So close and yet so far - near miss for Zac Sunderland

by Nancy Knudsen on 13 Jul 2009 Surely nothing can stop him now - but you're never home until you're home.

Even as the excitement rises in the sailing circles of Zac Sunderland's home state of California, Zac, within days of becoming the youngest sailor ever to circumnavigate the world solo, has had a near miss with a ship at sea.

In Zac's matter of fact way, Zac tells the story, and there's no better way to hear it than from his own calm writing:

'Last night as I was sending off my blog my AIS alarm went off showing that I had a ship 30 miles off. It's track looked like it would pass a few miles off. I finished sending off my blog just as the 16 mile alarm went off. The track still showed that it would pass well clear so I set the alarm for 4 miles and went to get some sleep thinking that it would pass clear of Intrepid.

'A few minutes later, the alarm went off again. The ship must have altered course after passing Guadalupe Island and now was headed directly at me. I hit tha data button on the AIS and saw that the ship's name was Maersk Kure and it was going 19 knots which is really fast for a container ship.

'I hailed them a couple times on the VHF but got no answer so I tacked over. With the light wind, I was only making 3 knots. They didn't have their nav lights on - only two white lights at the bow and stearn. It was impossible to see their exact angle.

'I tried to hail them a couple more times and then the San Diego Coast Guard heard me and they tried to hail the ship. Still no response. By now the ship was less than a mile away. I grabbed my flare gun out of the chart desk and watched the blip on the radar screen hit the half mile mark.

'The Coast Guard was still hailing the ship but with no response. I told the Coast Guard that if they came within a 1/4 mile I would start shooting off flares and went back in the cockpit to stare at the lights trying to make out the silhouette of the ship.

'The ship crossed the 1/4 mile mark I put a flare in the gun. Just then I saw the silhouette of the ship so I altered course a bit more and the ship passed less than 1/4 mile off. It is pretty crazy to have a ship with no one on lookout. It only took about 15 minutes for the ship to pass me after the 4 mile alarm.

'To their credit the San Diego Coast Guard were totally organized and helpful. They had notified their cutter that was in the area what my position was and I am certain that had anything happened they would have been right on it.

'After the ship, the wind stayed light all through the night and into the morning but now I've got a nice 13 knots that is predicted to stay steady so I am officially on the homeward tack!'

Bravo Zac - it's your calm handling of so many could-have-been crises during this journey on Intrepid that has brought you this far. Intrepid is a good word for you too, and Sail-World is with you and cheering.