Home is the Sailor
Hi guys,
Sorry I haven’t written in so long. As you can imagine, things have been pretty crazy over the past week or two. I would have posted more but on the second boat I was on, the Osiris, I was having some trouble with the email. This blog is going to be like a short novel, but I figured you guys wouldn’t mind.
I’m back home now with no more plans to go anywhere too soon. Before I get going with all the happenings of the past weeks, I want to just let you all know how grateful I, and my whole family are for your support. It has really helped us recently. It’s tough to be in the spot light of the media. While not all the media support me there have been a lot that have been kind and done a great job and I would just like to thank them for that. Things have already begun to calm down and before long there will be a new story for everyone to start following.
It feels weird to be sitting at home in the office writing a blog. It feels like years since I’ve been here, and only days since I was wedging myself into my chart desk seat with my lap top writing in about weather conditions, getting excited over big blows and complaining about calm weather and the cold.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Greetings yachties,
Abby Sunderland’s solo attempt to sail around the world has sparked all sorts of discussion about age and the ability to make the right decisions. What do you think?
buy some Abby16 merchandise here
Poised calmly before dozens of cameras, rescued teen sailor Abby Sunderland on Tuesday recounted the harrowing storm and rogue wave that ended her attempt to sail around the world.
The strongest gales had abated and Abby was down in the cabin working on the engine when a giant wave caught the sails and rolled the boat upside-down. It immediately righted, and when Abby got to the deck, she saw that there was nothing more than a 1-inch stub where her 60-foot mast had been.
During the rollover, she got banged up and briefly blacked out, she said.
“When I got outside, there was nothing there,” she said at a news conference at Marina del Rey. “It was a 1-inch stub. There was nothing to jury-rig.”
Sunderland recounted the terrifying moments, talked about what she had learned and responded to criticism of her parents during the hourlong news conference.
Abby Sunderland didn’t circle planet, but she’s no failure
by Pete Thomas
Abby Sunderland will return home this weekend and try — despite all she has been through and must still go through — to revert to being an ordinary 16-year-old in her middle-class Thousand Oaks, Calif., neighborhood.
It won’t be easy. Like her older brother Zac, she has tasted adventure and is not content mingling with friends and simply hanging around.
She received a beating two weeks ago at sea. Her 40-foot boat rolled in heavy seas, losing its mast and rigging, forcing the mariner to abandon a quest to sail around the world and to activate two emergency beacons, signaling the beginning of a dramatic rescue effort that became a major news story.
That marked the end of a dream and the beginning of a nightmare for her worried parents. Now Sunderland, a high-school junior, will return home and be asked what went wrong rather than how great it felt to circle the planet. She’ll fend off critics who seemed to have hatched like mosquitoes the day the Indian Ocean rescue effort began; critics who so far have restricted their attacks to Abby’s mom and dad.
It’s unfortunate that many will regard Sunderland’s voyage as a failure because, although the timing of the voyage was not ideal, what happened to her could have happened to anyone attempting a Southern Ocean crossing at any time of the year. Age, sex might have had no bearing on her fate.
Had Sunderland not lost her mast and satellite communications, she’d still be sailing. Had she gone on to become the youngest person to have solo-circumnavigated the planet, instead of making it a little beyond halfway, she would have been regarded by the masses as an inspirational figure instead of a careless risk-taker.
For those wondering whether this is a valid assessment, consider the sagas of Sunderland’s peers: brother Zac, England’s Mike Perham and Australia’s Jessica Watson. All embarked on similar quests recently at the age of 16.
Abby is Almost Here
Many people have been asking where Abby is and we are excited to report that she is expected to arrive at Reunion Island sometime around June 24-25. She should be back in the USA a few days later. We have spoken to Abby and she is in good health and spirits. She is so thankful to everyone who has expressed concern for her safety and humbled by the great support from all over the world. Abby has asked us to again pass on her gratitude to all those who played a part in assisting her and she is looking forward to doing this personally very soon.
Abby Sunderland Sails Around The World: Superkids And Their Parents
Even before the rescue of Abby Sunderland, the 16 year old round the world sailor, national criticism of her parents’ judgment was becoming intense. But if we focus just on Abby’s parents, we will miss a key story line about contemporary American parenting: how we have allowed our adolescents to become adults and our children to become adolescents, and how parents lose their moorings when children profess a dream of competitive success.
