The Rescue of Valiant and crew
on Monday August 7, 2017 04:50PM
Todays Richmond Paper had a first page article http://www.richmond.com/life/bill-lohmann/lohmann-after-rescue-at-sea-in-iceland-richmond-man-is/article_50d36b1d-5eaa-5c2e-b11d-ddc5854235ed.html about the rescue of Wes Jones and the crew of Valiant off Iceland.
Excerpts and Pictures below:
“All we can speculate is that one of those rogue waves crashed down us,” Piersol said as he sat and sipped coffee. “It broke on top of the boat and completely smashed the boat down into the water. Blew out the portholes on the low side. Took everything. It was a violent smashing. Wasn’t like a gentle, oh-my-gosh-we’re-rolling-over. It was, wham!
“Next thing you know, you’re rolling over and upside-down and water’s pouring over you. It took the boat over on its side and rolled it over. Once it went over, it kept going. Thank goodness. If the keel gets lost in an accident like that, you’ll stay upside-down, and that would have been bad.”
Piersol figures the whole episode didn’t last more than three or four seconds, but a racing mind can cover a lot of ground in that amount of time. About the time Piersol finished thinking, “We’re really in trouble,” the boat completed its 360-rollover and was upright again, though the deck had pretty much been stripped bare, including the mast.
