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‘Below Deck Mediterranean’ Captain Mark Howard’s cause of death revealed

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Captain Mark Howard’s cause of death has been revealed nearly two months after the “Below Deck Mediterranean” star passed away . 

Howard died naturally of hypertensive cardiovascular disease — with chronic alcoholism listed as a contributory cause, according to the medical examiner’s report obtained by Page Six. E! was the first to report Howard’s cause of death .

The Bravo alum — who appeared on Season 1 of “Below Deck Med” in 2016 — died at age 65 in October. 

“Our thoughts and sincerest sympathies are with the family and friends of the respected Captain Mark Howard,” the network  wrote in a statement  at the time. 

“As the captain of the first season of ‘Below Deck Med,’ he will always be remembered for his many contributions and mentorship and will forever remain part of the Bravo family.”

Howard — a native of Michigan who was a yacht captain for nearly 30 years — was known on the show for his warm demeanor, hands-on interactions with his crew and a penchant for prioritizing charter guests at all costs. 

“Be honest, work hard, and pay attention to senior crew members while never forgetting the golden rule of yachting: ‘The guest is always right,’” he previously said, detailing his advice to aspiring yachties. 

Following his death, Howard’s third stewardess Tiffany Jones (Copeland) paid tribute to him in a sweet Twitter post. 

“RIP Captain Mark Howard. You were a joy to be around,”  she captioned photos of herself posing with Howard and his crew. 

Meanwhile, Chief stewardess Hannah Ferrier applauded Howard for being an outstanding captain, friend and colleague. “Always the gentleman,” she wrote. “You will be missed.”

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Tragedy at Sea Aboard Atlantic Rally for Cruisers Yacht Agecanonix

The 36th Atlantic Rally for Cruisers (ARC) began their ocean crossing on November 21 from Las Palmas de Gran Canaria toward the Caribbean island of Saint Lucia. But bad news is now reported concerning a casualty among the 141 participating yachts.

“ World Cruising Club is sad to report the death of crew member Max Delannoy on board the ARC yacht Agecanonix during the night of 26/27 November. The full circumstances of the incident are not known at this point. The three-man, all French crew, were sailing Agecanonix, an X-Yachts X4.3, as part of the ARC IRC Racing Division, and had opted for a course well to the north of the rhumb line route to Saint Lucia, aiming to avoid the light winds affecting the southerly route close to Cape Verde.”

A MAYDAY call was made from the Agecanonix around midnight November 26-27 requesting a medical evacuation. However, the injured crew member Max Delannoy was declared dead before any outside help could be provided.

MRCC France Gris-Nez was initially involved in controlling the incident, before passing over to MRCC Ponta Delgada in the Azores, as the closest station to the Agecanonix. At the request of MRCC, the cruise ship PV Mein Schiff 1, diverted to evacuate Philippe Anglade, who was also injured, Jean-Philippe Anglade and the body of Max Delannoy.

The Inspiring Journey of Jessica Watson, Australia’s Youngest Solo Sailor

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Dark waters: how the adventure of a lifetime turned to tragedy

The Clipper round the world yacht race was created for amateurs seeking the ultimate challenge. But did they underestimate the risks?

O n 18 November 2017, Simon Speirs, 60, a retired lawyer from Bristol, was hauling on his waterproofs below deck on a yacht in rough seas in the Southern Ocean. For nearly three months, he’d endured cold, cramped quarters, soaked clothing, sea sickness and very little sleep. As one of the crews competing in the Clipper Round the World yacht race, Speirs had completed more than 13,000 nautical miles since leaving Britain, but the wild remoteness of the Southern Ocean was more challenging than anything he had experienced before.

Speirs had a hacking cough and a heavy cold, but as leader of the watch he had to get out on deck. The race had so far taken them across the northern Atlantic Ocean to Uruguay and back across the southern Atlantic to South Africa. Two months in, he’d asked for a break. But after only a week his replacement had fallen out of his bunk and hurt his wrist, and Speirs had to resume his role.

By 2pm, the wind was getting stronger; the yacht lurched up and down waves the size of steep hills. The captain ordered the crew to change the headsail to make the boat easier to control. Speirs made his way to the foredeck, but, at that moment, a massive wave hit, sweeping him over the side.

Speirs was still attached to the boat with a tether. For several minutes he was dragged behind the boat in the roiling waves, while the crew tried to haul him back in. Then the clip on his harness snapped, and he lost contact with the yacht. It took three attempts and 32 minutes to pull him back on board, by which time he was dead.

Simon Speirs is exactly the sort of person Robin Knox-Johnston, the veteran sailor, had in mind when he founded the Clipper Round the World yacht race more than 25 years ago. At that time, the only people who got to race boats around the world were professional sailors. Clipper was designed for ordinary people: offering training and the opportunity to join a mixed-ability crew, it would enable customers to achieve the ambition of a lifetime.

The race is held every two years. Eleven yachts, each with a paying crew of 16-22 amateurs, led by a professional skipper and a qualified first mate, start from an English port, and take up to 11 months to cover 40,000 nautical miles. Paying crew can choose to do one or more legs of the journey, and it isn’t cheap. To take part in the whole race, over seven or eight legs, costs around £50,000. The route takes in some of the world’s most treacherous seas, but you don’t need any sailing experience to participate. According to Clipper Ventures, the company that runs the race, around 40% of participants are complete novices. Since it began, the race has become hugely popular.

Clipper Ventures is not the first outfit to sell an iconic and dangerous challenge to amateurs. On 23 May 2019, 354 climbers made it to the top of Mount Everest in a single day . This included a dentist, an architect, a surgeon, a CEO and a housewife, who had each paid between £33,000 and £100,000. The oldest was 64. The commercialisation of extreme adventure has been made possible by advances in technical equipment like satnav and portable oxygen metres, and turbocharged by a hunger for personal growth and fulfilment. But it has also been accompanied by accidents and tragedies. May 2019 was one of the deadliest seasons on record: 11 climbers died on Everest in nine days . According to reports, overcrowding and underprepared climbers were partly to blame.

There have been other fatal accidents on the Clipper race, too. On 4 September 2015, Andrew Ashman , 49, a paramedic from Orpington, south-east London, was standing in a known danger zone in the yacht’s cockpit area when he was struck by the boom and suffered a fatal neck injury. Six months later, on the same boat, Sarah Young , 40, an entrepreneur from London with no previous sailing experience, died after being swept overboard by a wave. She was not clipped on.

According to a report by the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) into Speirs’s death, published in June 2019, 17 people fell overboard from Clipper yachts between 2013 and 2018. Just over two weeks before Speirs went overboard, a Clipper yacht ran aground and had to be abandoned in a “very serious” incident just off the coast of South Africa. An MAIB investigation into that incident published in June 2018 concluded that the inexperience of the crew was a factor: “With only one professional, employed seafarer on board, the Clipper yachts were not safely manned for the round the world race.”

“If you read Clipper’s material, you’d think their number one concern was to keep people safe, but they have failed in so many ways,” said Margaret Speirs, Simon’s widow, when we first met in 2020. “I believe the company is compromised by their desire to make money out of these races.”