There are many ways beyond solo boating that we let our children take risks beyond their years. I recall an anxious mother saying that she felt she could not say no to her 12 year old hockey playing son when he pleaed to play basketball in the same season. She knew that this would be extremely taxing for her son-he would have no down time because each sport had an intense schedule-but she wondered if basketball might be her son’s “gift.” “If he never had the chance to find out if basketball is his gift,’ she said, I would always regret it. What if Michael Jordan’s mother had said no to basketball
Family Post
Our family would like to thank everyone for their wonderful support and encouragement over the past week. As you can imagine it has been an exhausting time with so many mixed emotions and we are now eagerly looking forward to Abby’s return.
We will not be issuing any further public or private statements. To assist us to manage the publicity Abby’s trip has created we have appointed a public relations consultant / manager to act on our behalf and request that from this point, all media enquiries be directed to him. This will enable us to return to our primary role – parents to our children and in particular at this moment, a supportive mom and dad to Abby.
We would ask that you respect our family’s request for privacy at this time. Our focus is on both Abby and our new baby who is expected to arrive into the world at anytime. The next couple of weeks will be very exciting for us.
We will continue to update our blog with Abby’s progress and in due course Abby will be available to tell her story.
Thank You,
Laurence & Marianne Sunderland
Outdoors, action and adventure
Pete Thomas & company provide the inside scoop on what’s happening outside
Reporter who sailed with Abby Sunderland shares perspective
I don’t know Abby Sunderland as well as those close to her, but I think I know her better than other reporters and columnists know her.
I’ve interviewed the Thousand Oaks teenager several times, and before she set out to chase a dream and try to circle the planet on a 40-foot yacht, I sailed with her through the night aboard that yacht, Wild Eyes, which by now probably rests at the bottom of the Indian Ocean.
Same goes for Abby’s older brother, Zac. While working for the Los Angeles Times, I followed his 13-month around-the-world odyssey from the beginning, providing frequent blog posts and newspaper updates.
And yes, I’ve met the parents, and the brothers and sisters. I never became close to the family; my interactions were all during story assignments. But I gained some insight that other reporters and columnists do not have as they digest and regurgitate information regarding Abby’s recent rescue, after Wild Eyes was slammed in heavy seas between Africa and Australia.
Thus, because Abby and her family have become such a curiosity and so glaring a target, here are a few observations, quotes and anecdotes that might provide a better understanding of Abby, 16, and the sailing Sunderlands:
– This might not have been reported but a representative from child protective services interviewed Abby for nearly two hours at her home before her Jan. 23 departure from Marina del Rey. Marianne Sunderland, Abby’s mom, told me about this a few weeks after Abby’s departure. The interview was to make sure the high school junior was not being coerced into making this voyage.
– People have argued that Abby was too young to have tried to sail around the world by herself, and some have suggested her parents are guilty of child endangerment. This was a family decision and sailing around the world was Abby’s dream before it was Zac’s. Abby and her parents believed she was capable and she did sail more than halfway around the world before Mother Nature intervened. Abby is not the first global sailor to have been stopped by foul weather, nor will she be the last.
As for child endangerment, the same charges could be leveled at any parent placing their child in a midget racing car or on a motocross track or a bucking bronco, encouraging careers along those lines. Those are high-risk sports guaranteed to produce serious injuries and occasional deaths
The father of teen sailor Abby Sunderland told The NY Post that he’s broke and had signed a contract to do a reality show, “Adventures in Sunderland,” about his family of daredevil kids weeks after she set off on her doomed and dangerous solo sail around the globe.
Laurence Sunderland, a sailing instructor who lives in the middle-class Los Angeles suburb of Thousand Oaks with his pregnant wife and seven kids, opened their home to film crews four months ago.
FoxNews Story here
The studio didn’t reply to e-mails and calls for comment yesterday.
Sunderland insists Abby’s trip wasn’t just a stunt.
The reality show was, he said, “the last thing on my mind.
“The wheels in motion for this trip had actually started when Abigail was 13 years old,” he added.
Sunderland also defended his decision to let his daughter take the risky journey.
“I love my daughter dearly,” he said. “I love the passion of sailing dearly, and this was about Abigail following her dream. She followed the criteria that I had set out, and met all the requirements to embark on this trip.”
