The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • 42

tEhe Siibnni Horning Ijeralb NEWS REVIEW 41 wwwsmhcomau SATURDAY FEBRUARY 19 2000 Join the ISP WHO WINS THE TOP AWARDS wrong bloke" Richard Purcell internetau magazine 'BEST OVERALL ISP' 1999 Fourteen months later yachtsman Richard Purcell is still battling the storm that killed six men in the 1998 Sydney-to-Hobart race Alan Kennedy reports pc world FTA awards PC WORLD MA READER'S CHOICE I BUSINESS from the coroner which recorded calls made to the radio relay ship Young Endeavour on December 27 He said they show it was at about 705 pm that the call went through It has been acknowledged by Sword of Orion's owner Rob Kothe that it was the fix from Purcell's yacht that brought assistance and led to the rescue of the crew although one Glynn Charles had died about two hours before Purcell saw them when he was washed overboard Margaret Rintoul II battled on to Hobart Its radio was switched off to conserve power as with the engine gone the crew had no way of recharging batteries As they rounded the Iron Pot at the mouth of the Derwent they switched the radio back on and heard that Jim Lawler and Mike Bannister off the Winston Churchill had died Purcell said he and Betts and Dick Norman went on deck and had a bit of a cry for Lawler who was mate" Purcell's actions were backed by Stanley in a television interview last June turn around a boat in those conditions it is very dangerous life threatening" he said "You can call in the position but physically you can't do anything else In those conditions you are fighting to save your own life" As the case against Purcell became public the letters of support started flooding in Ed Psaltis winner on handicap of the 1998 race in AFR Midnight Rambler wrote to him about his frustration with the media coverage and the accusations made against him would always go to the assistance of a yacht in trouble but only if this did not in turn place my yacht and crew in further extreme danger" he said Psaltis then recounted how for eight hours were just hanging on It is hard to describe to anyone not on our boat how precarious our position was think it is fair to say that anyone in the yachting community who knows how bad it was during this storm would concur with my Peter Kurts one of best-known yachtsmen wrote to Purcell last June almost ashamed to be a member of the club in the circumstances they have set themselves "Just what the committee expect a skipper to do in the circumstances you found yourself in on that fateful evening is absolutely beyond me "If you attempted to stop and hover around the chances are you and your crew would have ended up the same way as Sword of Orion" And most poignant of all a letter from Penny Dean and her children Nathan and Peter Her husband John died after the Winston Churchill sank I was not aware of what you are going through with these ridiculous charges against you" she wrote you to have turned around in those conditions would have been suicidal and you had to think of your crew Why it has gone on so long puzzles and angers Purcell The CYCA when it released its report on the 1 998 race said the incident would be referred to the coroner The club said then that nothing could be resolved until the report But the club and Purcell have been advised that the coroner is not interested in the matter and that Purcell will not even be called as a witness The Crown solicitor wrote to the CYCA on January 7 saying it had no objection to the Purcell matter being dealt with The counsel assisting the coroner has advised Purcell he will not be called as a witness and he is free to use the radio tapes for the purposes of any dispute he may have with the CYCA As far as Purcell is concerned there is nothing stand-' ing in the way of having the matter dropped Two weeks ago he set out the club's choices in a letter that was more like an ultimatum The club has three options It can drop the matter on the grounds that the protest jury has not been properly constituted At the same time it has to make a public apology to Purcell and his crew and there has to be some compensation for the mounting legal bills he has incurred while fighting the CYCA If the CYCA decides to continue with the charge he wants a full public hearing before a jury open to the media people can hear what bulls this all And then he will call a special meeting of the club the directors can explain to the members what they have been doing" If none of the above occurs he is ready to unleash a legal avalanche on the club for defamation He is still awaiting a reply but has run out of patience He has already succeeded in having pulped the book Knockdown by Martin Dugard an account of the 1998 race And he repeated what he said in December: "They took on the wrong bloke when they took on me" In January last year Purcell ran into Deda Runow on the docks at Hobart He said to him: I brought your boys back" HE SAW the flare for five seconds glowing dimly red about 400 metres across a foam-streaked sea The wind was blowing about 80 knots his yacht was in survival mode ploughing southwards with just a storm jib up His engine had packed up hours ago Two other men were with him the rest were below decks listening to the storm and anticipating the rolling crashing motion of their yacht Some were seasick others were battling the special sort of terror that comes to sailors when they realise they are fighting for their lives Richard Purcell squinted at the flare and for an instant saw a dismasted yacht on