Around Alone Race Nearly Turns Deadly

Her life in peril and her boat destroyed by mountainous waves, a French sailor was rescued unharmed in the South Pacific on Tuesday by a competitor in a solo around-the-world race.

Isabelle Autissier was picked up at 6:37 a.m. by Italian yachtsman Giovanni Soldini, who braved heavy seas to find her capsized craft about 24 hours after she sent a distress signal.

“The French sailor is now safe and in good condition aboard the Italian yacht Fila,” Chilean Navy Cmdr. Nilton Duran said.

Autissier was the overall leader of the 27,000-mile Around Alone race when her 60-foot PRB overturned in fierce weather Monday. The Chilean navy said the 42-year-old Frenchwoman’s boat was “completely lost.”

“The boat suddenly turned more than 90 degrees, and I could no longer be in the cockpit,” Autissier said. “Then it suddenly turned over, and I didn’t have time to shut the door.”

Autissier sent a mayday and made a brief call to Paris after her boat was capsized by 40-mph winds and waves as high as 40 feet.

“Very quickly, the mast snapped into pieces,” she said. “When I saw that, I sent the signal because there was nothing else I could do. Then I began to get organized, getting security material together.”

With no known commercial or private shipping in the isolated ocean south of Australia, organizers said the fleet represented Autissier’s best chance for survival.

Autissier was in second place in the third leg before her boat capsized, trailing Marc Thiercelin by 38 miles. The rescue came 2,070 miles west of Punta Arenas, Chile, the southernmost city in the world.

“I calculated that Marc or Giovanni were closest to me, but nevertheless realized that it could take at least 24 hours for them to arrive,” Autissier said.

Soldini was 200 miles and at least 10 hours away when he turned south into heavy seas to reach Autissier. Duran said the weather had improved at the time of the rescue and winds had slowed to 29 mph to 31 mph.

When Soldini found Autissier’s yacht, it was upside down and he didn’t see the Frenchwoman. After two or three passes, he threw a hammer at the hull to wake her up.

“She came out of the hatch, got into a life raft and drifted downwind to Giovanni,” she said. “They are now having wine and cheese somewhere on Giovanni’s boat.”

The Chilean navy kept contact with stations in Hawaii, California and New Zealand during the search and rescue efforts.

The race, which includes nine boats, began in Charleston, S.C. in August and is to end there in the spring.

Thiercelin still leads the race.