Yacht skipper: We didn’t provoke whale (& photos are real)
- Thu, 22 Jul 2010
- Comments (11)
A South African yachtsman who made news around the world yesterday after pictures emerged of his boat being leapt on by a whale has denied claims that he had somehow provoked the cetacean into defending itself.
Ralph Mothes and his sailing companion Paloma Werner were cruising in their 32ft steel yacht, Intrepid, off the coast of south-west South Africa on Sunday when the whale decided it would try and pass over - not under - the boat.
The southern right whale, estimated to be around 33ft long and weighing in at 40 tons, smashed into the yacht's topsides, ripping off the mast and luckily leaving the two on board completely unharmed.
After initial reports of the incident yesterday, it emerged that officials in South Africa had launched an investigation into claims the whale had reacted after being "harassed" by a RIB and a yacht.
"We would be stupid if we even thought of harassing these magnificent mammals and have always and will continue to sail with care and treat them with great reverance and respect," Mothes told MBY.
"Most sailors who sail up and down the coast at this time of year see whales and often need to take avoiding action, but then the whale is directly in your path and not breaching, like this one was doing. It was just a freak accident."
Mothes further rejected suggestions that the images were faked, which some had claimed due to the fact he's not actually looking in the direction of the vast black mass flying towards him in the photo.
"The photos are real - scary but real," he said. "That's what happened and we're lucky to be alive. We were sailing, had no engine on and no idea it would come out of the water where it did."
Remarkably, the boat is not a write-off.
"The mast is being repaired as we speak and the doghouse will have to be rebuilt or replaced with a bimini. Some stanchions are broken and there are a few dents here and there but otherwise our steel Intrepid is fine and probably will be back in action by the end of next week," Mothes said.
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Peter
August 09 14:44
The sun is about 70 degrees to port, judging by the lighting on the genoa (I am assuming that the genoa is filled with the wind on the port quarter, else why is the main not in use (but why is it still in its bag?)? Does the lighting on the whale correspond to the direction of illumination on the boat? I think the light should extend over more than a quarter of the whale but it only extends over about one-sixth on average and the shadow of the whale extends from the bow to just aft of the port capshroud. That corresponds to the illumination of the genoa but not to the illumination of the whale. I am not happy being unable to distinguish the whale's shadow on the water. That should be investigated by the insurers, as should the illumination of the whale, but they will have to investigate contrast settings very carefully. The time it would take for the whale to emerge by about 7 metres is about a second (I assume the whale's speed was not much greater than zero at the time the picture was taken) so the steersman should have heard and reacted to the whale by the time the picture was taken. He might have been looking at his estimated point of impact to decide how to steer during the one-third of a second to impact - or not?
Is it a fake? I don't know but although there was plenty of time to point and shoot, the mystery is why the camera and the movie camera were at the ready. Finally, the whale's positin reminds me of mine when leaping back onto my laser after a capsize. I usually got bruised and batrtered on a boat with somooth surfaces. The whale should have left bits behind on the stanchions, mast etc. Did it?
Mark Ward
July 26 18:39
so very highly unlikely
Stewart Campbell
July 26 12:24
I was told that a tourist on a nearby boat took the photos. He was presumably taking photos of the whale, and kept shooting as it approached the yacht.
Arrigo
July 26 12:20
Who took the shots?