Yacht rescued off Chateaubelair

by Adrian Codogan 12.JAN.07

What could not be achieved with heavy equipment and brute force on Saturday was accomplished with ingenuity on Monday.

Last weekend at 4 am the Coast Guard escorted a

crippled Moorings 4200 Catamaran to the Chateaubelair Harbour; it was listing and taking on water through a hole in the aft (back) of the right hull.

Despite many efforts using heavy equipment including a bulldozer and an 18-wheeler cab, which is used for hauling shipping containers, to pull the boat onto the beach for repairs, it would not budge. Ballasts were then used.{{more}}

“We tied a big ballast between the two sterns and then tied some smaller ones on both sides and inflated them so she start to raise up off the water,” Chateaubelair resident, John Bentick, who took part in Monday’s operation, told SEARCHLIGHT.

The young St Lucian Skipper of the catamaran, who did not want to be named, told SEARCHLIGHT he was about 10 miles off St Vincent traveling at about six knots when the vessel started taking on water.

“I called the Coast Guard and they escorted us to Chateaubelair,” he said.

The boat was being delivered from Canouan to St Lucia for charter when the problem developed.

Moorings 4200 is 41 feet five inches long with a beam of 22 feet nine inches. It has two 40-horsepower diesel engines and four

cabins and was developed by Alex Simonis, Robertson & Caine and The Moorings and built in Cape Town, South Africa.

The Moorings is the world’s largest yacht charter service operator and has several operations all over the Caribbean including Canouan in the Grenadines. The catamaran will undergo initial repairs in Chateaubelair then taken to a shipyard where extensive repairs will be done.