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roz:
hello again,

Did anyone see the programme on BBC2 last night about the sea kayaker who paddled from Tasmania to New Zealand? Very scary, very sad stuff. It's on bbc I-player for anyone who can watch it.

And on a slightly related but thankfully completely different topic, Simon has made it home from Madagascar.

Slide show  ( click on slide show part two) http://www.seakayakingcornwall.com/madagascar-gallery.html

Diarmaid:
saw a bit of it... what happened, he had some kind of canopy on the boat, which broke, and when he capsized it dangled down underwater and he couldn't roll?  :S

roz:
Diarmuid http://www.andrewmcauley.com/

To sleep he would use a sea anchor and squeezing his body down into the kayak and sealing the hatch with a bulbous fibreglass capsule (dubbed "Casper") fitted with an air-only ventilator which, with its self-righting capabilities, made it possible to ride out the most severe storm conditions that are inevitable in that part of the ocean. And survived a massive storm in the middle of the ocean.

Unfortunately, when the capsule was pivoted to its stowing position behind the cockpit, it made it impossible to kayak roll due to being filled with water like a bucket. Therefore, whenever he capsized, he had to swim out of the kayak, push it upright and perform full self-rescue. During the storm one of the capsule arms was broken. They think the next time he capsized, he couldn't right the kayak as the capsule was hanging down into the water and was too heavy for him.

He was trying to cross between Tasmania and New Zealand, 1600km as the crow flies. The last contact with him was a call to the coast guard



--- Quote ---do you copy.  this is kayak one.  do you copy, over
I've got an emergency situation
I'm in a kayak about 30 kilometres from Milford Sound
I need a rescue
my kayak's sinking
fell off into the sea
I'm going down
--- End quote ---

It's really sad he had land in sight, 30km away after kayaking 1600km on his own.

Simon R.:
yea it was pretty hard viewing at the end. poor guy.

Ritchie:
Roz they talking about your Simon (first line): http://www.playak.net/profiles/blogs/first-playboats-in-madagascar

looks class wouldn't mind doing it, any takers??

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