16 Year-Old Sailer Missing In Indian Ocean

[FSTargetDrone]

Hope the for the best, but...

Thursday, June 10, 2010 9:43am PDT

Emergency rescue effort is launched for teen sailor Abby Sunderland

By: Pete Thomas, GrindTV.com

A rescue effort has been launched in hope of finding Abby Sunderland, 16, who set off her emergency beacon locating devices from the southern Indian Ocean early this morning.

Sunderland, who had been attempting to sail around the world alone, endured multiple knockdowns in 60-knot winds Thursday before conditions briefly abated.

However, her parents lost satellite phone contact early this morning and an hour later were notified by the Australian Coast Guard that both of Sunderland's EPIRB satellite devices had been activated.

One is apparently is attached to a survival suit or a life raft and meant to be used when a person is in the water or aboard a life raft.

Abby's father struggled with emotions and said he didn't know if his daughter was in a life raft or aboard the boat, or whether the boat was upside down.

"Everything seemed to be under control," Laurence Sunderland said. "But then our call dropped and a hour later the Coast Guard called."

Abby is hundreds of miles from land. The nearest ship was about 400 miles away. The rescue effort is being coordinated by the French-controlled Reunion Islands and Australia. Sunderland had been sailing in 50- to 60-foot seas and it was dark when the EPIRB devices were activated.

The Sunderlands are asking people to pray for their daughter, a high-school junior from Thousand Oaks, Calif.

Charlie Nobles, executive director of the American Sailing Assn., said, "We're all praying for her and our thoughts are with her. If she's got the survival suit, and she's got the EPIRB and she's in pretty good shape, she's just got to try to hang on. And when they get there, these guys... they're going to hopefully send the best that they've got to try to do a rescue and it's definitely possible. They're amazing people who do those rescues. They know exactly what they're heading into."

Nobles said a scenario whereby a sailor has to abandon ship might go like this: Water flooding the vessel automatically inflates the life raft, which is tethered to the sailboat. The sailor, if the sailboat is sinking, would grab the boat's EPIRB device and stuff it into a ditch kit, take the ditch kit and deploy and climb aboard the life raft. The sailor would only cut the tether if the sailboat is sinking, pulling down the lifeboat.

Abby was for several months one of two 16-year-olds attempting to sail around the world alone. Australia's Jessica Watson completed her journey last month, just days before turning 17.

Abby's brother Zac, who graduated from high school, completed a solo-circumnavigation last summer at 17.

The timing of Abby's trip was criticized by some because it was going to place her in the middle of the Indian Ocean when the stormy Southern Hemisphere winter was at hand.

I'll just say this: No minor child of mine would ever be allowed to do this.

[Admiral Valdemar]

It's hip to let kids emulate the challenges that killed many men years ago. Send them to cross the ocean, alone, or to single-handedly climb Everest after reading the Penguin guide to mountaineering. You want them to have special experiences and have something to tell their kids, after all.

I swear this stupid fad has become increasingly common lately. It's not like risk takers aren't on this Earth to justify the budgets of most emergency services globally anyway, but having kids go out and do it who can't even vote yet is a tad beyond the Pale in my book.

But I'm a terribly boring person, so whatever.

[Sea Skimmer]

I can sort of understand the race going on right now for kids to climb every tall mountain on earth, since well, that's about equally dangerous no matter what age you are, and other people are normally with them. I haven't heard of any sole climbing race. The sailing solo around the earth thing is just plain stupid though. It literally is a race to death. I really hope this kid is okay, no one should die because they have parents that dumb, but 65mph winds is a force 11 storm. That's barely below a hurricane. No sail boat or life raft can take that very well.

[weemadando]

Can't wait to see the bill that this silly girl racks up for the rescue.

Seriously. What a fucking idiot to have your trip taking your across the Indian Ocean at those latitudes at this time of year. Do you have a fucking death wish?

[Akhlut]

Can't wait to see the bill that this silly girl racks up for the rescue.

Well, given that her parents can afford to send two of their children out on sailboats to circumnavigate the globe, I imagine they can eat that cost without too much trouble, all told.

Seriously. What a fucking idiot to have your trip taking your across the Indian Ocean at those latitudes at this time of year. Do you have a fucking death wish?

A 16-year old financed by her parents would be my guess.

But, seriously, no 16 year old has all that great sense, especially in matters of life and death. A lot of teens have a streak of perceived invincibility and don't really grasp their own mortality, especially the super-rich variety, I'd assume. So, really, I'd probably place more blame on the parents for allowing her to engage in this bout of extremely bad planning.

