Injured Golden Globe sailor rescued 3500km from Australia

Rescuers have reached an injured Golden Globe race competitor injured last week after huge seas left him drifting and helpless in the Southern Ocean.

The French fisheries patrol vessel Osiris reached Abhilash Tomy about 3.30pm yesterday Australian time. Tomy suffered a severe back injury after his 10-metre ketch rolled in storm conditions generating 70-knot winds and 15-metre seas on Friday and was dismasted. He has been unable to move from his bunk.

“Tomy is concious, talking and onboard the Orisis," the Australian Maritime Safety Authority, which was coordinating the multinational rescue effort, said in a statement. "Australian and Indian long range P8 Orion reconnaissance aircraft are circling overhead. Thuriya’s position is 39 32.79S and 78 3.29E."

The French rescue boat is now heading towards Amsterdam Island, where a doctor is waiting to assess Tomy. The injured skipper was transferred to the Osiris after the French crew consulted the doctor, with the team prepared to tow the disabled Thuriya back to Amsterdam Island if Tomy could not be moved.

Tomy is taking part in the Golden Globe Race, a revival of a what organisers say is a step back to the golden age of yacht racing. However, the race’s origins are clouded in controversy, with only one of the nine yachts taking part in the original 1968 event circumnavigating the world.

Race organisers reported that Tomy’s dismasted ketch, had its rigging acting like a sea brake, was at “the limit of immediate rescue range”.

Another Golden Globe competitor, Irishman Gregor McGuckin, was also dismasted, but had attempted to reach Tomy's position to help with the rescue effort. He made the decision to abandon his vessel given how close rescuers were to his position, and the condition of his boat.

Australia has sent help via a Navy vessel. “Royal Australian Navy Frigate, HMAS Ballarat, will sail from Perth for the yacht’s last known location,” the Department of Defence said in a statement released yesterday. “The ship joins a P-8A Poseidon [search plane] from the Adelaide-based Surveillance and Response Group, Royal Australian Air Force, which has been deployed to La Reunion Island, France, to assist in the search.”

The navy was called in at the request of the Canberra-based Australian Maritime Safety Authority’s Joint Rescue Coordination Centre.

AMSA told boatsales.com.au yesterday that it had tasked a French fisheries patrol vessel, Osiris, to respond, which is expected to arrive on the scene sometime today. HMAS Ballarat is expected to take several days to reach the stricken yacht.

“The Indian Armed Forces are supporting the search with an additional P-8 aircraft,” AMSA said. “AMSA is coordinating aircraft on scene to confirm the condition and location of the damaged yacht until a rescue vessel arrives.”

Tomy’s rescue attempt bears striking similarity to that of solo sailor Tony Bullimore, an ex-Royal Marine who was recovered alive in 1997 after his yacht racing in the Globe Vendee race capsized and lost its keel in 90-knot winds about 2500km from the Western Australian coastline. He spent four days sheltering inside the upturned hull before swimming out to crew from the HMAS Adelaide after hearing them tap on the hull.

His rescue sparked controversy after it was revealed the Adelaide’s rescue effort sparked by the high-risk Globe Vendee race cost Australian taxpayers about $6 million.

The Australian rescue mission did have one positive outcome; it sparked the amalgamation of the nation’s rescue centres into a single entity called Australian Search and Rescue. A year later it was to play a pivotal role in the infamous 1998 Sydney to Hobart yacht race in which six people died, and another 55 were winched to safety aboard Royal Australian Navy helicopters.