Relief after rescuing sailors at Vendée Globe

At the Vendée Globe, the sailors are left on their own for weeks – and in an emergency they are there for each other. This camaraderie has now saved the life of the Frenchman Kevin Escoffier.

AOn a life raft, the sea choppy, the waves up to five meters high, spray spray. The water under the French skipper Kevin Escoffier: ten degrees cold. Without a tracking device and incomplete safety equipment, it drifts in the Southern Ocean. Like all sailors at the Vendée Globe, he is on his own – especially at this moment, not so much in others. Sometimes the skippers see their competitors passing by and can wave to them. But in the extreme case they are hundreds of nautical miles away.

“I am now realizing what happened,” says the Frenchman Escoffier on Tuesday afternoon in the livestream. “I still have the image of my bug in my head pointing up. It’s like a bad dream. All the water that came in It’s still difficult for me to believe. ”He had to give up his boat on Monday at 2:46 pm (CET). Before that he was able to send a message: “I need help. I’m sinking It’s not a joke, ”it said. “The boat was full within four seconds. Then a wave came from behind, the water destroyed most of the electronics. I had time to drop a message, then I had to get out. It was totally crazy ”, he describes the situation in a video shortly after his rescue.