[FSTargetDrone]

But, seriously, no 16 year old has all that great sense, especially in matters of life and death. A lot of teens have a streak of perceived invincibility and don't really grasp their own mortality, especially the super-rich variety, I'd assume. So, really, I'd probably place more blame on the parents for allowing her to engage in this bout of extremely bad planning.

Forget bad planning. The very idea of, say, "Sure honey, we're fine with you sailing off on your own" is just poor decision-making.

The blame is theirs entirely, of course. Unless they are extraordinarily fortunate and she is somehow found alive, they will wring their hands and wail about how horrible this was. I will be surprised if she is found at all, alive or dead.

The kid was writing a blog a sea and the last entry was on 9 June, I believe, as I glanced at it after looking up more about the girl. It's too depressing to even look at again now. I'm not going to link it.

[Alyeska]

Can't wait to see the bill that this silly girl racks up for the rescue.

Does Australia sea rescue services bill all rescue survivors? The USN and Coast Guard never bill the survivors they rescue, ever.

[Invictus ChiKen]

I just hope should the worst (Heaven forbid) happen that others will get it through there heads that this fad of life risking for minors is not the best idea.

[Broomstick]

Have to wonder if part of the problem is modern technology, which enables a youth of 16 to circumnavigate the globe, carry sufficient food and water, stay in contact with others, check weather reporting that didn't even exist even 30-40 years ago, and carry survival equipment unavailable at any price for most of human history. It gives the illusion that sailing around the world - solo or not - is safe.

It's not.

Mind you, technology has made it safer... but it will never be safe.

A 16 year old may be physically capable of an adult feat... but no 16 year old is mentally mature. Their judgment is NOT as good as an adult's (the human brain does not finish maturing until sometime between 20 and 25). Part of staying out of trouble during a record-seeking feat is knowing when to call it quits, even if the goal isn't reached. That's tough for an adult to do, much more so for a youth whose foresight and planning skills aren't fully mature, and who is likely to lack the self-discipline to call for help early.

On top of that - sailing a small boat like that involves a certain amount of just luck. The technologically insulated, particularly the privileged rich, do not want to believe in luck, but random chance is a factor out in the wilds. Luck can be either good or bad, it involves weather, it involves decisions you made minutes/hours/days prior, it involves whether or not you're hanging on or vulnerable to injury when a rogue wave hits or your ship capsizes...

I hope they find the girl alive and well, but this was a fucking stupid thing to do in my opinion. It would be questionable for a fully informed adult (at best!) but for someone not yet fully adult... stupid.

[hongi]

Forget bad planning. The very idea of, say, "Sure honey, we're fine with you sailing off on your own" is just poor decision-making.

At what age would you think that it was okay to send your child off to sail around the world?

or to single-handedly climb Everest after reading the Penguin guide to mountaineering.

I don't think you know what you're talking about.

Very few people climb Everest solo, and those that do so are very experienced climbers. People usually climb Everest in climbing teams, with massive logistical support. Even the inexperienced people are taken up by professional guides (an entire industry revolves around getting people up there). When you hear about youngsters climbing Mt. Everest or other mountains, such as a 13 year old recently, they do so because they've gone up several other mountains before and they have other mountaineers climbing with htme.

[FSTargetDrone]

Forget bad planning. The very idea of, say, "Sure honey, we're fine with you sailing off on your own" is just poor decision-making.

At what age would you think that it was okay to send your child off to sail around the world?

I already said at the start that I wouldn't allow any minor child to do it, so not until she or he is 18.

Granted, I wouldn't be happy if he or she did it at 38, so I'd probably never be "okay with it." But it's no longer up to me once the child is legally an adult.

[Stofsk]

I'm not sure it really matters how old this girl is. Whether she's 16 or 18, she still would have gone into the Indian ocean at the wrong time of the year.

Can't wait to see the bill that this silly girl racks up for the rescue.

Does Australia sea rescue services bill all rescue survivors? The USN and Coast Guard never bill the survivors they rescue, ever.

Not IIRC, but the issue has been raised where someone has gotten lost due to their own stupidity (like not telling someone, anyone, that they're going to wander off into the bush for the next month) and the effort made to search and rescue them racked up quite a bill.

