Jean-Jacques Savin’s ocean canoe

Could this boat have been made differently and Savin lives?

Jean-Jacques Savin: French adventurer dies crossing Atlantic Ocean https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60097918

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The boat appears to be ultimately stable upside down, but perhaps in a raging sea it just keeps rolling.

 

There is also a thread on the YBW Forum in England about this incident -
Loss of Ocean rower-boat design https://forums.ybw.com/index.php?threads/loss-of-ocean-rower-boat-design.578037/

I wonder if Jean Jacques designed / built this boat himself?
If so, it probably would have been much easier / cheaper / safer in the long run to buy an existing second hand rowing boat - I think that there are probably quite a few out there always for sale.

The boats designed by Phil Morrison for the first Woodvale transatlantic rowing race in 1997 seem to be the most numerous -
Ocean Rowboats https://angusadventures.com/adventurer-handbook/oceanrowing/ocean-rowboats/

These boats are self righting - but only if the hatches in the cabins are closed, and if they have the emergency fresh water ballast in the keel.
Twenty odd years ago a pal of mine decided to have a go at the female singlehanded transatlantic rowing record - she used the boat that her Dad had rowed in the 1997 race from the Canaries to Barbados.
But she was maybe a bit too ruthless re her weight elimination, and / or maybe she had a hatch open - when she was about 10 days out she was capsized, and the boat stayed inverted.
She had to activate her EPIRB, and after about 8 hours sitting on top of the inverted boat, she was rescued by a cargo ship.
The boat meanwhile carried on drifting, upside down, across the Atlantic, and eventually washed ashore on an island in the Bahamas.

The Rannoch boats seem to be more popular now - but I am sure that they are a lot more expensive than the Woodvale boats were in kit form (many of the rowers in the Woodvale races built the boats themselves from kits).
https://www.rannochadventure.com/boats-2/rannoch-r10-solo

 

Just learned Jean-Jacques Savin set sail again across the Atlantic. This time it was in an ocean canoe. He ran into bad weather near the Azores, deployed EPIRBS and was later found dead by maritime rescuers. They found his vessel capsized.

Looking over various stories it appears the bad weather damaged his electric desalination system and he was forced to filter water by hand. He reported the hand pumping was very tiring.

His vessel looks seaworthy like other ocean canoes. If it took on water though that could spell trouble and perhaps lead to a capsize.

RIP to this adventurous man.

French adventurer, 75, dies in attempt to row across the Atlantic https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/23/french-adventurer-75-attempting-to-row-across-the-atlantic-found-dead

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Excellent points. Hopefully the rescue dive team was able to determine what the cause was. Not much room for error especially while traveling solo. I’ve read many stories about crew rotating to take on emergency tasks around the clock. Going solo requires total faith in your vessel.

 

Re Jean Jacques previous transatlantic adventure drifting across in a big orange barrel, there was a long running thread on here at the time about it -
Frenchman sets sail across Atlantic in a barrel! https://www.boatdesign.net/threads/frenchman-sets-sail-across-atlantic-in-a-barrel.61606/

 

Yes this was the same sailor, but different vessel. He died doing what he loved. Bless his soul.

 

Thanks to moderator for title work.

 

So, the critical piece is hatches open or hatches closed it seems.