Knox-Johnston has strongly denied such claims. “Safety is a core principle of the Clipper Race, ahead of the racing element of the event itself, and therefore the most important part of the training of its crew,” Clipper Ventures said in a statement to the Guardian. The company says it has made investments in safety gear, becoming “the first ocean-racing company to introduce personal AIS beacons into its lifejackets to aid recovery of a man overboard”.

After the deaths of Ashman and Young in the 2015-16 race, the future of Clipper looked uncertain, a source who works at Clipper Ventures told me. “I thought, nobody is going to want to sign up.” But, in fact, applications increased. People are drawn by the chance to do something exceptional – and the risk is part of the attraction. Many customers, the source said, tend to think: “This is really dangerous! This is something I’ve got to do!”

T he founder of Clipper Ventures, Knox-Johnston, became the first person to sail solo around the world , without stopping, in 1969. In the memoir he published soon after his return, he describes the hardships he endured. His boat leaks, his water supply gets polluted, his steering gear is smashed, he shoots a shark when it comes too close, and suffers what was later diagnosed as a burst appendix. He carries on, undaunted. This, it seems, is the Knox-Johnston way. At the age of 68, he became the oldest person to race solo around the world. He had got irritated with people saying he was past it.

In the autumn of 1995, the same year he received a knighthood, Knox-Johnston placed newspaper ads to see how many people would be willing to pay to become part of a round-the-world crew. The response suggested that there may be a viable business in the idea. William Ward, a former property developer, who became CEO of Clipper Ventures, invested £1.8m.

Knox-Johnston commissioned eight new boats – Bluewater 58 sloops – from Colvic, a shipyard near Chelmsford, Essex. The company set up a base in Plymouth, Devon, and Knox-Johnston recruited friends from the sailing world, many ex-servicemen, as skippers. As soon as the boats were completed, they began training crew, taking on additional skippers as they went.

On 16 October 1996, the first race left Plymouth with the eight boats. The race was a success, and over the next few years Clipper built itself into an international brand. Major companies started to sponsor the boats (Garmin, Nasdaq), as did charities such as Unicef, and, from 2002, British cities such as Leeds, Liverpool and Glasgow. “Since the first race in 1996, the event has been transformed from a low-key amateur sailing race into a major, and highly profitable, international event attracting the interest of the world’s media and business leaders,” wrote Ward in Clipper company accounts in 2007. In the following years, the company continued to grow.

After the 2011-12 race, the company upgraded its yachts, and launched the new Clipper 70s, manufactured in China. They were longer and faster than the previous yachts, reflecting Clipper’s ambitions for more exciting racing. In 2018, Clipper expanded its business to Asia with the launch of a China-based division, Clipper China. In 2019, the company made a profit of £3.2m; by 2020 it had a staff of 86.

The man at the heart of this success, Knox-Johnston, is, in the words of the Daily Mail , “a patriotic Englishman of the old school”, who “embodies the spirit of the stiff upper lip”. He has little time for what he sees as unnecessary bureaucracy. In his autobiography, he criticised the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA), the government department that enforces safety at sea and sets standards for the Clipper race. Knox-Johnston complained about its ridiculous and “inappropriate” rules for small racing yachts.

Knox-Johnston sees the race as a life-changing opportunity. Ben Bowley, a skipper and chief instructor, who worked for Clipper Ventures for nine years from 2011, was impressed by Knox-Johnston’s vision and belief. “He has drive, passion and his ability to convey the awesomeness [of the race] is quite captivating.” Having completed the race, Knox-Johnston wrote in his autobiography, people “usually feel confident to take on greater challenges”. He continued: “They have painted their lives with bright colours, not pastel shades, and that brightness is like a drug and they want more of it.”

T he moment Simon Speirs decided he was going to sail around the world came in 1992, when he was in his mid-30s. Watching the first TV footage of the Whitbread Round the World race, he was entranced by the huge seas of the Southern Ocean. “It then became more a case of ‘when’ rather than ‘if’,” he later wrote on his blog. Ocean sailing was his wife’s idea of misery, but she understood his obsession. “Simon was excited about it. It was his retirement dream to do it before he was too old, too infirm,” she said.

Speirs, a senior partner in a Bristol legal firm, was meticulous and thorough. He liked to-do lists and DIY, and had a dry sense of humour. He also had an adventurous side. Every two years he would take on a challenge to raise money for charity: he had climbed the Three Peaks (the highest mountains of Scotland, England and Wales), cycled from Land’s End to John O’Groats, run a 66-mile race in the Lake District.

Speirs originally signed up for the 2015-16 race. But he deferred his place because work was busy and his oldest son was getting married. Better to wait until the next race, 2017-18, when he would be 60 and newly retired. He kept fit by cycling six miles a day to work.

Speirs was a keen amateur sailor. He kept a couple of dinghies on a reservoir in Chew Valley, Somerset, where he had “sailing Sundays” with his children. He had a son and a daughter with his first wife, who died in 1991, and two sons with Margaret, whom he married in 1996. He had skippered chartered yachts on family holidays in the Mediterranean. “But that in no way compares with the experience of these huge racing yachts in these wild oceans,” said Margaret.

Training for the Clipper race consists of four courses, levels 1-4, each lasting a week. This process, which is compulsory for participants, covers basic sailing techniques – headsail changes, tacking, gybing, helming; as well as race strategy and safety. Trainee crew also sail offshore, mostly in the Solent, and later spend a few nights in the Channel. “The Solent and the Channel are widely recognised as one of the best sailing grounds in the world for training,” said a spokesperson for Clipper Ventures, because “of the complexity of tides, shipping, navigational hazards and inclement weather”.

The people who sign up for the Clipper race tend to be middle-aged men of means. Many are at a turning point in their lives: just divorced, promoted, retired, bereaved, recovering from illness. Nathan Harrow, then 43, a business consultant, decided to sign up as a round-the-worlder in the 2017-18 race after a period of stress and depression after redundancy. “Clipper was me drawing a line under the old me and getting my confidence back,” he told me.

Mary Morrison, a mentor for troubled children, from south-west London, was 65 and perfectly content with her life, when she did the 2015-16 race. “One of the guys I was sailing with said, ‘You’re the one least after change, but you’ll probably change the most’, and that was probably true,” she says. She gained new friends, an appreciation of the scale and sheer beauty of our planet, and a sense of how we need to look after it more. “And it gave me a lot of confidence,” she said. Another woman in her 60s, who did the third leg of the 2017-18 race, told me it was the best thing she had ever done.

Crew are assigned to each yacht a few weeks before the race. The aim is to balance experience and ability across the fleet. Whether everyone gets on is a matter of pure chance. “It’s one big social experiment,” said a crew member who did the race in 2007-8 and again in 2017-18. “If you’re lucky, you have a good time. It’s partly to do with the characters involved.”

Each boat is certified for 24 people including one skipper, who in 2017 was paid about £38,000 a year, plus £150 a day for six months of training beforehand. (“We ensure that our skippers share Clipper Ventures’ ethos of safety above all else,” said Clipper Ventures. “Anyone who fails safety standards is dismissed.”)

