We departed Montgomery Reef on a bright, sunny, windless morning for the 45nm leg to the famous and dangerous Horizontal Falls that lie at the head of Talbot Bay. The plan was to anchor near the falls overnight and explore the entrance to the falls by RIB the next day, on the flat tide. 

The ocean scenery on the way was miles of turquoise blue sea, surrounded by scrub covered land with red rocks and reddish sandy beaches. The colour contrasts are stunning. It’s just so remote out here and so untouched. With more current on the nose than we expected, we entered Talbot Bay later than planned and into dangerous waters.

Like so many other places we have been on this expedition, you have to be so careful in the strong currents. There were places on the charts marked as 6m deep, but were 50m when we crossed them. The 16nm to the top of the inlet, to the anchorage, suddenly seemed a long way away as our speed over ground steadily dropped as we were slowed by the outgoing current. On the surface of the water, we could see whirlpools and eddies. Getting out of the current takes you towards the shallower edges of the inlet and submerged rocks.

In these conditions, you are heavily reliant on your engine. With a lack of breeze and strong currents, sailing is impossible. Freya was at the helm and we had worked our way from the centre of the inlet, out to the right hand side, where it was shallower (20m vs 40m) and flow against our bow was slower. Freya had built our speed over ground from 2 knots, back to 6 knots in the shallower waters, as we worked our way upstream.

Silver Fern had got ahead of Salt Lines by half a nautical mile and one of our crew looked back downstream to observe Salt Lines 90 degrees to the current and heading into the middle of the flow. A few seconds later we received an urgent VHF call from skipper Matt Harvey to advise their engine had failed and they were going to attempt to anchor and they would meet us upstream at the anchorage, once they had diagnosed and fixed the issue.

Knowing how dangerous the river flow and rocky bottom was, we responded immediately by turning Silver Fern’s bow downstream to head back to Salt Lines, so we were ready to assist. Within 2 minutes Matt called back again on the VHF to say their anchor had dug in, before being pulled completely out of the vessel. It was ripped out over the bow with 80m of chain following the anchor to a murky resting place. Salt Lines was now drifting in 5-6 knots of current, with no ability to manoeuvre their vessel and it was just a matter of minutes before they were on the rocks.

The speed on Silver Fern hit 12, then 14 then 15 knots over ground, as we covered the distance back to Salt Lines in just 3 minutes. The obvious solution was to attempt to raft up side to side with Salt Lines, so we could get the yacht under control. That meant bringing Silver Fern alongside, while both being swept sideways down the river at 5-6 knots. It was not going to be easy and we did not have a lot of time to execute.

The Silver Fern crew tied fenders along the port rail and we instructed Salt Lines to prepare fenders, bow and stern lines and springers on their starboard side, so they were ready to tie up. We also set up an extra bow and stern line on Silver Fern as a back up. I was nervous. Lashing 78 tons of yachts together in these conditions without damage or injury was unlikely.

I approached Salt Lines from astern and bought Silver Fern alongside. We got our timing wrong with throwing the lines and the boats quickly drifted apart, only attached at the bow. It quickly became dangerous as Silver Fern swung out at a 90 degree angle to Salt Lines while still attached bow to bow. Realising this could go bad really quickly, I called for our crew to release the bow line, so we would free ourselves and have another go.

Tick, tick, tick… Salt Lines was headed for the rocks and the clock was winding down. We had to nail it next time round, or there may not be time for a third attempt. I guided Silver Fern clear of Salt Lines while fighting the impact of the current, which just shoves your bow off course by 20-30 degrees with no warning. We circled around for another attempt. This time I came in from a 30 degree angle with more speed and we set up 2 crew this time, on each of the 4 dock lines. It was simply too much for one person to catch and hold each line and get them tied to Silver Fern, under the loads being experienced. We also had to time it, so all 4 lines were thrown and tied simultaneously as the boats would simply try and separate again if only 1 or 2 lines held the hulls together.

