Fatal Storm (33 page)

Amid a forest of masts crewmen hang like monkeys while making final checks of rigging before the race start. Most masts are aluminium and the rigging stainless steel rod or wire.

It was a “brochure day” for the start on Sydney Harbour on December 26, 1998. Hundreds of thousands of spectators followed the excitement either from boats or vantage points along the harbour foreshores.

Gary Ticehurst, the man who became a vital cog in search and rescue operations, at the controls of the television news helicopter that followed the race. This was the 16th Sydney to Hobart he had covered.

The classic old yacht
Winston Churchill
sets off on her fateful passage south. This yacht was one of nine that contested the very first Sydney to Hobart race in 1945.

The way we were. This is the position repoort for the race fleet just when the “weather bomb” was exploding an Bass Strait.

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) search and rescue headquarters in Canberra. This is the Rescue Control Centre (RCC) from where the search and rescue operation was coordinated.

The eye of the storm in Bass Strait. This satellite photograph reveals the intensity of the storm south east of the Australian mainland.

The Mooloolaba entry
Midnight Special
making good speed towards Hobart before a strengthening north-easterly breeze. This yacht was rolled twice and eventually sank during the storm.

Solo Globe Challenger
heads away from the coast south of Sydney. This supposedly very seaworthy design was dismasted during the storm and went within an ace of being lost.

The Tasmanian entry,
Business Post Naiad
, surges south under spinnaker towards her home waters. Just a day later the crew was fighting for their lives and to save the badly damaged yacht.

The 42-footer
Miintinta
was entered in the race for the fun of it. Its lines came from one of Australia’s most respected yacht designers of the 60s and 70s – Ron Swanson.

Sword of Orion
was sailed by one of the most experienced crews in the race. At the height of the storm this Grand Prix level racer had to contend with waves considerably higher than its mast.