Yesterday, Abby blogged that she was undaunted by her misadventure, and was considering writing a book.
Time for a Reality Contestant Screw-Up Tax
By Frankie Stone
Published: June 15, 2010
One clip caught my attention. Looking like a bad outtake from “Paranormal Activity,” Zac moves in tight to the camera and mugs his way through an anecdote about a dangerous moment he’d survived with eye rolls, hair tosses, lip biting, grimaces and heavy sighs.
Oh, that’s it: He’s playing reality show participant.
Sure enough, media coverage from Zac’s return confirms that a show was one piece of a grand marketing plan being pursued by his parents, along with heavy-hitter corporate endorsements and a Zac-the-adventurer personality franchise. But all apparently went the way of Abby’s boat. Zac’s website currently boasts a self-produced DVD, a few discounted tchotchkes and press clips recalling past glory.
Makes you wonder about the real motivations and goals behind Plan B.
When Abby was lost, a PR strategy was ready to roll. It started with Zac as the sole family member granting interviews. Were their parents locked away, heartbroken? Or did someone with a creative POV explain that Zac provided the best natural narrative link whatever Abby’s outcome?
The elder Sunderlands then emerged post-rescue with a few carefully rehearsed media appearances. Not perfectly rehearsed, however. Especially when they announced that they were “broke” and wouldn’t reimburse the Australian government any of the $300,000 it had spent in rescue costs (about which Australian citizens are furious), but cavalierly suggested the U.S. government just write the Aussies a check.
Then, as we’ve come to expect, everything starts imploding
PerthNow
Abby Sunderland seeks cash to save her boat Wild Eyes from the Indian Ocean
By Carly Crawford and Michael Harvey
THE family of US solo sailor Abby Sunderland are seeking public donations to save her crippled boat Wild Eyes from the Indian Ocean, despite claims they don’t have the money to compensate the Australian Government for her $300,000 rescue.
An appeal launched on Abby’s blog site called Save Wild Eyes asks visitors to help raise the money necessary towards the cost of towing the stricken vessel from the Indian Ocean back to the nearest port.
According to the site, every dollar donated will be put towards the cost of recovering Wild Eyes.
The appeal has so far raised $2,460 from 75 members from the public, mostly from the USA. Donations have also come in from Canada, the Netherlands, Germany and New Zealand.
The site is also hosting a poll asking visitors if Wild Eyes should be saved and brought home to be reunited with Abby, with 61% of the 10,000 respondents saying yes and 39% saying no.
Chatter on the forums here
Boat In General
previous owner:
“Having sailed numerous times on Wildeyes (former owner), she is by no means a “questionable” boat. Yeah, the 40s are slow, which is why the BOC dropped them, but they are very seaworthy. However, she is a bitch to try and get going up wind. Overall, she is a good boat, extremely well built, and without a doubt will be able to take her around, the only thing that can stop the boat from going around again (as Alan Paris’ BTC Velocity for 2002 Around Alone) is Abby.”
original owner:
“Abby’s boat was designed and built for the Around Alone 2002 – 2003 yacht race in which I sailed her around the world…..slowly !! In many ways this boat is solid as a rock and built to an old IMOCA Class 50 ( yes Class 50 ) rule which includes 110% bouyancy, inverted instability rules, 5 water tight compartments blah blah. There is kevlar in the entire hull as well as 3 large sections filled with foam.
Downwind in 60kts she is just fine ( my highest velocity was just over 60 ) Upwind she is useless and requires great care. So Abby if one of your friends or family reads this, be VERY conservative of lee shores and expect to be able to at best attain a close reach of 80 degrees AWA.”
more here scroll down to post 69
Sailing Anarchy forum here
What tack to take on Abby Sunderland’s tale?
It remains unclear whether any type of film or reality TV show will emerge from the teenager’s aborted around-the-world sea voyage. Is she a victim — or heroine?
“It’s not at all about money,” the father said. “It’s about a passion for sailing and loving your kids so much you want to be part of their dream.”
What the market is for the Abby Sunderland brand and whether the accident that ended her trip has increased the potential audience remains unclear.
