‘The wave reduced the boat to matchsticks’

TWO Irish rowers who cheated death after being capsized mid-Atlantic described how a massive wave pulverised their boat to “matchsticks.”

Ciaran Lewis, 34, and Gearóid Towey, 28, were thrown in the ocean 1,200 miles from shore late on Sunday evening after a punishing day of angry seas and mechanical problems ended in disaster.

Their ordeal only ended five hours later when a giant gas tanker staged a daring rescue, plucking the two men by rope while still moving, and hoisting them onto a ladder where they fought high winds and a fierce swell to climb 45 feet to the deck.

“I think we’ll have to put them up for adoption,” said Gearóid Towey’s mother, Carmel, pondering how she and Ciaran Lewis’s long-suffering family will react if their daredevil sons think of taking to the oceans again.

“The first I heard about it was on the news at six o’clock. I nearly got a heart attack,” said Ms Towey.

Family members and neighbours piled into the Kilworth, Co Cork, home to support each other while they waited for developments and while they were determined to stay optimistic, Ms Towey said they quickly turned to prayer.

“Everybody was praying. I’m telling you, you hang on to your religion when there is something wrong.”

She revealed the rowing buddies had made room in their cramped vessel for the many holy medals supporters had sent them and they even took along a piece of Donegal clay sent to them for luck.

“They were supposed to keep them safe from hurricanes and all sorts of disasters. I think they worked because both boys are safe.”

Millionaire businessman Denis O’Brien, whose mobile company Digicel is the pair’s main sponsor, has offered every available support to get them home and arrangements were being made last night in the hope of bringing them back to Ireland this weekend.

The pair survived thanks to sophisticated satellite technology which enabled them to get a distress signal to the nearest coastguard, the US service at Norfolk, Virginia, and convey details of their position at sea.

They activated their EPIRB (emergency position indicating radio beacon) and the alarm was raised almost instantaneously, setting in train the dramatic search operation which led to their rescue.

It was also clear, however, that the cool heads of the crew played a huge part in their survival. Gearóid was thrown into the wave when the boat flipped over and, although he did not know which way was up and he believed he would drown, he was determined to keep swimming in the hope of breaking the surface.

Ciaran, meanwhile, was trapped upside down in the cabin and could only take one breath from a tiny air pocket before wriggling free and swimming outside.

The drama began shortly before 5pm Irish time while the two were 40 days and 1,600 miles into their epic 2,931-mile Atlantic Challenge race from the Canaries to the Caribbean. Gearóid was at the oars and Ciaran was in the cabin when he heard Gearóid warn: “This is it.”

“We were hit by what must have been a massive wave, completely out of the blue, and then I was upside down in the water,” Ciaran, a Dublin-based barrister, recalled. He surfaced to see the stern ripped off and the boat looking like “debris.”

Gearóid, a geography student at Trinity College, saw the wave coming and knew they were in trouble.

“The boat was absolutely destroyed. The sleeping cabin was completely ripped open. The boat was wrecked. The wave reduced it to matchsticks.”

After getting free from the cabin, Ciaran had to swim back underneath the boat three times, first freeing the life raft, then activating the EPIRB and lastly retrieving a bag which had a spare EPIRB which they could use if they got separated from the remains of their boat. They then climbed into their life raft, put on survival suits packed inside, had something to eat and drink and prepared for a long wait.

“We were saying the worst is over. We survived the capsize, we are safe in the life raft and we just have to keep our heads,” said Gearóid.

Unknown to them, the Spanish-registered ship tanker, the Hispania Spirit, was already on its way. They didn’t see the 800ft long gas tanker in the dark but heard its engines and let off flares.

The rescue was carried out in 30-knot winds and five-metre swells while the ship had to keep moving at 13 knots because of the difficulties of manoeuvring its massive bulk.

Matthew Brooks, search and rescue controller with the US Coastguard, said: “It was nasty out there.”

He said Ciaran and Gearóid had all the right equipment for an emergency but added: “If nobody was around to respond, it would have been a life- threatening situation.”

The pair were checked out by the Hispania Spirit’s medical officer and while sore and tired, suffered no real injuries. They will stay with the ship until it docks at Cartagena in south-east Spain on Saturday before flying home.

The pair were fundraising for the Irish Cancer Society and the Merchants Quay centre and the appeal is remaining open for the time being.