[Sea Skimmer]

In the US the issue of charging people for rescues is being raised a lot. Not at sea mind you, but people doing crap inland. Mainly a lot of people go hiking into the desert, and bring personal locator beacons along instead of properly preparing. Then they call for help when they inevitably run out of water or just get tired. I know of one case in which a father-son team of idiots called for help via automatic beacon (which means you can’t call back and say never mind don’t come) THREE TIMES in one trip. The first two times helicopters came out, but they insisted on staying. The first time they called because they just thougth the water they had was salty, it was not. The second time they ran out of water, but found more before help arrived. I forget why they called the third time, but at that point the crew on the rescue chopper forced them to leave.

[Darth Lucifer]

I just happened to be listening to "The Savage Nation" tonite and I love how Michael Savage is using this girl being missing to bitch on the radio about liberals in the white house. What an asshole.

And yes, he had absolutely no problem with a minor attempting a feat of this magnitude...because her parents said she had once gone solo off the coast of California.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

The problem with these solo sails is fatigue, primarily. Let's remember also that the first guy to sail around the world alone went sufficiently crazy from doing so that he claimed the only reason he survived at some points was the ghost of Columbus' navigator standing watch for him. Mind you, that may well be the reason he survived, hallucinating someone to talk to could help keep you awake.

I've always wanted to sail around the world and would definitely take teenaged children along with me in doing so, but I would not sail with less than three adults so that we have 8 hour watches and everyone is rested enough to surge to activity in a major crisis. I also would tend for a larger, very heavily built yacht and certainly with two engines, for generally when in blue water you can ride out any storm in the world, even a full fledged hurricane, if you have engine power to keep your bow into the waves. Lose the engine and you're dead, and I sort of wonder if that's what happened; she got control over the situation but then the engine quit and with one person aboard she couldn't possibly diagnose the trouble and while trying to set enough sail to keep some kind of steering way was swept beam-ends and capsized. But that is, of course, just speculation.

[Stark]

Don't they have wierd sleeping schedules that maintain awareness as much as possible? You can't afford to sleep a regular 8-hour period when you're alone.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Don't they have wierd sleeping schedules that maintain awareness as much as possible? You can't afford to sleep a regular 8-hour period when you're alone.

Sleep is on a "when possible" basis when soloing. Ships and boats have autopilots after a fashion, but they're rather limited in what they can do, keeping a straight course and waking you if you're needed with alarms, or keeping you at a certain point to the wind.

[FSTargetDrone]

Yeah, it's not just the money. The personnel and equipment tied up for looking for this child might be needed to rescue other people, such as commercial sailors, who have legitimate reasons for being at sea.

This is really one of those things that should never have happened. I don't care how enthusiastic or experienced or self-confident she was or claimed to be, she had no business ever being in the middle of an ocean by herself. This sort of thing is just not worth the risk. It's inconceivable to me that her parents could be so utterly irresponsible in allowing her to actually go out and do this (never mind allowing the 17 year-old son to do so before). This is pants-on-head stupid decision-making. No matter how mature she may be (or may appear to be), she is a child and the idea of allowing a child to sail off alone across an ocean is madness to me. I just hope she gets to grow up.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Yeah, it's not just the money. The personnel and equipment tied up for looking for this child might be needed to rescue other people, such as commercial sailors, who have legitimate reasons for being at sea.

This is really one of those things that should never have happened. I don't care how enthusiastic or experienced or self-confident she was or claimed to be, she had no business ever being in the middle of an ocean by herself. This sort of thing is just not worth the risk. It's inconceivable to me that her parents could be so utterly irresponsible in allowing her to actually go out and do this (never mind allowing the 17 year-old son to do so before). This is pants-on-head stupid decision-making. No matter how mature she may be (or may appear to be), she is a child and the idea of allowing a child to sail off alone across an ocean is madness to me. I just hope she gets to grow up.

Everyone who wishes to travel between locations has a legitimate reason to be at sea, don't be absurd. And it's much safer than driving, which we also let 16 year olds do (though we shouldn't). The main difference is that still further safety gains can be acheived by having a larger crew for a given size of vessel. In principle 13 year old boys were for a long time sent to sea, but on large ships in which they were just a small fraction of the crew, which is also what should have been the situation here. Still, charging the rescue is ridiculous; it is a fundamental part of customary law of the sea that all at sea are required to render all possible aid and that the aid should be easily accepted.

If we start the precedent of charging for crucial aid, we're going to see more situations like what we already get where broken down ships in no immediate danger are subject to negotiations with the captain of the salvage tug, which was the direct cause of the wreck of the Amaco Cadiz. If they don't like the price you're quoting, they can just refuse the help and you can watch a supertanker slam into your coastline; that actually happened, and extending the prospect of that sort of clusterfuck to situations of urgent danger in addition to situations without pressing danger would not be a good thing.