Her story has great marketing potential as a documentary, an audiobook and even a movie, said Scott Sternberg, a veteran TV producer. A documentary would depend on how much footage is available of her journey, up to her final days at sea.
LETTER FROM THE AUSTRALIAN SEARCH & RESCUE
Can you put a message on your blog informing your readers that the Australian government has not requested any recovery cost for Abby’s search and recovery. In fact the Govt here has been in the media and stated that fact several times. I doubt this got coverage in the US.
Australia like the US have always responded to requests for help and have provided whatever resources are required. At no stage have we asked for cost recovery. Likewise domestic search and rescue have never requested payment for services. If a person wishes to make a contribution to the costs then that is their call. It is not expected or asked for.
The cost recovery stuff is a beat up by the media. They do it every time. Don’t get sucked in by it. Unfortunately some of the comments I have read on some blogs seems to paint Australians as a bunch of tight arses who will only rescue people if they have a cheque book. This has never been the case as you have found out.
Let’s not let the media hijack a good story. Likewise don’t become a victim of it by playing into their hands.
Bottom line is, don’t get sucked in by the media. I would like a clarification on your blog just letting your readers know that the Australian Government has not requested payment nor would they. Let’s not let the media portray the many groups that were involved in Abby’s rescue as a bunch of people motivated and driven by money. This is not the case.
-Search and Rescue Volunteer Perth.
Dear Abby Sunderland Supporters:
We are all asking for prayers for Abby today. Please take a moment and light a candle for her. I will try to keep you all in the loop as I get information through out the day.
A rescue effort has been launched in hope of finding Abby Sunderland <http://abbysunderland.com/> , 16, who set off her emergency beacon locating devices from the southern Indian Ocean early this morning.
Sunderland, who had been attempting to sail around the world alone, endured multiple knockdowns in 60-knot winds Thursday before conditions briefly abated.
However, her parents lost satellite phone contact early this morning and an hour later were notified by the Australian Coast Guard that both of Sunderland’s EPIRB satellite devices had been activated.
One is apparently is attached to a survival suit or a life raft and meant to be used when a person is in the water or aboard a life raft.
Abby’s father struggled with emotions and said he didn’t know if his daughter was in a life raft or aboard the boat, or whether the boat was upside down.
“Everything seemed to be under control,” Laurence Sunderland said. “But then our call dropped and a hour later the Coast Guard called.”
Abby is hundreds of miles from land. The nearest ship was about 400 miles away. The rescue effort is being coordinated by the French-controlled Reunion Islands and Australia. Sunderland had been sailing in 50- to 60-foot seas and it was dark when the EPIRB devices were activated.
The Sunderland’s are asking people to pray for their daughter, a high-school junior from Thousand Oaks, Calif.
Sailing Anarchy forum updates here
Abby Sunderland believed to still be on her sailboat
Two emergency beacons activated by teen sailor Abby Sunderland <http://abbysunderland.org> were tracking together in the Indian Ocean as of 8 p.m. (PDT),
the Sunderland family announced in an email prayer request sent to some of Abby’s supporters.
They take this to mean that Abby–who manually activated one device on her survival suit or life vest, and another on her sailboat–is still aboard the 40-foot cruising sled.
“They are tracking together so that means that Abby is still on the boat,” the Sunderland family announced.
The statement added: “Our fear is that the boat has capsized and that it is taking on water. It will be very difficult to rescue her if she is capsized.
The boat is equipped with an escape hatch that she can exit from but it will be very difficult in the water she is experiencing.”
The Sunderlands also stated that the Australian search-and-rescue airplane trying to reach her position was not expected to arrive until at least 10 p.m. (PDT).
The announcement–due to be posted on her blog <http://soloround.blogspot.com/> –closed with this passage:
“Thank you for praying and asking your friends to pray. We pray that Abby will feel God’s spirit and even see His angels at work around her as she trusts in Him.”
Abby is Fine!
We have just heard from the Australian Search and Rescue. The plane arrived on the scene moments ago. Wild Eyes is upright but her rigging is down. The weather conditions are abating. Radio communication was made and Abby reports that she is fine!
We don’t know much else right now. The French fishing vessel that was diverted to her location will be there in a little over 24 hours. Where they will take her or how long it will take we don’t know.
More updates as news comes in.
Abby Sunderland – dismasted but safe
‘Abby – dismasted but safe and well’ .
