Tapio Lehtinen The Golden Globe Race (GGR) was interrupted in November by the dramatic sinking of the boat Asteria at the border of the Indian Ocean and the Southern Ocean, and the ship went to the bottom of the ocean with it Lauri Viidan The first edition of the first poetry collection Betonimyläri from 1947.
Lehtinen, 64, who finally got home, held a media meeting in Helsinki on Tuesday, where he was moved to read Viida’s poem Luominen Betonimyläri collection. Lehtinen said that during the long solo sailing, he felt like he was in a time machine, when he was accompanied by albatrosses, a species older than modern humans.
– I left the church a long time ago and am an agnostic, but I believe in life. I’m grateful for the chance that Lehtinen got to live, Lehtinen said.
Lehtinen reminded that the oceans are the world’s biggest carbon sink and appealed for “twisting every screw”.
– If I have a small piece that I can drag into the crowd, it is to raise awareness, to ensure that the earth is passed on to the next generations in a viable condition, Lehtinen said.
Lehtinen also participated in the GGR race four years ago and described the changes he saw at sea as big and sad.
– It feels like the Atlantic is dying. The number of birds, whales and dolphins has decreased. I saw dolphins three times before sinking off France, when before there could be three dolphins a day. Whales like this twice, even though I saw a lot of them before. It is a result of predatory fishing and the acidification of the seas caused by climate change, Lehtinen said.
No time to panic
The cause of Asteria’s sinking will forever remain unexplained. Lehtinen said that he was startled by the bang and thought that something had broken on the deck. The sinking place was about 830 kilometers from Port Elizabeth, South Africa.
– French boats have repeatedly reported that they hit a container, so it is theoretically possible, but then you would have thought it hit the bow. Killer whales have sunk boats, but they have happened off the coast of Portugal and Spain. I did have the Ukrainian flag up for a long time, Lehtinen grinned as he pondered the possible reasons for the sinking.
The boat filled with water so quickly that, according to Lehtinen, the water started up to his navel when he climbed on deck.
– I had one hundred percent confidence in the boat. It was an unsinkable tank. The thought for the first two seconds was that it can’t be true. Then the process started systematically. I realized that the boat was sinking and quickly, Lehtinen said.
There is a gap in Lehtinen’s memories of the sinking at the point when he jumped into the life raft.
– The first priority was a life jacket. I claim that I would have survived with it, even if I had been floating in the water, because I knew that help would come in about a day. The second trick was that I could be given the location with some satellite trick, Lehtinen said.
Lehtinen said he was not afraid.
– Before leaving, we had several safety briefings in France. At the last meeting, I asked to speak and said that there have been bad situations at the Games, but we are in the best hands, trust me. I would never have thought that I would be the one whose boat disappears from under.
Lehtinen said he laughed out loud when he noticed the big text “Don’t panic” on the life raft.
– There was no time to panic.
Lehtinen drifted a day before the South African who participated in the race Kirsten Neuschäfer picked him up in his ship. After that, Lehtinen took a cargo ship to Indonesia, from where he flew to Finland.
In the autumn of next year, Lehtinen and his 12-person team plan to participate in the 50th anniversary race of the Whitbread Round the World sailing. In the Whitbread race in 1981, Lehtinen sailed around the world for the first time.
– This was a crushing disappointment, but I knew that I was rolling up my sleeves together with the band and we would continue the preparations. No time to worry. The past is the past and life goes on. The flags are flying towards the next adventures, Lehtinen promised.