One of the saddest images to come from last weekend’s Cowes Torquay Cowes race was taken by Nina Seymour (below).

Chasing Cougar 46 for the lead at Anvil Point, Drew Langdon and Italian co-driver Giancarlo Cangiano experienced serious mechanical issues with their Mark 6 drives.

After stopping their Outerlimits hull, the craft was swamped with water and in no time at all, it was being kept afloat by the bow buoyancy.

Langdon and Cangiano were rescued immediately, recovering the stricken craft proved to be a more difficult task.

The Weymouth RNLI all-weather lifeboat (ALB) tried to get Silveline under tow, breaking at least 2 tow ropes in the process.

A spokesman for Weymouth RNLI said;

The crew of the ALB made repeated attempts to help salvage the powerboat, by attempting to attach a tow line to her bow, and pull her upright in attempt to drain and re float her.
The crew managed to hook the line attached to the powerboat’s bow on several occasions and attach a tow line from the ALB, but each time the line from the powerboat parted as they started to tow her.
After several attempts, it was deemed too dangerous to try any other means of taking the boat under tow, and the ALB was stood down by Solent Coastguard and returned to station.

Drew Langdon then instructed and paid a commercial salvage team to recover Silverline and he told me this afternoon;

I couldn’t be more happy with the way their team dealt with the operation. They did a great job and now the boat is back at our Racing HQ.

I said the damage must be horrendous?

The hull did get damaged in the initial recovery attempts. Our main concern is saving the engines. They have been soaked in diesel initially and the aim is to get them running.
Obviously we are aware that all of the electrics on the motors and in the boat are a write off.
It took a year to rig and prepare for last weekend’s race and now we feel as if we are starting all over again.

Langdon concluded,

I want to thank everyone that has helped and has sent good wishes, we will back!

Racing Photo: Chris Davies

Crew Photo: Malc Attrill

Rescue Photo: Francesco Piras