For many years, Clipper were required to have two professional sailors on board during the race, under the MCA’s small commercial vessel code. However, a freedom of information request shows that in 2010, Knox-Johnston lobbied the MCA to allow him to replace the second qualified person with a trained-up member of the fee-paying crew. The MCA refused. In 2012, with the MCA under new leadership, Knox-Johnston tried again. “We have tried to make the system of having two qualified people aboard each boat work,” he said in a meeting with the MCA on 1 August, but, he said, it is “not financially sustainable”.

Knox-Johnston had a subsequent meeting with the MCA at Clipper’s base in Gosport, Hampshire, at the end of September. Details of the meeting were not released. A year later, in October 2013, the MCA granted Knox-Johnston’s wish. From that point on, it wouldn’t be necessary to have two professionals on board. All that was required was one fully qualified skipper, and a second person who had successfully completed the company’s coxswain training course.

The Clipper coxswain’s course lasts 12 days, and is paid for by Clipper. The company aims to have two people on each boat who have taken the course, which covers use of radar, reading wind direction and force from a chart, calculating tidal flow and ocean currents, and manoeuvring the yacht safely into a berth in a port or harbour. Some sources I spoke to were sceptical about whether this training is really a match for hands-on experience. “As a professional sailor you’re trained to look and see things that are going wrong ahead of catastrophe,” said one skipper. “You’ve got to have this ability to stand back and look at the whole picture, all the time.”

After the deaths of Ashman and Young in the 2015-16 race, the MAIB urged Clipper to review its manning policy. “The special nature of the Clipper Round the World yacht race places a huge responsibility on one person to ensure the safety of the yacht and its crew at all times,” the MAIB wrote in April 2017.

Four months later, the 2017-18 race started without a second paid professional on board any of the boats.

T he race was not quite what Speirs had imagined. Seven weeks in, he described the trip on his blog as “acute discomfort mingled with elation and awe”. High points included the “beauty of the sky at night”, the “soft swish” of the boat through calm sea, the camaraderie of the crew and an encounter with a pod of dolphins. Less enjoyable was the sea sickness, the cold and the lack of sleep. Speirs had dropped two trouser sizes since the start of the race, a fact he attributed to the physical effort of sailing. Pulling ropes. Grinding winches. “I miss you very much,” he wrote in a letter to Margaret, on 10 October. The experience, he said, was “not a barrel of laughs”. But he still planned to complete all eight stages. “I am too stubborn to drop out,” he wrote on his blog.

Not all of his fellow crew members were so reluctant to quit. Mark Tucker, then 40, had signed up to do the whole Clipper 2017-18 race and was assigned to Great Britain, the same boat as Speirs. (The boat was sponsored by the British government, as part of a marketing campaign to attract tourism and investment; on 2 August, the crew were photographed outside 10 Downing Street .) However, Tucker left after the first leg because of his concerns about safety. He felt that there was insufficient time before the start of the race for maintenance and repairs to the boat. At the time, he wrote a resignation letter to skipper Andy Burns, explaining his thinking, but he wasn’t able to speak candidly in public because he’d signed an NDA. “In retrospect,” Tucker told me, “I view them very much as a media/PR company that happens to do a bit of sailing, rather than the other way around.”

By the end of the second leg, Speirs was exhausted. At the end of the 10-day stopover in Cape Town, South Africa, he wrote on his blog that he had used the layover to “repair and recharge”. He went to bed early and ate healthily. He got his haircut and met up with his daughter, Katherine, and her husband. She gave him a fruit cake baked by her mother-in-law.

On 31 October 2017, the Clipper boats began the third leg of the race: Cape Town to Fremantle, Australia. A journey of more than 4,700 nautical miles, it would take about 23 days and pass through the Southern Ocean, one of the world’s most dangerous waters. An area of almost constant high wind and frequent gales, it is where one of the highest ever waves was recorded – 120 feet.

For this third leg, the crew had dropped from 20 at the start of the race to 16. The average age was 50, but the overall sailing experience was greater than on the previous two legs. Tim Jeffery, then 56, an architect from London who had sailed small boats for 15 years, had signed up for the first leg “to get to know people”, and the third leg for the Southern Ocean. “It is the most remote place in the world,” he told me. “The sea is dramatic. It’s challenging because of the size of the waves. You also get very fast sailing and it’s hard work.”

The crew was divided into two groups operating a system of five watches a day: two shifts of six hours from 8am; three shifts of four hours from 8pm. Everyone was given a job: engineer, medic, treasurer. As well as head of his watch, Speirs was the nominated sail repairer. He became known as “Tailor of Gloucester” on account of the hours he spent at the sewing machine with glasses perched on the end of his nose.

Speirs was also the Clipper coxswain, regarded as the skipper’s second in command. Great Britain had actually started the race with three paying crew members who had completed the Clipper coxwain’s course: one was Tucker; the other, apart from Speirs, was Jon Milne, then 50, an IT director, who was injured at the time of Speirs’s accident. A common theme of Speirs’s blog was that he felt overworked.

Everyone on Great Britain was delighted with their captain, Andy Burns. Then 31, Burns had started sailing as a schoolboy in Lincolnshire. After working on superyachts and for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, he joined Clipper Ventures as an instructor in 2015. This was his first race as skipper.

Speirs regarded Burns as an ally. Both were good with people, patient, enthusiastic. Burns prioritised safety over speed. He “assessed the abilities and limitations of his crew to the extent that, during leg two, he made the decision not to race competitively, but to sail conservatively”, according to the June 2019 MAIB report.

Once the boat was sailing through the Southern Ocean in extremely cold weather, the shortage of experienced hands became a problem. Speirs wasn’t able to rest as there was no one to take his place. “The boats are set up for a certain number of crew,” according to a source at Clipper Ventures. “You need that many people to be able to work the boat. If you’re one or two people down that’s very problematic, and of course it makes the rest of the crew tired.”

After the 2014-15 race, a fitness test became part of the interview. Crew have to show they can climb on to a top bunk (not so easy when the boat is listing at 45 degrees) and get on the boat without using a ladder. The source said they felt Clipper Ventures’ vetting process needed to be tougher. Being at sea can be petrifying. “People become frozen with fear and start behaving out of character and become very difficult because they’re frightened.”

One person, who did not want to give his name, signed up for leg three on Great Britain in the 2017-18 race. In the final week of training, the boats raced down to France and back. “The weather was hideous. We had 18 people on board and there was probably only four or five of us that managed to keep the boat sailing. The rest were incapacitated downstairs. I was burning myself out covering for other people. When we pulled up into the dock, I packed my bags and I said, I’m done, it’s not safe.”

The dropout rate among round-the-worlders is 40%, wrote Speirs on his blog. Things must get very bad, because crew are liable for 100% of the fees if they drop out during the race. “People remortgage homes and invest significant amounts of money in the adventure,” said one former crew member. “Sometimes as much as £100k if you include insurance, food, accommodation, flights, kit etc. It’s going to take something pretty serious to knock them off course.”

A part from injuries and fatigue among the crew of Great Britain, a major concern was the condition of the boat. In an email to Clipper’s management on 3 July 2017, six weeks before the start of the race, Speirs had pointed out that Great Britain was leaking. “Still working hard to keep water out. Not easy job and pretty hairy when boat kicking around. This should have been sorted out at refit before handover. It’s a safety issue,” Speirs wrote in his blog on 12 August.

