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French Polynesia, Marquesas Islands: Family Rescued from Sinking Catamaran

French Polynesia’s Joint Rescue Coordination Centre (JRCC) has been involved in several rescues in their area of operation in the last two weeks, including coordinating the rescue of one of France’s Olympic Champion sailors and her family in the Marquesas Islands.

Published 4 days ago

Rescue Operations in the Marquesas

Source: Radio 1 Tahiti

JRCC Tahiti has coordinated two rescue operations following sailboat sinkings in the Marquesas Islands. This does not indicate, according to the rescue center’s deputy director, that the area is exceptionally dangerous, or that the crews navigating it are insufficiently experienced.

The first incident was due to an unexpected breakage and the second was due to a collision in the middle of the night with an unidentified floating object (“UFO”) that could be a drifting container, a mass of vegetation, or a cetacean.

Family Evacuated Safely

In the most recent incident, the catamaran Luna Bay II, on which three-time French Olympic sailing medalist Charline Picon embarked a few months ago for French Polynesia struck an unidentified object off the coast of Ua Pou, 50km south of Nuku Hiva in the Marquesas Islands, on the night of Friday May 30.

In October 2024, Charline, fresh from winning a bronze medal in sailing (49er) at the Paris Olympics, presented her “baby” to the newspaper L’Équipe: the Luna Bay II, a brand-new catamaran with which the champion—already a gold medalist in Rio and a silver medalist in Tokyo for windsurfing—intended to set sail for Polynesia. An adventure she embarked on with her partner and seven year old daughter starting with a transatlantic crossing, the Panama passage, the crossing to Polynesia and stops in the Gambier Islands, Fatu Hiva and Ua Pou.

Unfortunately the adventure took a dramatic turn on the night of Friday May 30 and the morning of Saturday May 31. At 3:16 a.m., the JRCC received a distress alert from an EPIRB satellite beacon, that of the Luna Bay II, then located approximately 70 nautical miles southwest of the island of Ua Pou. According to the High Commission, attempts at satellite contact were unsuccessful; no other vessels were sailing in the area, so a French army Gardian took off from Tahiti on a “search and rescue” mission. At the same time, assistance was requested from the fishing vessel “Lady Chris 10,” located about 100 nautical miles from the Codim Te Ata O Hiva launch, based in Hiva Oa. On the scene, the Gardian discovered the catamaran “sinking” but observed the dinghy and a life raft nearby. VHF contact was established with the survivors, who confirmed that they were all safe in the raft, which was showing signs of “water ingress.”

JRCC Tahiti image from the rescue of the crew of the Luna Bay II.

The Gardian therefore dropped a “SAR” chain—for Search and Rescue, which included a self-inflating inflatable boat, a distress beacon and survival equipment—into the area to allow the Olympic champion and her family to stay alive until a rescue boat arrived. The Stardust, a sailboat located about four hours’ sailing away, diverted its course and finally picked up the three survivors early Saturday afternoon, 10 hours after the Luna Bay II activated their distress beacon.

According to (JRCC) information, the catamaran struck an unidentified object in the open sea. This type of accident, which is very rare and particularly caused by containers or equipment falling from cargo ships and floating on the surface, is also the most dangerous: sailboats hit can sink in a matter of minutes. According to JRCC specialists, it was thanks to their experience and their quick reaction that the couple and their child survived until help arrived.

UFOs, rafts, beacons… What the JRCC says about the “black series” in the Marquesas Islands

Following the incident involving the Luna Bay II, the JRCC was asked (by Radio 1 FP) about the number of incidents in the Marquesas Islands recently, often on sailboats and sometimes attributed to the lack of experience of crews crossing the area on round-the-world voyages.

“The Marquesas Islands are not a particularly dangerous area,” said a spokesperson for the JRCC French Polynesia. “The “hotspot” in Polynesia remains the Society Islands, where we still have many more cases of damage or distress. It’s true that there’s a small series of incidents in the Marquesas Islands, but it’s a one-off, circumstantial occurrence. And what’s more, these incidents involve events with completely different origins: a part of the ship breaking and creating a leak, then being struck by a UFO… We can’t generalize by saying that the area is dangerous because ships sink there.”

Read the Full article here from Radio 1 FP (in French)

Helicopter Assists in Rescues

Source: Radio1 Tahiti

The Dauphin helicopter from the French Navy was also involved in assisting two catamarans in rescue operations in the Society Islands which occurred just a few hours apart during the night from Sunday May 25 to the morning of Monday May 2.

Incident near Mopelia

The first involved a Turkish-flagged sailboat sailing near Mopelia. (Also known as Maupihaa, Mopelia is an atoll on the western edge of the Isles Sous Le Vent (Leeward Isles) of the Society Islands – about 150 miles west of Bora Bora).

The skipper had raised the alert on Sunday morning. Speaking only Turkish, he was able to remain in contact with the JRCC throughout Sunday thanks to the intervention of a representative of the Turkish community in French Polynesia, who provided interpretation. According to the High Commission’s press release, the sailboat suffered several damages, but weather conditions prevented any towing, with a three-meter swell and winds exceeding 35 km/h. The skipper refused to be evacuated. But on Sunday evening, the situation deteriorated; the boat’s mast threatened to brea, and the skipper was hoisted out by the Dauphin helicopter during the night.

Catamaran in Distress off Moorea

A few hours later, another alert was issued around 4:30 a.m. Monday morning. A catamaran was sinking a few nautical miles west of Moorea. The Dauphin helicopter, on its way back from its first mission, picked up the distress signal and responded immediately. The two occupants of the sailboat were hoisted out safely at dawn.

The High Commissioner took advantage of the news of these two rescues to reiterate the importance of carrying appropriate safety equipment on every sea trip.

JRCC Tahiti’s Area of Responsibility in the South Pacific.

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