will spend the crossing cramped inside the bottle and take turns navigating.

With visibility restricted to a small, bubble-like window on the hull, the greatest dangers will be floating objects such as icebergs, discarded containers or an unsuspecting whale.

To avoid collisions, Oerlemans has installed radar and an early-warning sonar system.

After devoting years to nautical expeditions, the tireless mariner said his next adventure will be on land, but he refused to go into details.

“I’m going to reconstruct a historical journey made 2,000 years ago,” he said.