| At sea. Atlantic Rowing Race: Conditions better for Mission Atlantic but concerned over injuries |
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| Friday, 13 January 2006 | |
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Paula, Kathy, Sarah and Lois: Yesterday, nearby teams began to report less extreme winds of around 18 knots and a favourable swell, creating a more comfortable lifestyle. Typical trade conditions are generally winds from 15-25 knots with regular squalls. Anything over 25 knots creates huge, breaking seas making it difficult to control the boat. The more favourable conditions must be to the teams liking as the girls rowed 55 miles yesterday - further than the previous 4 days - and look set to continue with around another 55 miles today. Elsewhere in the fleet - On Gurkha Spirit Al Howard was told to stop rowing following doctors advice, as it is suspected he has either cracked or broken 2 or 3 ribs when the boat was broached and he was thrown overboard on Sunday. They have decided to carry on for 24 hours and assess the situation then; to carry on with Nick rowing and Al cooking, or to abandon the race. Clearly they wish desperately to avoid the latter alternative if at all possible. 2 days ago, Charmed Life summoned emergency assistance from a support vessel. The support vessel Aurora reached them yesterday morning and discovered a crew member had repeated spasms in both his arms and legs following a fall onto his back. Yesterday evening a UK specialist gave the all clear for the rower to continue after what appeared to be a pulled muscle in his shoulder. Spirit of EDF with TV presenter Ben Fogle and Olympic rower James Cracknell on board have continued to pull away from the rest of the fleet with just 614 miles to go to the finish. They are even making gains on the team of 4 just in front of them. Yesterday’s major issue on Row4Life was the state of their bottoms. “We are both in agony with no respite. Apart from hurting when we row, even the rocking of the boat is extremely painful.” The main cause of sores is from salt crystals after getting wet, so they have been advised to wash with water, dry out in the cooler hours of the day to avoid sunburn adding to the problem and then to apply large quantities of sudocreme – a routine to repeat twice a day. Open sores need to be washed with iodine and then covered with gauze. You can picture the scene… Mission Atlantic is crewed by Paula Evemy, Kathy Tracey, Sarah Day, Lois Rawlins-Duquemin from Guernsey, C.I. http://www.humanedgetech.com/expedition/missiona/ |
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| Last Updated ( Friday, 13 January 2006 ) |
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