“There was so much riding on
this record attempt that I couldn’t
relax, even though I trusted
my team completely”A SWELL TIME
Although the boat was coping well, it was taking its toll on the
crew, not least because every time a wave exploded over the
windscreen, they’d lose visibility as they waited for the water to
dissipate. A defl ection plate ensured the wipers were protected
from the full force of the blast but only when they were tucked
out of harm’s way.
“The adrenaline was pumping hard so I wasn’t physically tired,
but the stress of worrying about what might go wrong and the
consequences of such a public failure were a constant source
of concern,” admits Frank.
If it was this bad in the Irish Sea, the crew were now starting
to worry what it would be like when they rounded Rathlin Island
and headed out into the Atlantic properly. “We’d all seen the
pictures of monster waves crashing into Rathlin during a storm
but in fact, things started to calm down once we passed Belfast
at around 3pm and three hours later, we pulled into Port Rush
for our fi rst refuelling stop.”
Although the crew were grateful for the respite, after the fi rst
30 minutes of watching the fuel fl ow into the tanks, they started
to feel the frustration as the clock continued to tick away on their
record time. It took a full 90 minutes to take on the 4,000 litres
needed for the long leg out to Rockall and back but as Frank
says, it wasn’t just the fuel pump dictating their departure time.
“We wanted to arrive at Rockall in daylight so we could take
pictures of the moment. We weren’t coming all this way only
to round it in the dark without ever setting eyes on it.”
So when they set off from Port Rush at around 8pm, he
deliberately kept the speed down to 33 knots with a view to
arriving just as the dawn broke at 4.30am. Mary and Carl took
turns at the helm through the night while the rest of the crew
tried to catch a few hours sleep hunkered down in the back
of the wheelhouse or strapped into one of the reclining seats.“To be honest, I was too fi red up to get much sleep,” confesses
Frank. “There was so much riding on this record attempt that
I couldn’t relax, even though the boat was running fi ne and I
trusted my team completely.
“It actually never got completely dark as this far north, there
was always a strip of light on the horizon – but it was still a pivotal
moment when the silhouette of Rockall started to emerge out of
the gloom.”ROUND THE RUGGED ROCK
To record the moment, the team launched a tiny two-man
infl atable they’d brought along for the purpose of capturing40TRAVELRockall emerges
from the cold
Atlantic swell
Powering back to
Cork after covering
1,121nm in 34 hours