We set out into the Andaman Sea and to cross the Bay of Bengal in good spirits and made good progress for the first day or so. We spotted a dolphin for the first time in a while which we thought would be a good omen, and indeed the following day a whole pod came to play for an hour or so. Initially we were surrounded by ships exiting the Malacca Straits so a keen look out was needed.
Four days out we encountered heavy rain with thunder and lighting, which was to be more or less continuous for the next several days. We commented that the ships were like fireflies coming from all directions and we were nearly run down on several occasions no doubt because there was inadequate watch on the bridge.
We heard a cri d coeur from ‘Bionic’ who were ahead of us but believed they had something entangled in their propeller, so we altered course to close on them to provide any assistance that we could, as it was clearly not safe for Jaime to dive on it. This sort of help was the accepted norm of boats on the rally.
The winds were generally south or south-east force 3 to 4 but interspersed with vicious squalls gusting often to more than 40kts, so we had to be very alive to the sails that were set, at all times. Finally, as we were closing the last position that ‘Bionic’ had given us, Sarah asked over the radio where are you? Jaime answered I'm on my boat which was hardly surprising as he was half-way across the Bay of Bengal! By the time we had him in sight, he was able to report that whatever had been entangled with the propeller had dropped off and he was now fully seaworthy.
Now it would be true to say that the weather forecasting for this part of the ocean was not the best. In fact, we were about to be caught in an un-forecast tropical revolving storm. This hit us a thousand miles out of Phuket with 500 miles still to go to Galle. It started with continuous torrential rain with the radar being entirely black. The wind picked up from the south-west and steadily increased to forced nine with gusts over 60 kts with huge seas. In fact, the anemometer was carried away in a gust whilst it was reading over 60kts.
As usual, Sarah had gone to bed at midnight to try to get some rest, and during the early part of my watch I noticed that the automatic bilge pump was cycling on and off. I lifted one of the inspection panels in the cabin sole and to my horror saw that we were taking on substantial amounts of water. I immediately thought that a through-hull fitting had failed and shouted for Sarah to get up.
Now of course, I knew the position of every one of the 18 through-hull fittings like the back of my hand and went forward with the intention of inspecting each one of them from bow to stern. However, whilst lifting the cabin sole in the forward cabin, I was surprised to have a bucketful of water sprayed onto my neck from above. It turned out the anchor locker was completely full of water and as Moonbeam was submarining in the heavy seas, water was being pumped through the top of the forward bulkhead where it had not been sealed. This was the first and only time I cursed the build quality of Oyster Marine. I jury rigged a temporary seal, whilst starting the engine and running the engine bilge pump until we had eliminated most of the water. What a mess in the forward cabin! Everything was completely soaked in seawater. However, it was with great relief that we were not sinking, and it was unnecessary to seal the forward watertight door.
This started a spell of the worst weather we experienced on Moonbeam. As there had been no forecast of this storm, nor could we get any sense out of the rally organisers in Galle who we asked to obtain up to date forecasts for us. They merely contacted the Sri Lankan Navy in the first instance, who basically were unable to help, so we did not realise that we were in a tropical revolving storm and that it was tracking north-east. Had we known this and given that it would have been readily identified from satellite observation, it would have prompted us to turn south towards the Equator. However, we didn’t, and the nearest port was Trincomalee to the north-west and initially it seemed like a good idea to head for it. Just to illustrate how severe this storm was, the Falmouth coastguard received a call asking for medical advice when the skipper of ‘Baccus’ a 14m sailing vessel, injured his arm. Less than an hour later the yacht started to sink, and the crew contacted Falmouth coastguard again to say that in force 11 winds with high seas and heavy swell they had lost control of the yacht which was taking on water and sinking. Happily, the crew were rescued by the merchant vessel Maersk Surabaya which was en route to Malaysia, but the yacht was lost.
There were four boats caught in this storm, Moonbeam, ‘Nautibuoytoo’, ‘Bionic’ and ‘Natibou’. We set up a web on the HF so that we could communicate with each other and the rally organisers in Galle. Hans, off ‘Natibou’ who was from Sweden, acted as co-ordinator, and this provided some comfort to one another whilst we in caught in the storm. When we finally arrived in Galle, Hans still had sores on his forearms from leaning on his chart table whist on the HF.
It was clear that a substantial amount of water had somehow got into in the fuel tank which resulted in an engine failure, when I did not notice the warning from the Racor. Also, it meant that we were unable to run the gen-set without jury rigging some form of fuel supply separate to the main diesel tank. When the wind went into the west, we lay ahull for two days so that I could complete the jury-rig for a fuel supply for the generator, and hence start charging the batteries. I started to investigate what had happened to the fuel supply to the engine.
Eventually the storm blew itself out and the wind settled into the south-east once more and we were able to sail. In the meantime, I had taken the fuel injection pump off the engine and found that the internal shaft had fractured, when I dismantled it. This would be the first and only time that I could not fix a problem whilst at sea.
Now Moonbeam is a sailing vessel and at some point, the wind would enable us to continue to our destination. However, consequent on being in the rally there was a requirement to make landfall in order to join an excursion that had been arranged in Sri Lanka commencing 20 January. Consequently, we advised every one of our inability to meet this arrival time, as we had suffered an engine failure that was beyond repair and that we were becalmed.
It turned out that ‘Moonshine’ who had left Phuket after us, was running out of fuel and could not make landfall. Happily, although we had run out of wind, we still had plenty of fuel, so we organised a rendezvous. This was so that ‘Moonshiner’ could take us undertow whilst we provided them with fuel, so that we could both get to our destination.
Once we met up, we transferred a total of 120 litres of fuel, in two tranches, which was not an easy task at sea, but that enabled Dick and Sarah to tow us into Galle Harbour where we were met by a number of the Bluewater yachts and a host of Sri Lankan Navy staff.