“Nothing can be more ridiculous to my mind than our open boats here with their enormous sails and unseaworthy qualities, they are always on the brink of capsize and their owners seem to measure their sport to the nearness they can go to the inside of a shark.”

Walking around below decks and seeing the names on the bunks and the pots in the galley and the nav station where Mike Quilter sat for days on end, makes the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.

In the 1960's PA25 came to grief when David and a friend were out fishing one night. A passing Scallop boat hooked their anchor, dragging the boat underwater, and tipping the occupants into the water. They were extremely lucky that their screams were heard by the Scallop boat crew who came to their aid. The boat was in the water for some days, before being salvaged by a Mr Ireland (of the Florist family), who placed tractor tyre tubes under the boat. He inflated them which brought the boat to the surface.

Why should anyone care about the disappearance of sharks in the Saya de Malha Bank?  Ernest Hemingway once described going bankrupt as something that happens gradually… and then suddenly. The extinction of species is like bankruptcy, and when it finally occurs, there’s no going back. If we keep draining the Bank of one of its most previous riches, a “sudden” reckoning may be soon.

The AWBF has just released a recording of the panel discussion between a gang of Derwent Class sailors and SWS’s co-editor Sal Balharrie at the recent festival. It’s not your standard symposium fare!