The boat was still leaking when it left Liverpool on 20 August 2017. Within two days the generator packed up. The water maker, which turns salt water into drinking water, didn’t work for three weeks. “Andy [Burns, the captain] was spending his entire time dealing with maintenance issues on a boat that was three weeks into a year-long circumnavigation,” said Mark Tucker. “If he’s down below sorting out why the water maker doesn’t work or the generator doesn’t work, he’s not on deck coaching people, making sure the boat’s being sailed safely.”

As part of its investigation, MAIB singled out an issue with the guardrail and supporting stanchions, which may have been partly responsible for Speirs’s death. The guardrail, which was designed to keep crew from falling overboard, was damaged in rough seas on 4 November, 13 days before Speirs’s accident. The crew managed to lash up the guardrail by wrapping rope around it. “The repair was not great,” said Tim Jeffery. “We had to be extra careful on the foredeck after that.”

The MAIB report identified a series of problems with Great Britain. “The cumulative effect of the defects was to increase workload for the crew, contributing to their fatigue, lowering morale, and distracting from sailing and gaining sailing experience,” it stated.

There were problems on other boats. Unicef had to be bailed out every four hours, on legs one and two, according to one round-the-world sailor. Unicef started the race with a broken fuel pump. The generator failed on the first leg. Two crew members who had signed up to do the whole race left Unicef after leg two, saying they were unhappy with the number of problems with the boat that needed attention.

Staff at Clipper put the malfunctions down to normal wear and tear. The boats had been around the world twice at that point, they say, as well as being used in training and for corporate events. “Some people believe that because they are paying to go around the world, the boat should be like hiring a car,” said Lance Shepherd, skipper on Liverpool during the 2017-18 race. “Everything should be immaculate, ready to go. But that is not how boats work. They are much more fickle and difficult to maintain.” Clipper’s management was prudent, he said. “They put safety first and foremost.” The boats “get stripped right back and overhauled” at the end of every race.

But there were also problems with the Clipper 70s from the outset. Clipper Ventures first discovered an issue in 2013, when the new hulls were shipped to the UK from China. There were gaps in the layers of fibreglass-type material, which could “make the boat more prone to cracks in extreme seas”, a marine surveyor told me.

Clipper had the entire fleet surveyed in February and March 2013. They had the “bad parts” cut out of the new boats and relaminated, according to Knox-Johnston. Not an easy job, given the scale of the problem, or the time frame in which repairs had to be done. The 2013-14 race was due to start in just over six months’ time. It couldn’t be delayed. Sponsors were signed up, the jamboree of corporate backers, supporters and families was already planned in each port.

Crew members later expressed concerns that there were too many problems to fix in the short time before departure. Garmin crew member Kira Pecherska, an experienced and highly qualified sailor, said there was no time for proper sea trials. “If you send a boat on a transatlantic journey, especially with beginners on board, who have no experience in sailing at all, at least these boats must be trusted. And you can only trust your boat when you test it.” (Clipper Ventures said: “Clipper Race yachts are well built, well tested and maintained by a dedicated and highly skilled maintenance team who travel to every port of call on the race route.”)

The source who works at Clipper Ventures told me there was anxiety about reporting problems: “There is a fear culture, that prevents a lot of that. They [skippers] are thinking, I’m going to get crucified for letting that happen.”

According to Clipper Ventures, on stopovers Knox-Johnston and Ward have “been accessible to all sailing staff and crew for any questions or concerns. They created a culture of openness and this continues with all Clipper Ventures staff today.”

A t about 2pm on 18 November 2017, Simon Speirs came up on deck, wearing a foul-weather jacket and salopettes. Conditions were rough: his fellow sailors had never seen such massive seas. His wedding ring was tied around his neck on a leather shoelace: jewellery was considered a safety hazard on board. He was one of five crew on the foredeck lowering the headsail. He was attached to the deck with a safety tether.

At 2.14pm, Great Britain was hit by a huge wave. The yacht dropped into a trough, slewed violently, and Speirs was thrown into the water. One crew member, who did not want to be named, saw Speirs with his lifejacket inflated, being dragged alongside the boat. He leaned over to try to grab him, but Speirs was just out of reach. He tried pulling on the tether, but the boat was going too fast. He could see Speirs was struggling as the water buffeted him. “He was constantly being hit by the waves. Never able to gather his breath.”

The crew member managed to hand Speirs a rope with a lifting hook to attach to his lifejacket, in order to winch him out of the water. Speirs tried to clip the rope to his lifejacket, but he was getting exhausted. “Water was going over his face and he was being bashed against the side of the boat.” As Speirs was dragged through the sea, his clip bent out of shape. At 2.22pm, it snapped open.

“My immediate thought was, thank God, he’s not going to drown by being dragged along by this boat,” said the crew member. “We can get the boat under control and go back and get him. We’ll get him in two minutes. It’s not dark. It will be fine.” But turning the boat around in strong wind and very rough seas was not easy. It took three attempts to retrieve Speirs from the sea. Finally, at 2.54pm, 40 minutes after he fell in the water, six crew lifted Speirs on board Great Britain. His lifejacket was cut off and crew carefully carried him below deck. He was already dead.

After Speirs’s body was brought aboard, the skipper radioed to the Australian coastguard. Clipper tried to contact Margaret, but when they couldn’t get through they called the family home and broke the news to their son Toby. “They told him his father had died,” said Margaret. “A 17-year-old lad who is on his own at home. Toby is a sensible lad but I’m sure it has scarred him for life. Clipper did wrong by us, very wrong by us.”

“We tried to contact Mrs Speirs, Simon’s emergency contact. Unfortunately she was not at home and her mobile phone was switched off,” said Jeremy Knight, then chief operating officer at Clipper Ventures, in an email to the crew of Great Britain, after being informed that the Guardian was investigating Speirs’s death. “This decision to break the news to Simon’s son has proved difficult for the family, and we understand that,” Knight wrote. “But the alternative, holding off and risking the family finding out through the media, was much worse.”

At 7pm that evening, the race director called Margaret and told her that her husband would be buried at sea in eight hours. “He was not giving me any options. He told me they had come to that decision for the benefit of the crew so that they wouldn’t have to travel with Simon’s body on board. And they told me the burial at sea would be at three o’clock in the morning our time. And by three o’clock in the morning we did have some friends and family gathered. The vicar came and we read the service at home that they were having in the Southern Ocean as if we were sharing it.

“The burial at sea has robbed me and my family of the opportunity of laying Simon to rest at a place of our choice and allowing us to say goodbye to him in a way that we would have wished to,” she continued. “It has also deprived our family of the opportunity for a coroner’s inquest. We didn’t get a chance to put questions, hear the responses, to help us understand what happened.”

Burns quit Clipper Ventures at the end of leg four. “Andy didn’t enjoy a second on that boat after Simon died,” said the crew member who had tried to rescue Speirs. Jeffery didn’t do the final leg, as planned. After Speirs’s death, he did not feel right leaving his wife and two daughters.