We shared the plan with Matt’s on VHF and I came in with more pace (10 knots over ground) as Salt Lines was still drifting side ways at 5-7 knots. It was counter intuitive, but the maths made sense and as I turned Silver Ferns bow away at the last moment and the momentum pushed the hulls together (like doing a handbrake slide in a car), and the crews did a brilliant job of getting all lines attached. Both vessels were now secured together and being swept sideways in the current together, with our keels creating massive drag.

The next challenge was to use Silver Fern’s rudder and motor to turn the bows of both boat’s 90 degrees downstream, so we could get steerage, control and start to steer the yachts away from a certain rocky grave. This was harder than I expected. I applied full power to Silver Fern and then full rudder, but could not get the bow down more than 20 degrees. I called out to Jess who was on the helm of Salt Lines and asked her to alter course with her rudder at the same time. As we built speed, the bows of both yachts slowly turned downstream, towards clear water and away from the rocky shoreline for the first time in 7 minutes. It felt like half an hour had already past and the tension and anxiety on both boats was fairly high, as the crews started to take stock of what had just happened and realised how close we had come to losing a yacht (or two).

Still unaware of what caused Salt Lines engine to stop suddenly, our next challenge was to find an anchorage, with a soft bottom and out of the current, so we could anchor both safely. Our plan to go the last few miles upstream to Horizontal Falls, had to be shelved for now and with darkness approaching in 90 minutes, we had to ignore any thoughts of going across or up current to an anchorage and simply head for something safe and simple. We tasked the two Ken’s to consult our expedition guide books and find a downstream anchorage. 

By now Matt had diagnosed that the cause of the engine failure was a lack of fuel. His brand new fuel gauges (calibrated in Cairns by a specialist) did not tell the true state of the fuel in the tanks. While stating the port tank was 27% (135 litres) full, it had actually run dry. As soon as Matt topped it up with fuel from a jerry can the engine restarted. Tank sensors are not perfect, but they should not differ by 27% when the boat is sitting level.

Eventually Ken & Ken picked Boat Club Bay at Koolan Island 5nm away, so we created a route that included pointing the bows of the yachts 30 degrees above the waypoint, so we could crab our way across the harbour, while being swept downstream, to the other side. We anchored right on dark, while rafted up together, as the last of the days light fell, to close out a day that could have ended with tragic consequences, if things had gone differently. We take two yachts on these expeditions for this scenario, but you hope you never have to face situations like these.

Our plan B worked this time. Quick thinking and great team work on both boats, prevented the emergency becoming a disaster. Having rafted up in a number of anchorages together previously, helped our crew know exactly where to tie the lines. That experience led to a successful execution, under extreme pressure, when it really counted. It’s easy to think about the ‘what if’s’ and consider all the tragic outcomes that could have occurred. But these didn’t happen, because we were close enough together and had enough crew, with the right training to make saving the vessel possible. A yacht on its own, in those circumstances would be out of options and would have become another statistic.

We agreed to have dinner on our respective yachts and then have a debrief. It’s an opportunity to recap on what had just happened and get everyones feedback on what went well and what would could improve in a similar situation, while its fresh. More importantly though, some of our crew were in a state of shock, with some visibly upset, some angry, some feeling unsafe and some struggling to process what had just occurred. In these situations, people often want to place blame and that’s not usually productive, especially when emotions are running high.

The crew debrief was a good exercise, with each of the 21 crew required to contribute their thoughts and feedback. While there was some debate about how many people were communicating or giving direction at the same time, it was a complex situation and no one individual could have scripted and executed the timing, with so many things having to happen simultaneously to pull off the successful tie up.

I cannot stress enough, how proud I am of this group of people and the way they worked together to safely secure Salt Lines and get us out of a difficult situation. Calm heads and focussed execution, largely prevailed and we live to fight another day with lessons learned. Matt has implemented a tank dipstick system for now and is taking the contractor to task for the poor calibration work with his new fuel tank sensors.

We implemented a 20 minute anchor watch roster overnight, with everyone taking turns to make sure we stayed put. There were not a lot of photos taken, we were too busy.

David