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Unconditional - ARC+ Leg 2, Day 3: All Hands on Deck!!



Blog Editor If you have something like this from me yesterday, ignore this message. My Draft folder showed ‘no content’ for the message – Tom
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  200nm out to sea at ~21.00hrs with the 1st shift on duty and the three others starting to get some rest, Evan yells “All Hands on Deck!!!” That expression is characteristically associated with: Crew overboard, hole in the hull, derigging, piracy, etc.; something dramatic! What was happening? We heard nothing... It turns out that unnoted by radar, we sailed within a meter or two of a buoy of some sort with a dim green light. Why green, and why 200nm west of Cape Verde? Suspicion is that it was a channel marker that made its escape from its chain, and is touring the North Atlantic.
  As we were sailing downwind at ~6-knots with a dual headsail configuration, the boat would not have been easy to quickly come about, and it was disturbingly impressive the separation distance that a few seconds allow. Message: STAY ON THE BOAT!
  Today’s malfunction is the SSB. I can hear clearly, but it will not “tune’ for transmission. Ah well, only 50% of the ARC+ yachts have/use SSB, and we have SAT Phone + 3 VHF Radios. Another Antigua or St. Lucia issue. In Las Palmas we had the tuner serviced and the coax cable to the SSB backstay antenna replaced. Peter of S/V Fleet II has agreed to assume my Net Controller segments.
  Tom Hughes


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