After Speirs’s death, the MCA would not allow the Clipper boats to sail with only one professional onboard. Clipper Ventures had to recruit a second qualified mate for each boat in the fleet for the rest of the 2017-18 race.

The MCA investigation into the death of Simon Speirs was closed in 2020. “The MCA received strong legal advice that the evidence was not enough to bring a prosecution,” stated a spokesperson. The MCA referred the case to Hampshire police to follow up an allegation of fraud in the certification of the boats, and they concluded that there were no grounds to pursue an investigation.

Ward was awarded an OBE in 2018 for his services to the economy and to the Great Britain marketing campaign. Knight retired from his role as COO of Clipper Ventures in April 2022 and is currently a magistrate. When we contacted Knox-Johnston in November 2022, he was at sea.

One bright morning last month I spoke to Speirs’s sons Mike and Toby on Zoom. For more than two years, the family had been fighting a civil action against Clipper Ventures, charging the company with an “immature safety culture”. They wanted to make Clipper Ventures answer for some of the failings that had led to their father’s death. “If you offer a service that is dangerous you have a responsibility to make it as safe as is reasonably possible and I don’t think that was done,” said Toby.

At the end of February, Clipper Ventures paid the family the net sum of £140,000 to settle the case. The family believe the timing of the settlement was no accident. Clipper Ventures is up for sale. In settling the case, the company admitted no wrongdoing. But the family felt vindicated. They donated the money to the RNLI.

Nothing can make up for the loss of their father. Toby is a student at his father’s alma mater, Queens’ College, Cambridge. “I just wish I could talk to Dad about that,” he said. Mike longs to tell his father about the grandchildren he never knew.

For Margaret, the settlement has brought a sense of relief. “I can hang up my sword and put all things to do with Clipper Ventures behind me,” she told me recently in an email. Simon Speirs had always been a loving husband and father. Now they could once again remember him not just by the way he died, but as the remarkable man he was.

This article was amended on 11 May 2023 to correctly refer to the Solent, rather than the “River Solent”.

• The long read

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US couple whose yacht was hijacked by prisoners were likely thrown overboard, authorities say

An American couple who was feared dead after their catamaran yacht was hijacked by three escaped prisoners were likely thrown overboard in the Caribbean Sea, authorities said Monday.

Ralph Hendry, 66, and his wife, Kathy Brandel, 71, were last known to be near Grand Anse Beach in Grenada. Their catamaran, named "Simplicity," was found abandoned in St. Vincent and there were signs of violence at the scene, according to Royal Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force spokesperson Junior Simmons.

Although family, friends, and members of the sailing community had hoped the pair was still alive, police in St. Vincent and the Grenadines said Hendry and Brandel were likely thrown into the ocean when their vessel was hijacked. "Based on the investigation thus far, it is presumed that Ralph Hendry and Kathy Brandel are deceased," Simmons said in a  video statement Monday .

Don McKenzie, police commissioner of the Royal Grenada Police Force, said at a news conference Monday that the three prisoners escaped on Feb. 18 from the South St. George Police Station. They hijacked the catamaran on the following day and traveled to the nearby island of St. Vincent, where they were arrested last Wednesday, he said.

Police: Prisoners 'disposed' occupants of Simplicity

After escaping from the South St. George Police Station, McKenzie said the three prisoners "commandeered" the catamaran, which had two U.S. citizens on board, Hendry and Brandel. The couple were likely thrown into the ocean and died, police in Grenada said.

“Information suggests that while traveling between Grenada and St Vincent, they disposed of the occupants,” McKenzie said.

McKenzie added that while police have "nothing conclusive" to prove that the couple was dead, he cited a "low probability" they were alive.

The suspects are being investigated for several criminal acts, including "bodily harm to the couple," according to Simmons. Authorities discovered signs of violence on the couple’s boat after it was found abandoned, he said.

"Several items were strewn on the deck and in the cabin, and a red substance that resembles blood was seen on board," Simmons said.

Stay in the know: For more updates, sign up for USA TODAY's Daily Briefing.

Police investigating prisoners' escape

According to the Royal Grenada Police Force, the escaped prisoners were identified as Ron Mitchell, 30; Trevon Robertson, 19; and Abita Stanislaus, 25.

All three were arrested and charged in December with one count of robbery with violence. Mitchell also was charged with one count of rape, three counts of attempted rape, and two counts of indecent assault and causing harm, police said.

McKenzie said police have launched an investigation into the escape and are looking into whether it was "a system failure" or a case of a "slip up."

"All aspects of that investigation are on the table," he said, adding that the police holding station where the three men were being held has "sufficient safety to prevent an incident like that (from) occurring."

The three men appeared in court in St. Vincent on Monday and pleaded guilty to four counts each of immigration-related charges, including entering the island as a "prohibited immigrant" with no passport, according to Simmons. They are scheduled to be sentenced on those charges in March.

Simplicity discovered by paddle-boarder near St. Vincent

The Salty Dawg Sailing Association said it was alerted by a cruising skipper about Simplicity, which was found "anchored and abandoned" off a beach on the island of St. Vincent. The association added that its live member’s tracking map showed the vessel anchored in Grenada before it moved to its last anchorage off St. Vincent.

"The good Samaritan had boarded the boat and noted that the owners … were not on board and found evidence of apparent violence," the association said in a statement. 

People reported that a sailing captain was paddle-boarding near St. Vincent when he noticed the catamaran with a broken sail. When he boarded Simplicity, he found the deck covered in blood and two passports belonging to Brandel and Hendry, according to People.

The St. Vincent Coast Guard took possession of Simplicity and local police are investigating with the U.S. Embassy and the Grenada police, according to the association.

Family, sailing community mourns couple's disappearance

According to a GoFundMe page raising money for the couple's families, Hendry and Brandel were "seasoned sailors who lived on their beloved catamaran." The pair spent their retirement sailing, the GoFundMe page states.

"This heartbreaking tragedy has left not only the sailing community, but also their families, shattered," the GoFundMe page states, adding that Brandel had recently welcomed her first grandchild.

The couple had sailed their yacht in last year's Caribbean Rally from Hampton, Virginia, to Antigua, and were spending the winter cruising in the eastern Caribbean, the Salty Dawg Sailing Association said. The association noted that the couple were veteran cruisers and longtime members of the association from its earliest days.

"Warm-hearted and capable, they both contributed to building the SDSA and Kathy sat on the association’s board for two years," the association said.

In a statement from the couple's families on Saturday, they thanked authorities and those who helped gather information.

"It means so much to us that so many people cared for Ralph and Kathy as friends and fellow cruisers that they are willing to stop and help in whatever way possible," the couple's sons, Bryan Hendry and Nick Buro, said.

Travel advisories near the Caribbean

Both Grenada and St. Vincent and the Grenadines are listed under a Level 1 travel advisory, according to the U.S. State Department. A Level 1 travel advisory urges U.S. citizens to take normal precautions in the area.

Other Caribbean islands are more dangerous, with Level 2 and 3 advisories in effect for the Bahamas and Jamaica, respectively. The advisory for the Bahamas was issued last month , warning travelers to "exercise increased caution" due to crime in some areas.

