OCC Crew Abandons Ship

A group of Orange Coast College sailing students and staff, returning the school’s $500,000 ketch from Hawaii after it took part in a transpacific race, have been forced to abandon the boat about 800 miles from Hawaii after its mast became dislodged.

No one was injured, and the crew members are now sailing toward Panama on two commercial ships that rescued them from the Bonaire, a 66-foot boat owned by the college’s school of sailing and seamanship.

The ketch, which is expected to sink soon, had been chartered by a group of Newport Beach yachtsmen to sail in the Transpacific Yacht Race from Los Angeles to Hawaii. The college crew had flown to the islands to sail the boat back to its home port of Newport Beach. The group sailed out of Honolulu on July 15.

But on July 23, the mast step, which supports the base of the 80-foot main mast at the keel, collapsed, causing the mast to drop a foot into the boat and threatening to punch a hole in the hull.

It took two days to locate a westbound rescue ship. At that point, six members of the crew--five students and a first mate--were transferred to a Panama-bound German freighter. The captain and other first mate attempted to continue navigating the Bonaire for three more days before they gave up and were taken aboard a Japanese automobile carrier.

“Of course, I was worried,” said Patrice Pauley of Tustin, whose 20-year-old son Ryan was one of the students on board.

Her son called from the ship the day he was picked up. “He said at no time was he in any danger,” the mother said. “He also said he’s having the time of his life. He told me the whole experience has been wonderful for him.”

Her son, who enters UC Berkeley as an English major this fall, had taken only beginning sailing classes. He won a scholarship to help bring the boat back to Newport.

The $2,500 scholarships provide each student a free berth aboard the Bonaire for the return trip, which was expected to last 15 to 18 days, and includes air fare, food and instruction. Only full-time OCC students are eligible, and at the end of the trip, the students must show they have mastered celestial navigation.

The other scholarship students on board were Jason Boyer and Lyle Carlson of Huntington Beach and Kevin Ramlo of Orange. Rescued with them were Robert Pelletier of Newport Beach, a student in the sailing program, and first mate Armando Eason, also of Newport Beach. The six are expected to reach Panama on Thursday and fly to Los Angeles on Friday.

Captain Marcus Mackenzie of Newport Beach and first mate Robert White of Costa Mesa abandoned the Bonaire on Sunday and were brought aboard the Japanese automobile carrier Century Highway No. 1, which is scheduled to arrive in Panama on Monday, said Brad Avery, director of the college’s school of sailing and seamanship. The two men are expected to fly home Tuesday.

OCC’s school of sailing and seamanship is one of the largest nonprofit sailing schools in the nation, with more than 6,000 students annually enrolled in 250 classes.

The school is open to the public, and only about 10% of its students attend OCC, Avery said.

Newport Beach yachtsman Gil Jones, 73, whose group had chartered the 24-year-old Bonaire, skippered the boat to a fourth-place finish in the Aloha Division.

“There were no problems whatsoever on the way to Honolulu,” he said. “We were the fourth boat in out of nine. I’m very surprised. When I chartered it, I was confident it was a very sturdy boat.”

The return trip was expected to be a challenge to the scholarship students.

A news release issued a month ago quoted Avery as saying, “For the first three days out of Honolulu, it’ll be rough. . . . They’ll get bounced around quite a bit and most likely will get seasick. Bonaire will head almost due north of the islands directly into the wind and rough seas.”

It ended up much rougher than anyone expected. As soon as the mast dropped, Avery said, college officials began working on a way to get the students off. “It took some time to do that,” he said.

One boat nearby was headed for Singapore. Another vessel, an ocean-going tug, lacked a small boat to transfer the students, Avery said.

“We didn’t want to take any risks. There was a chance the situation could deteriorate if the mast moved further and perhaps could punch a hole in the hull,” Avery said. “We asked our remaining staff people to only stay on board if they felt their lives were not in danger.”

With the mast’s rigging beginning to come apart and the weather worsening, the decision was made for Mackenzie and White to abandon the vessel, Avery said.

Responding to Mackenzie’s call to the U.S. Coast Guard, a C-130 Hercules rescue aircraft was sent to the scene, and the Japanese vessel responded to the Coast Guard’s request for assistance, said Avery.

The three professional crew members are staff of the sailing school and were serving as instructors for the voyage.

Avery said he has been in contact with the staff members through the Coast Guard since he was notified of the mishap. He’s also been in contact with the U.S. embassy in Panama for help sending the crew members home. They will be without passports and will need emergency documents, he said.

Throughout the trip, the crew was in constant communication with the Coast Guard, Avery said. There were also several nearby sailboats in radio contact, he said.

Avery said the collapse of the mast step was unexpected and he has no idea of the cause. “There were no signs before it went.”

On the race to Hawaii, Jones skippered a crew that left Los Angeles on June 25 and arrived in Hawaii two weeks later on July 9.

“It’s a special boat, but you wouldn’t want to live on it any longer than you have to,” said Jones, a veteran of Transpac races. “It’s sparse, lightly built and the accommodations are minimal.”

The boat had not been in the Transpac before, he said.

It was donated to the college in November and underwent extensive refitting. The boat is fully insured, Avery said.

OCC boats have sailed around the world, to the Antarctic and across the Pacific, and no one has been seriously injured, Avery said. “It’s an adventure where you’re taking some risk, but I like to say it’s risk well managed by us,” he said.

The school’s Alaska Eagle, a 65-foot sailboat, makes an annual trip around the world. This year the boat will take three-week trips to Tahiti, Easter Island, Pitcairn and Antarctica. The Alaska Eagle also served as a communications vessel for this year’s Transpac.

The sailing school is self-supporting, with an annual budget of $1 million and an endowment of about $700,000.

All the boats in the program are donated. The school accepts 50 boats a year and turns down about seven times that many.

Some boats are sold to support the school. One now for sale carries a price tag of $1.7 million.

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Times staff writer Jeff Gottlieb contributed to this report.

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High-Seas Mishap

Source: Transpacific Yacht Race