Catastrophe at Sea

A nighttime collision off Thailand

- Nat Warren-White

There are few things a sailor fears more than a collision at sea. On our circumnavigation, unfortunately, it happened. Our random moment was an experience that will stay with us forever and it even resulted in some persistent PTSD symptoms for several years afterward. Luckily, we were able to extricate ourselves without losing our boat.

We had arrived back aboard our Montevideo 43 Bahati just before Christmas. I’d been on a job in Tokyo and my wife Betsy flew in to meet me in Japan for a short side trip to Kyoto before returning to Malaysia with the aim of sailing north to Thailand for Christmas with our friends aboard the cruising boat Empire, who were relaxing in Ao Chalong, Phuket, waiting to ring in the New Year. We had become good friends with Eivind and Heidi and their two young boys, Marius and Eirik, since our first meeting in the Gala pagos and we felt like they were the closest thing to family we had among the cruising community. Marius and Eirik were like grandchildren in our hearts and minds. Nothing sounded sweeter than the idea of being with them to celebrate the holidays.

We provisioned and prepared to leave our good friends at the Telaga Harbour marina on the northwestern end of Langkawi Island on Christmas Eve, estimating that with the prevailing breeze behind us it would be an easy overnight sail north to Thailand. Betsy had come down with a bronchial infection in Japan and I was exhausted from a week of back-to-back corporate training programs, but we were determined to leave despite our collective fatigue. This was our first mistake. In fact, after discussing our itinerary we made the decision to sleep for six hours before casting off because we both recognized we weren’t really rested enough to put to sea. In retrospect, we shouldn’t have left at all, but, as the saying goes, “hindsight is 20-20.”

Quietly leaving harbor