Ericsson 3 Crew Email
Leg 4 - 15:46 GMT Friday, February 6, 2009. |
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Place: Taiwan, Hualien. Time: five in the morning. It is completely dark, rain is drizzling down and the temperature has suddenly dropped 10 degrees. But the heat is on and in a few hours, this mission will reach one of its most crucial points.
The new piece has arrived from Italy. Build team leader Andy Lowe and shore manager Ben Wright are the first ones to arrive in the shipyard to receive the big wooden box. |
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Delta Lloyd and Ericsson 3 moored in Keelung, Taiwan, having both sustained bow damage during Leg 4 of the Volvo Ocean Race 2008-09. Ericsson 3 is intending to finish the leg to Qingdao once repairs are completed, but Delta Lloyd will be shipped to Rio de Janeiro to rejoin the race for Leg 6.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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"Will the shape, size and structure be correct? What if the carbon has delaminated during the flight?" All these worrying thoughts are running through my head.
Of course, everything has been thoroughly checked from the beginning and the process should proceed just as we planed. "Bulletproof", I keep telling myself.
But. There is always a ‘but’. You can never know for sure. Even in Ben’s and Andy’s eyes, I can see a bit of relief when they open the box and conclude that everything is in order. |
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Herve Le Quillec, Shore Manager for Ericsson. Ericsson 3 is moved by barge, down the coast of Taiwan from Keelung to Hualien where an 8 metre piece of the bow will be pulled out and replaced before they continue the remaining leg 4 joureny to Qingdao.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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Now, eight hours later, the piece has been cut, shaped and is ready to go.
"Like a glove", Andy says the first time we try it on. But just a few seconds later he wants to take it down again to make it fit even better. "Just a few millimetres of sanding and it will fit perfectly."
And it does. One more step in the right direction.
4 February 2009
"They have promised me to do the impossible", Magnus Olsson shouted with a smile when he left the shipyard the other night.
He was talking about the boat builders and everyone else involved with getting the boat ready for us to get to the start line for leg five from China to Rio. |
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Ericsson 3 is moved by barge, down the coast of Taiwan from Keelung to Hualien where an 8 metre piece of the bow will be pulled out and replaced before they continue the remaining leg 4 joureny to Qingdao.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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We now have a really good setup here in Taiwan and everyone is working their bones off to make this happen. Carbon dust is flowing from the bow of Ericsson 3 all around the clock. Boat builders have flown in from different parts of the world and are now working in white overalls and facemasks to get rid of all the delaminated and wet structure.
It’s a pretty tough environment with noise and dangerous dust. But that doesn’t seem to worry these guys. The have done jobs like this uncountable times before and are focused on getting it done. |
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Ericsson 3 is moved by barge, down the coast of Taiwan from Keelung to Hualien where an 8 metre piece of the bow will be pulled out and replaced before they continue the remaining leg 4 joureny to Qingdao.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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On Tuesday, a seven square metre section of the bow came off. Yesterday was spent making sure the hull doesn’t have any other damage and making everything ready for putting the new piece on when it arrives.
It’s a good spirit among the guys and the environment to make a good repair is ideal. If you look on the boat from the starboard side, it looks like it’s in perfect condition to go racing. And when you walk around, you find a huge hole in the bow. It’s a very odd and frustrating feeling. And it gets even worse when you get closer and follow the work of the boat builders using saws and hammers to cut off even more of the structure.
It will feel better today when we reach the turning point and stop cutting off things and start building it up again.
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Ericsson 3 is craned onto a barge to be taken down the coast of Taiwan from Keelung to Hualien where an 8 metre piece of the bow will be pulled out and replaced before they continue the remaining leg 4 joureny to Qingdao.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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Most of the sailors are still in Qingdao to prepare for the long leg with food, spares etc. But they will return as soon as possible and help us to get ready here in Taiwan.
We haven’t left race mode since the start in Singapore. Personally I don’t mind to keeping focused on the race 100 per cent all the time, because, if you do get some time off, you are almost always thinking about it anyway.
But what we need is to sleep and eat well and not stress too much before the start. In all this rush we are taking on the longest leg in the history of Volvo Ocean Race and we are going to add a couple of extra days going from Taiwan to China. |
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Ericsson 3 arrives in Hualien, Taiwan, where an 8 metre piece of the bow will be pulled out and replaced before they continue the remaining leg 4 joureny to Qingdao.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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Most important now is to get the boat to the start but, at the same time, we can’t be exhausted when we start the race on the water. We are walking a thin line.
Rusty tug v Volvo 70
It was a very different trip, going on a tugboat with a barge with our VO 70 behind. Boatbuilder Roger Woodbury and I joined the Taiwanese crew to make sure the boat arrived in the new shipyard in Hualien in the same shape as it left Keelung.
I know how bad the sea state can be along the Taiwanese coast and I was very worried going out there with the boat standing on a 100 ft piece of iron. It just did not feel right. It would for sure go straight into the waves and the cradle would have to stand big hits. The fact that we were sitting on a 40-year old rusty tugboat with a non English speaking Taiwanese crew, did not make me feel a lot better. |
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Ericsson 3 arrives in Hualien, Taiwan, where an 8 metre piece of the bow will be pulled out and replaced before they continue the remaining leg 4 joureny to Qingdao.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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It started off well. The sea was amazingly flat and the sun was shining and Taiwan showed it’s most beautiful side with high mountains following the coast.
"The sea is a lot calmer than usual", the short but overwhelmingly loud skipper explained to me with energetic gesticulations.
When darkness was about to set in, the wind suddenly increased and the sea state became pretty bad. It was just when we rounded one of two capes and our rusty old piece of boat as was rolling pretty dramatically from side to side and the waves were spraying the barge.
A freezing feeling was running along my back. What have we gotten ourselves into?
Just as we passed the corner, the sea calmed down again and as it turned dark there was no point in worrying anymore. There was simply nothing we could do. |
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Ericsson 3 arrives in Hualien, Taiwan, where an 8 metre piece of the bow will be pulled out and replaced before they continue the remaining leg 4 joureny to Qingdao.
Photo © Dave Kneale / Volvo Ocean Race.
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The crew offered dinner and we had the experience of another world of working at sea. The food was simple with rice, vegetables and boiled fish, like meatballs but fish. Better than freeze-dried. But the facilities with galley and toilet are actually more sophisticated on our VO 70. Their toilet is just a hole and the kitchen is not very easy to work in when the seas get big. And the bunks... I’m sure the ones that exist are nice, but there were more crew than bunks so we got a 1.50 cm wooden sofa each. The VO 70-bunks are luxury compared with these.
Just as the sun was rising, we reached the harbour and the barge was hauled in alongside. The crew was fighting hard on the aft deck with keeping the massive rope in control. Several times they were centimetres from being punched overboard. A bit like our bowmen taking furled sails down in heavy weather.
After 20 hours we arrived and with a big effort, we now have the boat in the new shed. Let the repairs begin.
Gustav Morin - MCM
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