A security alert posted by the  U.S. Embassy in the Bahamas also advised U.S. citizens to be "aware that 18 murders have occurred in Nassau since the beginning of 2024." The alert warns that murders have occurred at all hours including in broad daylight on the streets.

Contributing: Gabe Hauari, USA TODAY; The Associated Press

Man dies after falling from yacht in English Channel during historic race

It is believed the sailor, who is from the Greater Manchester area, was taking part in the Royal Escape Race, a historic yacht race from Shoreham-by-Sea to the Normandy port of Fecamp.

Saturday 27 May 2023 16:10, UK

A man has died after falling off a yacht in the English Channel.

The incident happened in waters off the northwest of France at around 2pm on Friday.

A nearby fishing vessel went to the scene to assist French rescue teams, while the UK Coastguard offered communications support.

Coastguard said the victim - who has not been identified but is from the Greater Manchester area - was taken to a hospital in the port city of Le Havre by a French helicopter.

A spokesman for Sussex Police said: "Sussex Police were made aware of a man having sadly died in the English Channel after falling from a yacht in French waters in the early hours of Saturday morning.

"The incident is understood to have happened at around 2pm on Friday.

"Police are supporting the coastguard by offering liaison with the man's family and will continue to offer support to the relevant agencies while the full circumstances of the situation are established."

It is reported another sailor from the same vessel was rescued safely by French lifeboat crews.

Yacht club 'deeply saddened'

It is believed the sailor who died was taking part in the Royal Escape Race, a historic yacht race from Shoreham-by-Sea to the Normandy port of Fecamp.

Launched in 1977 to mark the Queen's silver jubilee, it is now among the oldest offshore sailing races in the country.

In a message posted on its Facebook page, Sussex Yacht Club said: "We are deeply saddened by the tragic loss of one of our fellow sailors yesterday.

"Sussex Yacht Club are working with the police, Maritime and Coastguard Agency and the Marine Accident Investigation Branch to assist with their enquiries.

"Our thoughts and prayers are with the family, friends and supporting our sailors at this difficult time."

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Superyacht anchor chain kills crew member

• Jamey Bergman

The chain wrapped around the sailor's legs, nearly severing them.

A crewman on board a Russian billionaire’s superyacht has died after the boat’s anchor chain nearly severed both his legs.

The Bulgarian man, Toni Hristov Kolev, reportedly was caught up in the anchor chain as it was being retracted by a winch when the Ocean Victory yacht raised anchor.

Kolev, 33, died after he was rushed to Bangkok Hospital Phuket in Phuket, Thailand. He reportedly lost a great deal of blood from deep gashes caused by the force of the anchor chain and became unconscious.

The 140m superyacht was anchored in the Similan Islands National Park, north of Phuket when the incident occurred around 2pm, local time.

The yacht’s crew reportedly notified the Royal Thai Navy’s Third Naval Area Command at 2:30pm, while Kovlev was being taken by speedboat to the nearest pier. He was then transferred to an ambulance and taken to hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.

Phuket police told the Phuket News that they have concluded an investigation into the event, ruling that it was an accident.

The Ocean Victory yacht is owned by Victor Rashnikov, 67, a billionaire in the Russian steel business. The yacht was built at Fincantieri shipyard in 2014 and is one of the world’s largest. Forbes lists Rashnikov as the 23rd richest man in Russia and the 403rd richest man in the world, estimating his personal wealth at $4.3 billion.

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Bay of Islands Coastal Classic death: Sailor dies during yachting race

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Yachts at the start line of the Coastal Classic yacht race from Auckland to Russell. Photo / Suellen Hurling-Live Sail Die

A person has died while racing a yacht in the Bay of Islands after they were struck by the boom.

The boom - a horizontal spar at the bottom of the mast - swung round and struck the person at 11.29pm yesterday, knocking them unconcious.

The Kokako Rescue boat from the Coastguard Bay of Islands service was nearby and rushed to help the crew, who had been taking part in the Coastal Classic race from Auckland to Russell.

“Upon reaching the yacht at shortly after 0100 hours, one of our crew boarded with a medical kit, including a defibrillator,” Ayden Armitage, a member of the Kokako’s volunteer Coastguard crew, said.

“Sadly, the individual passed away.”

Kokako Rescue then accompanied the yacht to Ōpua, arriving at 4am.

Armitage said treatment was also provided to two other sailors on the yacht, who had sustained moderate injuries.

“Our thoughts are with the whānau of the sailor, and their fellow crew members, who were on board at the time,” he said.

Armitage said the volunteer crew on Kokako Rescue had been training at the time of the incident, allowing them to respond quickly.

However, they had planned to coincide their training with the race so they could be on-hand to assist if needed, the Coastguard said.

More than 140 yachts started this year’s Coastal Classic.

Hosted by the New Zealand Multihull Yacht Club, it is an annual 119-nautical-mile race from Auckland to Russell.

First run 41 years ago, the event is one of the biggest events on the yachting calendar in New Zealand.

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NEWS... BUT NOT AS YOU KNOW IT

British crew member dies after being ‘electrocuted’ on luxury yacht 

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A British man has died after being electrocuted while fixing a power outage on a yacht in the Caribbean island of Antigua.

The pleasure yacht Baton Rouge was docked at the southern town of English Harbour last Friday when it suffered a power outage in the engine room.

Roy Temme, 47, the chief engineer, went to fix the only to be found unresponsive by a crew member at around 8.30am last Friday.

He was slumped over inside the engine compartment, with crews taking him outside to the main desk as the Antigua and Barbuda Search and Rescue team raced to the scene.

Temme was pronounced dead at a local hospital, according to the Antigua Observer .

Preliminary investigations suggest Temme, a father-of-two from Southampton, died of electrocution.

Friend Oliver Boghurst has launched a crowdfunder on the money-pooling website Collctiv .

‘Your donation will help to provide Natasha with some peace of mind at this time, allowing her to focus on the children’s welfare, rather than worrying about how she is going to pay the bills over the next few months,’ he said.

The Baton Rogue , a UK-flagged luxury motor superyacht built in 2010, has been moored since January.

A FCDO spokesperson told Metro.co.uk: ‘I can confirm that we are supporting the family of a British National who has died in Antigua.’

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected] .

For more stories like this, check our news page .

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Virginia couple missing in Grenada and feared killed after yacht allegedly stolen by escaped criminals

By Nikki Battiste, Tucker Reals

Updated on: February 27, 2024 / 4:48 PM EST / CBS News

Two Americans who planned to spend the winter on a yacht in the Caribbean were officially missing Monday, but feared to have been killed  after their boat was stolen by prison escapees in Grenada. Kathy Brandel and Ralph Hendry were last seen a week ago near a beach in the small island nation. Police found their sailboat, and captured three escaped criminals whom they believe stole it.

The couple was likely thrown into the ocean and died, police in Grenada said Monday. "Information suggests that while traveling between Grenada and St Vincent, (the suspects) disposed of the occupants," Don McKenzie, police commissioner of the Royal Grenada Police Force, said at a news conference .

Grenadan police were still searching for the couple, who are from Northern Virginia, and they told CBS News' Washington, D.C., affiliate WUSA that no bodies had been found.