Abby Sunderland says she is in good shape….family is thrilled
The mast of her boat as been torn off…a plane flew overhead, located, talked with her on the radio and she will be rescued in 24 hours!
A family spokesman says searchers have contacted a 16-year-old Southern California girl who was feared lost at sea and she is alive and well.
more news as it finds my inbox……..great to hear that she has been found 
Wild Eyes dismasted in the Southern Indian Ocean
Photo courtesy of Australian Search & Rescue
‘Abby Sunderland was in great spirits after being spotted’ say rescue members.
SEARCH and rescue crew members have described how stricken 16-year-old yachtswoman Abby Sunderland remained “in good spirits” after being spotted from the air yesterday.
A crew of 11 SES and FESA volunteers that were on board the ‘spotter’ airbus returned to Perth just after 7:30pm last night after successfully locating the troubled vessel in the Indian Ocean.
FESA taskforce leader Will Blackshaw said the crew had a very brief period of contact with the young sailor, but said she remained positive despite the setback.
From the forums on reddit.com
I grew up with Abby and her brother Zac and her family on my boat/their boat in southern California. Abby, who is three years younger than me, was more mature, selfless, capable, amazing, strong, when she was 11 years old than I am now at 19. She grew up on a boat, cruised the world with her family for her entire life. When she was 11 she helped give birth to her younger sister. AT ELEVEN YEARS OLD. She always took care of her other younger brother, Toby, who was prone to sea-sickness when she was 6-9y/o. I was 9 I was fighting with my brother and fighting my parents when they asked me to do something. She never argued back, she knew the boat inside and out. She made me feel like shit for talking back to my dad and not knowing every type of knot.
So many people are saying “child endanerment!” “I would never send my 16 year old around the world alone! WTF?!” and it makes me furious. NO SHIT YOU WOULDN’T! YOU AREN’Y EVEN CAPABLE OF GOING AROUND THE WORLD YOURSELF!”
She isn’t some girl who grew up like most of us; she didn’t go to public school, she never lived in a house. She always lived on the boat with (when I knew her) her older brother Zac, and Jesse and Toby and her parents. She was raised on the boat, knew how to sail the boat alone when she was 6 years old, was infinitely more mature and disciplined by the time she was 11 than I am now.
Abby Sunderland abbysunderland.org is safely in the hands of French fishermen, no longer exposed to the harsh conditions she had endured for the past several days.
The 16-year-old sailor from Thousand Oaks, Calif., who had been the subject of a highly publicized search-and-rescue mission as her de-masted 40-foot vessel was a adrift in rough seas in the southern Indian Ocean, was picked up by a crew from the Ile De La Runion on Saturday afternoon, or early Saturday morning PDT.
This officially brings to an end Sunderland’s bid to become the youngest person to sail around the world alone. But on the bright side, soon after she gets home — possibly beforehand — her new baby brother will be brought into the world.
Marianne Sunderland, Abby’s mom, is due to give birth to her eighth child on July 1. She had gone into false labor at least once during these trying past few days.
Marianne spoke with Abby shortly after the rescue and said she seemed like her old self, with not much to say. “She just said, ‘I’m fine,’ and then we talked for a bit and passed the phone around inside the house,” Marianne said.
Abby wasted no time getting familiar with the boat. She got on its computer and updated her blog soloround.blogspot.com with this passage: “Sorry I haven’t written in so long. As you probably already know I had a pretty rough couple of days. The long ad short of it is, well, one long wave, and one short mast (short meaning a two-inch stub). I’ll write a more detailed blog later. I just wanted to let everyone know I am safe and sound on a great big fishing boat headed I am not exactly sure where.”
The previous time Abby had talked to her mom and dad, via satellite phone, was early Thursday while she struggled in fierce winds and high seas. Abby had a day earlier been slammed by a supercharged storm and her vessel had been knocked side-to-side, its mast striking the water, in waves up to 50 feet.
About an hour after that call broke off, Abby activated two emergency satellite beacons, launching an international rescue effort. Her boat had rolled and she lost her mast and satellite communications. She might have been briefly knocked unconscious before activating the beacons, which signaled her position to authorities.
A period of 20 hours had passed before Abby was located and contacted aboard her vessel, Wild Eyes, by the crew of an Australian spotter plane. She was alert when the spotter plane arrived and she spoke to a crewman via VHF radio.
