a photograph of Thunder Child next to the infamous rock. Safely
in the bag, two of the crew then attempted to land on the rock
itself before thinking better of it.
“There was still a 2m swell running and I was terrifi ed of what
might happen if one of them slipped and banged their head,”
says Frank. In the end, they had to settle for chipping a small
piece of rock of the cliff face as a memento before heading back
to the safety of the boat.
The run back down the West Coast of Ireland proved to be
relatively uneventful. A second refuelling stop in Ballyglass at
1pm the following day gave them all a chance to catch their
breath. Even Frank started to relax as they closed in on the
fi nishing straight. But there was one more job they all wanted
to do – paying their respects to the four crew members of Rescue
116 who were killed when their helicopter crashed into the sea
off Black Rock lighthouse earlier this year.
“If something happened to us, who else were we going to
call on?” said Frank with a catch in his voice. They stopped
the engines, laid a wreath and took a moment to refl ect on the
sacrifi ce they’d made to help people just like them before getting
back to the job in hand.
THE HOME STRAIGHT
A brush with some dense fog off the Skellig Islands off the south-
west corner of Ireland soon gave way to calm seas and bright
sunshine as they powered into the fi nal furlong. Frank wound
the engines up to full power as they sprinted towards the fi nish
line at 52 knots.
“I was hoping to keep the time under 34 hours but in the end,
we missed it by a few seconds due to a minor miscalculation, but
at that point we didn’t really care. The Cork harbourmaster had
sent out a pilot boat and a tug with water cannons to welcome
us home and there was a big crowd of supporters waiting for us
on the quay.”
The team had succeeded in setting a new world record for a
circumnavigation of Ireland via Rockall, covering 1,121nm in
34 hours and one minute at an average speed of 32 knots. The
engines never missed a beat and taking into account the four
hours they spent refuelling and at Rockall, their average underway
was 37 knots.
“We probably could have run her harder and set a faster time,”
admits Frank. “I even worked out that we lost half an hour to
pee stops as we has to slow down to less than 12 knots every
time anyone needed to go! However, we succeeded in our goal
of setting a new world record and demonstrated just how tough
and reliable the new boat is.”
Despite the lack of sleep and only managing to eat two doughnuts
and half a dozen Jaffa Cakes during the whole
34 hours, Frank maintains that he enjoyed the experience.
“As one of my friend’s said, ‘It can’t have been that bad as
I’ve seen you looking worse after a big night out.’”
So what now for Thunder Child and Safehaven Marine?
“I’m sure I’ll fi nd a new challenge at some point,” answers
Frank. “But for now, we’re focused on selling the demonstrator
and continuing to develop the XSV concept.”
If you’ve got a spare €1.2 million, it would certainly make
an exciting alternative to a Princess S60!41TRAVELFrank and crew
grab a selfi e in
front of the rockEverything you need
to set a new recordThe crew launched
a tiny infl atable to
capture this shot