Daily Live – Saturday 31 March | Volvo Ocean Race

I have been thinking where to post these thoughts. But to my opinion Volvo as a sponsor needs to take responsibility for once and for all for crew safety. As they do for their cars. How is it possible that an over board crew member cannot be located let alone be retreived. From various articles I deduct that John Fisher was only in his wet gear and harness plus life vest i.e. without satelite location equipment. This in itself is unforgivable. Thus Volvo. Think about this: have every crewmember wear a personal epirb at all times. Make it fixed permanently to the safety harness or into any other gear they wear in any situation eg the survival suit. Then create a proximity trigger that triggers the epirb automatically as soon as the epirb leaves the proximity of the boat eg 65 feet. Have an alert procedure and system in place that immediatly wakes up all crew and provides navigation support to the crew. IMHO in 2018 'lost at sea' or 'cannot find him' should not be an acceptable outcome unless offcourse the body has already sunk. Investment in such a system could save the lives of VOR sailers and all the sailors that cannot rely on a professional crew eg minitransat. If you agree with me that Volvo should take responsibility give this comment a thumbs up.

Was the support boat an Amel?

That's one great plug for a support boat that can handle the southern ocean.

Thanks mate. This has been great coverage of one of the most courageous events that exists on our planet. Wish I was there. It is amazing that we can be in the most challenging environment in the world and still know it is wonderful.
You revived some recollections that are more than memories. They are life itself.
I wish them all good luck.

Looks like we have 2 races in one now, with the leading group of Brunel, Dongfeng and Akzo being one, and Turn The Tide On Plastic and Mapfre the other. Wonder how Vestas is going to fare… will they be able to rejoin the race for Leg 8?

The rules should NOT be PRETTY WELL understood, but PERFECTLY understood!
No bending of rules!

The guy on BRUNEL seemed to have a hard time not to grin… well, well, great sportsmanship!

I have to say that Conrad is the everything guy. I really loved his commentary during vendee. When he was really working.  Now I love his commentary here.

Thanks again to the Volvo Ocean Race for providing this FREE excellent coverage and analysis! You deserve more viewers and many more "likes"!

Thanks for the update on Scallywag, it's so nice to here they are safe and still afloat.
These VOR boats are great, so fast, and cool looking, it would be nice if they could actually surpass their design brief instead of falling short….. Will we ever see a race like the VOR where all the participants actually Finnish the race with their boats in one piece….

Can't help contrasting the help that Mapfre got with the heroic solo efforts of people like Conrad Colman and Conrad Humphreys in the Vendee Globe.

Bit of dry mouth there Conrad? Someone get him some water!

11:56 There goes the rudder again…

Just crazy

How come Mapfre is the most interesting boat no matter what? When they’re leading they get all the attention, when their main sail rips and they fall back, they get all the attention. No mention at all of who’s leading the leg. Mapfre must have payed someone in Alicante…

so, was Mapfre the ONLY team that had a "support" boat at cape horn? that's great planning on their part.bummer about Vesta's, those people can't get a break.

Any update on Scallywag's progress? Seems to be taking a very long time to reach the coast of Chile and, once there, where will they put in?

Time to redesign the masts and time to secure the sailors onboard

…dude from Brunel, surprised? yes.. well spoken? Not really