[Alyeska]

If we start the precedent of charging for crucial aid, we're going to see more situations like what we already get where broken down ships in no immediate danger are subject to negotiations with the captain of the salvage tug, which was the direct cause of the wreck of the Amaco Cadiz. If they don't like the price you're quoting, they can just refuse the help and you can watch a supertanker slam into your coastline; that actually happened, and extending the prospect of that sort of clusterfuck to situations of urgent danger in addition to situations without pressing danger would not be a good thing.

Not exactly

[The Duchess of Zeon]

If we start the precedent of charging for crucial aid, we're going to see more situations like what we already get where broken down ships in no immediate danger are subject to negotiations with the captain of the salvage tug, which was the direct cause of the wreck of the Amaco Cadiz. If they don't like the price you're quoting, they can just refuse the help and you can watch a supertanker slam into your coastline; that actually happened, and extending the prospect of that sort of clusterfuck to situations of urgent danger in addition to situations without pressing danger would not be a good thing.

Not exactly

"Not exactly" ignores the fact that the delay did cause the Seefalke to turn away. A captain should not have to call the owners to get permission to authorize a tow, in fact it should be explicitly forbidden for the Captain to conference with the owners before implementing any measure intended to preserve the safety of the ship. The owners will always side with saving money and ignore the prospective risks. Ask the Captain of the New Carissa, which beached off Coos Bay because he was too afraid of getting in trouble for cutting an anchor cable and losing an anchor that he had it hauled in before trying to work off the beach. Big mistake. When your anchor is dragging on a lee shore, cut it and bring the engines to full power as quickly as possible. Same principle here, because of the relatively slow nature of disasters at sea which taken a dozen hours or days in many cases, there's never been the same pressure to give the ship's officers the same sort of latitude that pilots have in trying to save their aircraft, or more precisely there's been a countervailing pressure, where underpaid seamen from third world companies are forced into positions of gambling their future employability by corporate owners with no ability to understand what's going on aboard the ship.

[FSTargetDrone]

Everyone who wishes to travel between locations has a legitimate reason to be at sea, don't be absurd.

I disagree. She had no legitimate reason to be at sea, on her own. That is the absurdity here. We aren't talking about her making, say, some emergency trip. This is nothing more than an ill-conceived stunt.

And it's much safer than driving, which we also let 16 year olds do (though we shouldn't).

And air travel is even safer, but we aren't talking about various ways young people can cross great distances on their own. I'm only concerned with the foolish notion that it is in any way appropriate for a child to set out on a ship, alone, to sail on an ocean.

The main difference is that still further safety gains can be acheived by having a larger crew for a given size of vessel. In principle 13 year old boys were for a long time sent to sea, but on large ships in which they were just a small fraction of the crew, which is also what should have been the situation here.

That's all well and good, and I would be less incensed about this incident if it was, say, her and a parent (or preferably more than one adult, as you rightfully point out) attempting this voyage together. But apparently this girl and her parents saw it as something special in her doing this on her own.

Still, charging the rescue is ridiculous; it is a fundamental part of customary law of the sea that all at sea are required to render all possible aid and that the aid should be easily accepted.

I made no comment about charging people for rescue. I hope she's plucked from the water safe and sound. I lay little blame on her. My beef is with her idiot parents.

[hongi]

I disagree. She had no legitimate reason to be at sea, on her own. That is the absurdity here. We aren't talking about her making, say, some emergency trip. This is nothing more than an ill-conceived stunt.

The fact is that trips like these are absurdly expensive. You need the media attention, publicity and the sponsorship even if you want to undertake it for entirely selfish reasons like "I want to challenge myself".

I have no problem with a 16 year old sailing around the world, provided that he or she is experienced and well prepared enough. There is a fair bit of luck in it, but that's why you should be experienced to deal with unlucky situations. Preparation is also critical. You shouldn't be sailing into storms because you should have the weather checked out long before.

I'm not going to cheer if this teenager turns out to have drowned. I'm not going to criticise her either for attempting to sail around the world. Some people just like pushing themselves.

[Sea Skimmer]

MNSBC is saying she's been found alive, but they don't have a story for it yet just a banner

[FSTargetDrone]

MNSBC is saying she's been found alive, but they don't have a story for it yet just a banner

Saw that.

If this is true, it's good news.

There's a lesson here. I hope it was learned.