Make California Post a Preferred Source A crew were left stranded in a remote part of the Pacific Ocean after a large pod of sperm whales sunk their yacht.
Four shipmates from the 52ft Tai Tam were forced to abandon ship when up to eight of the extremely rare beasts thrashed up against the vessel at the weekend.
Dramatic footage showed the craft slowly sinking as it took on seawater caused by a huge hole in the side of it, before rescue crews managed to save them 18 hours later.
The crew had set out from New Zealand but were left stranded 250 nautical miles north of the tiny remote Norfolk Island.
Australian Jemma Cooper told CBS News she was manning the steering wheel of the ship when it was suddenly pushed sideways.
“There was sort of a loud thud. The whole boat was pushed sideways,” she said. She then spotted a sperm whale stalking the vessel in the water.
“We looked out to our port side, and there were six to eight, a pod, of whales there. So then it became clear that that’s what it was,” she told AFP.
The jolt awoke her husband, Jeremy Cooper. He knew immediately that the bump signaled something “very serious.”
The boat began taking on water, and the crew needed to jump into action to get through the life-threatening emergency.
As it turned out, Cooper said, the collision damaged the boat’s steering and left them unable to guide it. “All the steering gear was smashed on the starboard side, and there was a significant amount of water coming in,” Jeremy told AFP.
French crew member Martin Jaffre said the collision left gashes in the boat’s hull and cracked its fiberglass structure.
Because of the massive amounts of water pouring into the boat, New Zealand crew member Terry Hetherington said the boat declared a “full mayday” at 1 p.m. New Zealand time Saturday.
While they waited, crew members would shovel water out of the boat as much as they could as authorities came to rescue them.
Jaffre swam under the boat to inspect the hull and assisted other crew members in filling the holes with anything they could.
With the boat doomed, the four crew members jumped onto a life raft Saturday night. They cut their tether to the yacht, fearing it may drag them down.
Aerial footage from the New Zealand Defence Force showed a crew member waving to the aircraft. Later footage showed the yacht slipping under the water as the life raft sat in the open ocean.
A 470-foot container ship, the MV Sofrana Surville, rescued the four sailors early on Sunday morning after their terrifying 18-hour ordeal.
None of the crew members sustained any injuries. They climbed aboard and had coffee with the captain of the container ship.
“It was wonderful, wonderful, and just a terrible, terrible ending — but luckily no loss of life,” Cooper said. The crew was last known to be on their way to the nearest port to disembark.
Rescue Coordination Centre Operations Manager Mike Clulow praised the yacht crew’s efforts and their rescuers.
“This was a well-coordinated and executed rescue,” Clulow said. “The crew of the yacht did all the right things, and it was unfortunate to have struck a whale in open water.
“They were well prepared and the early activation of their EPIRB (Emergency Position-Indicating Radio Beacon) was key to helping get them to safety.
“It is an excellent reminder that being prepared when going to sea can save your life.” Sperm whales are massive, about 50 to 60 feet in length, and are known to be able to sink ships.
The whale is considered a “vulnerable” species by the nonprofit International Union for Conservation of Nature.
A California man suffered his own terrifying ocean ordeal this summer when he left Catalina Island and his sailboat was disabled, out of gas, and he had no way to contact anybody.
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