During those 20 hours, headlines of a girl feared lost at sea, her boat possibly capsized, the sailor possibly trapped beneath the boat or — worse — in the water, topped newspaper and website stories.
That prompted debate and criticism as people questioned the wisdom of letting a teenage girl attempt so dangerous a feat, and the timing of an excursion that placed her in the region during the onset of the Southern Hemisphere winter.
Abby addressed some of these issues in her blog post: “The truth is, I was in a storm and you don’t sail through the Indian Ocean without getting in at least one storm. Storms are part of the deal when set out to sail around the world alone.”
Of the age issue she wrote: “Since when does age create gigantic waves and storms.”
Many also wondered who would foot the bill for this complex rescue in one of the more remote location on the planet.
Abby’s father Laurence, reached Friday night, said he would worry about that after his daughter was out of danger.
The rescue operation was tricky, as expected, as seas remained large and shifting when the large fishing boat arrived. The pickup was by a crew in a smaller boat and at one point its captain fell overboard and “was fished out in difficult conditions,” said a statement from French authorities.
The Sunderlands were notified of the rescue by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority. Afterward Laurence stepped from his home into the predawn darkness and told reporters: “She got out of her vessel with the clothes on her back, and we are just really excited and ecstatic that Abigail is in safe hands. She was in good spirits.”
It will be a long journey home for Abby, who is aboard a vessel on which only two crewmen speak limited English. The Ile De La Reunion will make a two-day trip to the Kerguelen Islands. Abby then is expected to board another boat for a seven-day voyage for Reunion Island, east of Madagascar.
The Sunderlands have not yet figured out the logistics of getting Abby home from there.
A Note from Abby
Hey everyone,
Sorry I haven’t written in so long as you probably already know I had a pretty rough couple of days. I can’t write much now as I am typing on a french key pad as well as trying to stay seated in a bouncy fishing boat.
The long and the short of it is, well, one long wave, and one short mast (short meaning two inch stub.) I’ll write a more detailed blog later, just wanted to let every one know I am safe and sound on a great big fishing boat headed I am not exactly sure where.
Crazy is the word that really describes everything that has happened best.
Within a few minutes of being on board the fishing boat, I was already getting calls from the press. I don’t know how they got the number but it seems everybody is eager to pounce on my story now that something bad has happened.
There are plenty of things people can think of to blame for my situation; my age, the time of year and many more. The truth is, I was in a storm and you don’t sail through the Indian Ocean without getting in at least one storm. It wasn’t the time of year it was just a Southern Ocean storm. Storms are part of the deal when you set out to sail around the world.
As for age, since when does age create gigantic waves and storms?
I keep hitting the wrong keys and am still trying to get over the fact that I will never see my Wild Eyes again. So Ill write more later.
Abby
Rescued teen’s parents defend solo sail attempt
Laurence Sunderland: ‘She gave it her best shot, following her dream’
Laurence Sunderland: ‘She gave it her best shot, following her dream’ (AFP: Robyn Beck)
The parents of 16-year-old US sailor Abby Sunderland have defended her solo round-the-world attempt after her successful rescue by a French fishing boat.
The sailor is on her way to the French island La Reunion after she was picked up 2,000 nautical miles off the West Australian coast on Saturday.
Sunderland’s parents have responded to criticisms that they should be held accountable because of their daughter’s age and that her yacht was not adequate for her round-the-world effort.
Her father Laurence says French yachtwoman Isabelle Autissier did not quit the sport after she suffered a similar fate a decade ago.
“Isabelle Autissier had a similar incident where she did lose her keel in the Indian Ocean and needed rescuing – she was I think at the time around 30, 35,” he said.
“She’s considered one of the world’s best sailors. Should we say Abby can’t sail again because she lost her keel?”
more Sailing Anarchy forums here
16 year old Abby Sunderland is preparing to sail around the world in an open 40, Wild Eyes.
Follow her story here and watch this story grow.
Abby Sunderland: The Adventure begins on Yachtyakka here
This post is tagged Abby Sunderland, Fox News, Laurence Sunderland, Los Angeles Times, Marianne Sunderland, sailing anarchy, unsinkable, Wild Eyes
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