Family and friends have described the couple as seasoned sailors who just last year sailed their yacht, named Simplicity, from Hampton, Virginia, to Antigua. They confirmed that the pair had been vacationing in Grenada, where their boat was docked.

In a statement Tuesday, the couple's family said that Hendry and Brandel sailed the eastern coast of the U.S., living on their yacht, "making friends with everyone they encountered, singing, dancing and laughing with friends and family."

"It's just really sad," said longtime friend K.C. McAlpin, who added that Brandel and Hendry had planned to make this their "last grand trip" on Simplicity.

Instead, things may have taken a very tragic turn. The couple went missing on Feb. 19, one day after police in Grenada say three convicted criminals escaped from custody. 

The three men — identified as Ron Mitchell, 30, Trevon Robertson, 19, and Abita Stanislaus, 25 — were arrested in December over an alleged violent robbery. Mitchell also faced one count of rape, three counts of attempted rape and two counts of indecent assault and causing harm.

All three were recaptured Wednesday, Feb. 21. The yacht was also found that same day, Brandel's 71st birthday, abandoned on a beach on the nearby island of St. Vincent.    

The police believe the men hijacked the couple's yacht in Grenada and then traveled to St. Vincent.

Police said they found evidence suggesting the pair were killed, but the Americans' deaths have not been confirmed and the investigation was still in its early stages, they stressed.

"Several items were strewn on the deck and in the cabin, and a red substance that resembled blood was seen on board," said police spokesman Junior Simmons 

Over the weekend, family members released a statement thanking officials and those who had helped gather information, saying it "means so much to us that so many people care for Ralph and Kathy."

"We live in world that at times can be cruel, but it's also a world of profound beauty, wonder, adventure, love, compassion, caring, and faith," the family said on Tuesday. "Our parents encompassed all those values and so much more. If we have learned anything from this tragic event, it's that we know they left this world in a better place than it was before they were born."

McAlpin said the couple always made friends easily and he hoped they would be remembered for their big hearts.

"They were just a delightful couple and a real blessing in my life, and the lives of so many other people," he said.

• Missing Persons

Nikki Battiste is a CBS News correspondent based in New York.

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Person dies after being knocked unconscious during Coastal Classic yacht race

A person has died after being knocked unconscious on a yacht while racing in the Coastal Classic in the Bay of Islands.

A distress call came through to Coastguard Bay of Islands volunteers who were doing a night time training exercise about 11.30pm on Friday.

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Their boat,  Kokako Rescue , arrived at the yacht, where a crew member had been struck by the boom, just after 1am with a medical kit and defibrillator but the person died.

Ayden Armitage, Coastguard volunteer onboard  Kokako Rescue , said their training coinciding with the Coastal Classic was a strategic decision and significantly reduced their response time.

The other sailors on the yacht were assessed, including two who had moderate injuries.

Kokako Rescue  accompanied the yacht back to Opua, arriving shortly before 4am on Saturday.

Armitage said their thoughts were with the whānau of the sailor and their fellow crew members who were on board at the time.

Police said the death had been referred to the Coroner.

The Coastal Classic is a race from Devonport in Auckland to Russell in the Bay of Islands, hosted by the New Zealand Multihull Yacht Club.

It has been held annually at Labour Weekend since its inception in 1982.

Adrian Percival, commodore of the New Zealand Multihull Yacht Club said it was working with Police, Coastguard and Yachting NZ in their enquiries.

"Our thoughts are with the family, friends and we now turn to supporting our family of sailors," he said.

Yacht crew prepare for death

An industry friend died last month and it got us thinking about death, especially how prepared we are to handle this fact of life. Being ashore, many of the details are taken care of: call emergency personnel and they will handle it.

But on a yacht, the captain and crew are the professionals. How ready are they to handle a death onboard? As it turns out, plenty.

We targeted this month’s survey to captains and were particularly interested in finding out if they have prepared their crew to handle their own death.

We started with a few formalities, asking simply Do you have a will ?

( Read comments from crew here. )

About two-thirds of our nearly 100 respondents have a will: 41 percent have a current one, and 25 percent more have a will that needs a tune up.

If we add in the 23 percent of respondents who don’t yet actually have a will but who are working on it, that means about 88 percent of yacht captains who took our survey have at least thought about making plans for the end of their life.

“I would strongly suggest to have a will in place if you are married or have worldly possession and details of what one wants done with their remains,” said a captain in his late 50s who runs a yacht less than 80 feet.

Although a will is important in handling all our assets after we die, we wanted to focus our survey on the actual event of our passing, so we asked Do you have a living will? That’s the document that details our wishes regarding life-prolonging medical treatments, in the event we can’t speak for ourselves.

Here, captains are a little less in control.

About 46 percent of our respondents have a living will: 33 percent have a current one and 13 percent have one that needs a little work.

About 26 percent of our respondents don’t yet have one but are working on it.

That leaves 28 percent of our respondents who haven’t thought about this document, more than double the number who haven’t yet thought about creating a will.

But living wills are specific to medical treatments. They are more for doctors and the protection of our families. We wanted to know if yacht captains have thought about the details of their death so we asked Do you have a plan for what should happen to your body after death?

Most (56 percent) do. Whether it’s written down in a legal document (21 percent) or simply expressed to their loved ones (35 percent), more than half of yacht captains have a plan for what they want to happen to their body when they die.

“I have Neptune Society for myself: pre-paid pick up anywhere in the world, cremation, ashes sent where I want them, etc.,” said a captain in his late 60s who runs a yacht 80-100 feet. “I keep that card under my driver’s license, just in case. My will is current and someone knows where to find it. That is important.”

More than a quarter of our respondents, however, said it didn’t matter to them what happens after they die, that whatever their family chose to do with their remains would be fine with them.

That left about 17 percent who haven’t thought much about this part of death yet. It turns out that these are mostly the same captains who don’t have a will.

All these results tell us something about the captains who answered our survey this month, and that is that most of them have at least thought about the end of their life and have made some arrangement for it.

But what we really wanted to know was Do you have a plan for what the crew are to do should you die onboard?

The answer surprised us. In an industry where plans and drills are common, more than 80 percent of captains in our survey said they do not have a plan for what happens if they die onboard.

“I don’t care, I’ll be dead,” said a captain in his late 40s. (To be fair, this captain has a current will and living will, so he must care at least a little.)

“Well, at about that time I’m not really sure I give a damn,” said a captain in his late 60s who runs a yacht 80-100 feet. “I try to make sure that someone aboard has the skills to get the boat back to port, make radio calls, etc.”

“For myself, it’s probably the best way to go, doing something I love,” said a captain in yachting more than 25 years. “For anyone else, I pray that it does not happen on board my command, but I am ready for it.”

“If I die onboard you may render me unto the deep and I will commune with Neptune,” said a captain in his early 60s.

“No yacht would be properly equipped to deal with this at sea,” said a captain in his early 30s in yachting more than 10 years.

“Not pleasant to think about and I hope I never put my crew in a position of dealing with it,” said a captain in yachting more than 30 years.

About 15 percent of our captains said they’ve discussed the scenario with their crew, leaving about 2 percent who have included the scenario in a procedure and actually drilled on it.