top of a huge wave Then the boat and the flare were gone It all happened on December 27 1998 but 14 months later Purcell is still living with the demons unleashed that day during the fatal Sydney-to-Hobart yacht race in which six men lost their lives He has read in a book that he is a coward people he knew look away when they see him he has been charged with gross misconduct by the race organiser the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia (CYC A) a business contract has been cancelled and his family have shared his pain Hanging over Purcell's head is the charge that he failed to give assistance to a stricken yacht Purcell a builder who would be the first to admit that he wouldn't win many popularity contests at the CYC A is angry and bitter about his treatment To Purcell and it seems to most of the yachting community he did nothing wrong He has been sailing most of his life and prides himself on his seamanship and that of the men he chooses to sail with However he wonders if Keith Flint owner and skipper of Helsal II was right when he said on television: "Someone must have it in for Richard Purcell" Flint also thought Purcell had made the right decision and said Helsal II which was in the same storm would not have been able to give assistance either John Stanley who survived before anyone else otherwise more lives would have been lost Sailors with any knowledge would have realised that and would not expect any more than you did You saved the rest of the crew of Sword of Orion and should feel very proud of what you did I would like you to know that our thoughts are with you at this most difficult time and will continue to be during the harrowing months that we all have to go through We believe you did everything humanly Last year as the controversy swirled around Purcell Kothe issued a statement: have advised the CYCA that we have not sought action under these rules and believe any further investigation should be at the discretion of the coroner have recently been advised that the civilian fixed-wing aircraft which pinpointed our position was responding to a radio report from Margaret Rintoul II We have been advised that Margaret Rintoul II had managed to relay our position to the CYCA radio relay vessel The crew of Sword of Orion and their families are grateful for the assistance of Richard Purcell and the crew of Margaret Rintoul On June 12 Kothe said he did not initiate the action against Purcell and "we didn't know it was going to happen until a week before its the CYCA's report on the 1998 race release" Koethe gave the lie to the view being put around the CYCA that he was driving the charge and that he drop it" Then in August in the CYCA's magazine Offshore the club commodore Hugo van Kretschmar after apologising to Purcell for his comments at a press conference in June expressed the hope that a favourable finding could be made for Purcell and that the matter be to bed as soon as practical" Purcell's lawyers tried to do this but still nothing has been finalised the sinking of the Winston Churchill in the race when told the charge was being laid said it sounded like "Richard has been made a bit of a scapegoat" On that December 27 about 630 pm Margaret Rintoul II a beautifully restored classic sloop buiit in the late "60s was engine- less following a malfunction earlier in the day The storm was reaching its peak and Purcell said it was in survival mode when he sighted the yacht he later found out was Sword of Orion He asked two others Dave Wiggan and Bill Riley what he should do Riley replied: your call you are the skipper" So Purcell called down to his navigator Colin Betts to fix the position and then sat for a few minutes and thought of everything that would have to happen to mm the boat around He would have to get his twin brother Graeme Sven Runow and Matt Shillington up He knew he risked losing one of them over the side and he knew there was a danger of his storm jib flogging itself to bits as they went round And the biggest risk of all was being caught beam on in one of the monster seas He thought of the two brothers Sven and Lars Runow and he said a conversation he had with their father Deda before the race filled his mind Deda Runow was worried about them both being on the same boat and he said: "Both my boys are going down with you I hope you bring them back OK" Purcell decided his only option was to send a fix on the sighting to race control and to tell it that Margaret Rintoul II couldn't give assistance Betts then spent a chaotic 20 minutes trying to get through Kingurra had reported a man overboard and there was a complicated negotiation going on about organising a tow for the dismasted Team Jaguar owned by the director Martin James But Purcell has spent weeks dissecting the tapes obtained NATIONAL BUSINESS BULLETIN BEST SUPPLIER OF ISP ACCESS' 1999 OzEmail Internet wins the awards that matter And you win with fast reliable Internet access You win with live technical support 24-hours a day 7-days a week You win with plans tailored to your degree of Internet use with the ability to switch plans at no extra cost Phone 132 884 for your own award OzEmail will award you 100 bonus hours of Internet use when you phone 132 884 for your free CD-ROM starter kit If you have access visit wwwozemailcomau to join online or fill in the coupon and join the winners with OzEmail Australia's Favourite Internet Service Provider The abandoned Sword of Orion flounders on mountainous seas NSW 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