UPDATE: April 15, 2020
Broadcast Version For Maritime Mobile Service Network & Other Nets
A BOLO has been requested for SV KALAYAAN, UK registered Sun Odyssey 54DS, Blue Hull, with Captain Bob Peel on board. He departed Tyrell Bay, Carriacou on March 18th with plans to sail north to Puerto Rico.
CS:MEKZ8 and MMSI:232 019 710. SV KALAYAAN does have a life raft and is a very experienced mega yacht captain. Also, be on the lookout for a 6 man Sea Safe life raft.
Chris Parker has been has provided part of his initial drift analysis which indicates the vessel is probably drifting generally SW in the Caribbean, probably closer to ABCs and Venezuela than to PuertoRico or Hispanola.
Chris predicts that the target may be North of Bonaire and partially submerged at:
- Wednesday April 15: 14-50N /68-07W
- Thursday April 16: 14-47N / 68-25 W
Anyone with information should contact RCC Trinidad & Tobago, USCG or Glenn@boatwatch.org.
UPDATE April 13, 2020 – Chris Parker, Marine Weather Center (mwxc.com), a partner with Boatwatch, has been conducting an analysis of the EPIRB data to provide some answers and a possible drift analysis.
Chris is using the raw data for the confirmed EPIRB activation on 19 March 2020 at 0107 hrs UTC in position 12 32.57 N / 061 39.57 W. The EPIRB stopped transmitting on 23 March 2020 at 1222 hrs UTC in position 13 07.40 N / 062 16.26 W.
We have received two parts of the analysis.
PART ONE:
As for the present location of the vessel…The last 10+ hours of motion were WSW-W, which is more consistent with what the motion should have been for anything other than a sailboat trying to sail upwind. If we assume that motion (drifting downwind and being set by current, with no active motion upwind) continued, then the vessel is probably drifting generally W in the Caribbean, probably closer to ABCs and Venezuela than to PuertoRico or Hispanola.
The following information was received from concerned friends:
“We are currently undergoing search for a very well established captain from our yachting community, Robert/Bob Peel.
We had last established comms with Bob on 14th March and that his planned voyage was to head north to San Juan, Puerto Rico; he was at anchor in Tyrell Bay, Carriacou. After 10 days of no comms, we started to get concerned and we contacted the Cruiser community down there and someone eye-witnessed his yacht, Kalayaan, departing the bay and headed north. This was 18th or 19th March.
This evening, we have found out that his EPIRB has been set off, first on the 19th March, and then the Final and last signal received was 24th March; information I received from Trinidad and Tobago SAR. We have contacted MRCC Falmouth UK, USCG San Juan PR, MRCC Martinque SAR in Grenada – and everyone seems to be bouncing around whose problem this is.
We are now reaching out to the yachting community, for people still south in the Caribbean, or contacts you may have down there, to help aid in the search for Bob. Watchkeepers in the vicinity, please keep an extra vigilant lookout for anything that may help us work out where Bob is. Bob is a strong, stubborn Scotsman; he is a survivor and won’t give up if he is in that life raft.”
RCC San Juan has confirmed the EPIRB activation on March 19, 2020. RCC Trinidad and Tobago is assigned this case and has conducted a search.
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