Island boat loses sail in squall heading to Strait Challenge

The captain of the Island sail boat Persuasion was trying to outrun a squall that was bearing down on hisboat Saturday afternoon in the Northumberland Strait when the boat lost her mainsail.

Jason MacAulay and his crew member, Katherine Ballem,were sailing the 29-foot boat from Charlottetown to the start of the Strait Challenge in Shediac, N.B., and were just passingPetit-Cap, when MacAulay saysthey saw a curtain of black clouds ahead.

Decided to sailon

But another P.E.I. sail boat ahead of them, the Pepper sailed by John Rankin anddidn't turn around, so they decided to keep going too. They were making good time, when the wind died, so they switchedto the motor.

Then they saw lightning ahead.

"Course these types of boats have 40-foot long lightning rods on them, so that's a worry to start with, but when you get conditions, when the wind dies all of a sudden and you see a black cloud in front of you that's definitely a tell tale sign that things could get hairy in a hurry."

MacAulay said the challenge with only two crew members is getting the sails down quickly, especially in windy conditions.So they decided to play it safe and turn around.

'Agonizing decision' what best to do

"It was kind of an agonizing decision because out of a 70 nautical mile trip from Charlottetown to Shediac,we were only 15 miles awayfrom Shediac, and we were 18 miles away from turning back to the nearest safe port. And we had the tide with us too."

Turning backdidn't end up beingsmooth sailing either.

"At this point we were basically trying to run from the black cloud. Of course, that's not a great scenario when you're on a sail boat. You're never going to outrun a storm cloud."

They decided to keep the main sail up to givethe boat a fighting chance at staying ahead of the storm. The wind wasgusting between 40 and 50 km/hr.

Old, wet sail gave out

But MacAulaysaidthe sails on the boat are old, and it didn't help that the mainsailwas also wet from hard rain that had started falling.

"It just couldn't take it, so we got a foot long rip in the sail in one area and a three or fourinchrip in the other, and at that point the worse it becomes the harder it is to take the sail down."

"My crew member actually had to change my shoes into rubber boots 'cause I couldn't really take my hands off the wheel there at one point."

Finally, some good luck

But then Persuasion finallyhit a bit of good luck.

"I don't know whether somebody was looking at us from above or what but the black cloud that we were trying to avoid definitely rolled over us but the winds never got any worse."

MacAulay and Ballemsailed Persuasion to Borden-Carleton, P.E.I., where they tied the boat up for the night.

MacAulay took the sail into Charlottetown, where it was repairedby Ron White,a volunteerat the Charlottetown Yacht Club nicknamed "the sail doctor."

MacAulay plans to race the second leg of the four-leg Strait Challenge from Summerside to Charlottetown Tuesday.

He was a crew member on the boat that won the challenge last year, the Jagger sailed by Russell Compton from P.E.I.

Winning's not everything

MacAulayisn't worried that Saturday'ssetback could meanhe has less of a chance of winning this year.

"For us, we just like to go sailing," he said.

"The [Northumberland]Strait is always a challenge whether it's no wind at all and you're kind of just doing the marathon hours and hoursthing or whether there's too much wind and have to hunker down and bear some waves over the face a little bit."

There were23 boats registered to race in the Strait Challenge as of Monday, according to organizers, with at least seven from the Island, and more expected to join along the way.

The Strait Challenge wraps up Friday with the last leg between Barachois and Pictou, N.S.