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SVN Solovelanet Global
The crew was rescued and this incredible story then
became a book written by one of the crew members,
Giorgio Di Mola, now 77 years old, entitled "SOS Il
Guia affonda" (SOS Guia is sinking), which was publi
-
shed in 1978, two years after the accident in the At-
lantic. We talked to Mr Di Mola to retrace that drama-
tic day and the next night when the crew, with very
little chance of being rescued, was spotted by a ship.
SVN - What are your recollections of that day?
G.d.M.- I boarded Guia in Rio de Janeiro for the leg
to Portsmouth. Our crew was made of six people.
That day, it was in March, we were sailing just abo-
ve the equator, under the Cape Verde islands. It was
around 10 in the morning, and we had scheduled
4-hour shifts as is customary in very long regat-tas.
We were sailing upwind with a 25-knot trade wind,
and were proceeding very fast because not too clo
-
se-hauled, with nice rough ocean waves.Guia sailed
very well in those conditions, because she passed
smoothly over waves instead of hitting them.
At a certain moment our sailor, who was on deck,
turned aft and started screaming like a madman.
But he had done many races with Falk before, and
he had seen orcas, he knew them even if in a ba
-
sic way, and he started screaming because he was
Above, a killer
whale wanders
under the hull of a
boat. On the side,
Giorgio La Mola in
1976. Below the
Guia III in naviga-
tion