“There’s no ‘official’ plan in place and I don’t feel that it’s something you ‘drill’ for but if I died aboard, I would hope the crew would enter the nearest port, have my body removed from the boat and shipped home for an autopsy,” said a captain in his early 50s who has discussed the scenario with his crew.

Even though most captains in our survey don’t have a plan, we were curious if they had a preference so we asked What would you like to happen next if you should unexpectedly die onboard?

It should come as no surprise that many of our respondents who chose to answer this optional question opted for a maritime approach.

“Quick burial at sea,” said a captain in his late 50s in yachting more than 25 years. “Adios.”

“Sew me into a hammock with a chunk of anchor cable around my feet, say a few words and heave me over the side,” said another captain in yachting more than 25 years.

“A Viking funeral,” said a captain in yachting more than 30 years.

Most, however, were a bit more practical and simply expected the yacht to return to shore safely, their loved ones notified, and their body shipped home.

“I would prefer that the first officer takes over, as trained, and keeps passengers and crew safe,” said the captain of a yacht 80-100 feet.

“If more than 12 hours from dock, clear space in the freezer and place body in there,” said the captain of a yacht 100-120 feet. “If outside the U.S., return the vessel to the U.S. and report to customs.”

“Next of kin notified as quickly as possible and arrangements made for them to meet the vessel,” said another captain of a yacht 100-120 feet. “Calls to authorities, after consultation with next of kin.”

“If we’re out to sea, the crew get safely somewhere and then get my body shipped home,” said a captain in yachting more than 30 years.

“Put me in the freezer and head back to the U.S., if geographically feasible,” said the captain of a yacht 120-140 feet.

“To have the second-in-command contact local officials if in port or the USCG at sea for instructions and coordinates to meet authorities,” said the captain of a yacht 80-100 feet.

“Preserve the scene and body for disposition ashore, if in the U.S.,” said a captain in his late 60s who runs a yacht 100-120 feet. “Use judgement of relief if abroad.”

“If possible, donate all of my useful parts to someone who needs them, the rest send to the body ranch for science,” said a captain in his early 30s. “The gift of life is the best gift of all.”

“Have the coast guard or navy collect my body and have a replacement captain continue the cruise with as little fuss as possible,” said a captain in his late 20s.

“Crew take over the safety of the vessel,” said a captain in yachting more than 30 years. “Call authorities and be advised of what to do with the remains. Of course, it would depend on the vessel’s location at the time of the issue. Maybe everyone say what the really thought of me and laugh a long while. We are all going to pass. Nothing to fear if you have led a proper life.”

Some of our respondents left it up to the people who come after.

“Call my wife,” said a captain in yachting more than 20 years.

“Ship me home for my family and they will then deal with it,” said the captain of a yacht 140-160 feet in yachting more than 20 years.

And there were a few who didn’t think it important to think about this type of scenario.

“Does it really matter? I am dead,” said a captain in his early 50s who cruises globally.

“I know that death is in the life, but no thoughts about it,” said a captain in his late 50s on a yacht 120-140 feet.

Part of the reality of a captain dying while employed on a yacht is that the vessel must be manned, so we asked If something happened to you unexpectedly onboard, is someone else onboard able to take over?

The largest group — two-thirds of our respondents — said their crew could handle operations for a short time until a relief captain arrived.

“Vessel would have to return to the dock,” said the captain of a yacht less than 80 feet. “The owner and mate can operate it but with me down, crew goes to one. We’re a captain/mate operation. On deliveries, it’s only the two of us. All my crew is trained in basic vessel ops but a delivery crew may not be able to make the decisions necessary to safely seek safe harbor. I need to work on this. With the owner aboard, that’s a different story. He’s a U.S. Merchant Marine Academy grad and can handle all vessel ops and decisions.”

Most of the rest indicated that the vessel would operate without a hitch.

“Depends on which boat I’m on,” said a captain in yachting more than 25 years. “Typically, I have at least one other person trained well enough to operate the boat and take over.”

Just 8 percent said there was no one on board who could take over. We thought for sure that those were small vessels that perhaps only ran with one or two crew, but we were surprised to learn that all of the captains who said no one could take over were on yachts larger than 80 feet, and that half were on yachts larger than 120 feet.

In addition to the captain dying onboard, we were curious to learn Do you have a plan for what to do if someone else on your crew should unexpectedly die?

Although captains admitted to not having much of a plan in the event that they themselves should die onboard, they were more prepared should it happen to someone else.

While it’s still unlikely to be a procedure that the crew has drilled on (5 percent), more than half of our respondents said they have discussed this scenario with the crew.

“My plan in the event someone dies onboard is to head for the nearest U.S. port,” said a captain in his early 60s on a yacht 120-140 feet. “Do not put into a foreign port if at all feasible.”

Compared to planning for their own death, half as many (40 percent) said they had no plan in the event another crew member died.

The amount of planning improves again when we asked What about a guest?

Once again, more than half said they have discussed this scenario with the crew, and about 8 percent have a procedure that they’ve drilled on.

“In running a dive boat, we had a program in place for death aboard,” said a captain in his late 50s. “I know that helped me in planning in the event someone was to die on board.”

“I have had two guest deaths on board,” said a captain in yachting more than 25 years. “It’s brutal to deal with.”

“We had a guest die onboard once,” said a captain in yachting more than 25 years. “The coast guard told us to bring her into port in the morning. We did and they took her off. The family chose to depart with her, the grandma. A sad trip to be sure.”

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WEATHER ALERT

A watch and 2 advisories in effect for 7 regions in the area

Man, 56, killed after being struck by vehicle on florida turnpike in broward.

Joseph Ojo , Reporter

POMPANO BEACH, Fla. – Authorities responded to a fatal crash involving a 56-year-old pedestrian that they said temporarily shut down northbound lanes of the Florida Turnpike in Pompano Beach Wednesday morning.

It happened just before 3 a.m. according to the Florida Highway Patrol.

A Local 10 News crew was at the scene of the turnpike’s Coconut Creek Parkway exit in Pompano Beach where a yellow tarp was placed over the victim’s body as authorities continued to investigate.

Florida Highway Patrol officials said the pedestrian was walking across the Coconut Creek Parkway when a white Ford service truck moved to the center lane to avoid the pedestrian but the pedestrian abruptly moved into the center lane and was struck by the truck.

Tamarac Fire Rescue arrived at the scene where they pronounced the man dead.

A Florida Highway Patrol spokesperson did not identify the victim involved in the crash but confirmed he is from Williston.

Coconut Creek Parkway’s ramp toward the turnpike was temporarily closed but has since reopened. Traffic was temporarily delayed from Coconut Creek Parkway to south of Sample Road.

Authorities have not released any information on the victim involved in the crash and no arrests have been made at this time.

The cause of the crash is under investigation.

Copyright 2024 by WPLG Local10.com - All rights reserved.

About the Author:

Joseph Ojo joined Local 10 in April 2021. Born and raised in New York City, he previously worked in Buffalo, North Dakota, Fort Myers and Baltimore.

Local 10 News @ Noon : Mar 21, 2024

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