16-year-old girl starts solo sail around globe

do you think you could have done this when you were 16?

MARINA DEL REY, Calif. —A 16-year-old has set out to become the youngest person to sail around the world alone.

Abby Sunderland of Thousand Oaks sailed into the sunny Pacific Ocean on Saturday after being delayed a few days by a series of violent storms in California.

Her boat-builder father, Laurence, along with other family members and fiends, cheered at the Del Rey Yacht Club as they watched the 40-foot craft called Wild Eyes depart.

She plans to be at sea for five or six months. She will be alone but able to communicate via satellite telephone and a blog (at abbysunderland.com).

The current record holder is 17-year-old Mike Perham of Britain, who took the mark last year from Abby's then-17-year-old brother Zac. 

hmm she is gonna be so lonely 4 six months :S ..

I would absolutely it LOVE IT!!

but wouldn't it be kinda dangerous for her to be all alone in the sea? :/ 

At that age, I was contemplating on which medical school I ought to go to xD

Kudos to her and her decision. I'm sure it'll be such an amazing experience!

coughiwannagotoocough

Yeah, I would have done it if I have got the money from my parents…

do you sail, Memo?

no, I have never sailed

This girl is extremist…

Is it true? 

In my opinion, this girl make this decision to travel around this glob for a special mission.

Someone will do anything to achieve their mission. If this mission is truly important to him/her.

In my religion, Islam, travel to other place could gain our knowledge and make our heart closed to Allah (our God).

1989 and 1990 i have sailed and lived with my family on our self build steel sailboat, see the picture.i build it strong enough for going round the world but i have had never the intention to go round the world. for me was the sailing time just a new life expierence it was my kind of living in a barrel like Diogenes did…

i met in Turkey and Greece sailors who just finished their world sailing tour…to sail on the ocean is boring and the hell!!!you are completely alone, you see only water, no birds nothing ,no shores.. you must fight with your boat for your life against 10 meter high waves, then you can't sleep and eat3 or 4 or 5 days…. one of the two 16 years old girls is just in such a hurricane….in my eyes it is a crime what the parents are doing… only for earning money with their daughters lonesome  struggle for survive on fathers boat !!!

this is the second 16 year old girl who sails arround the world,she started in australia.

SYDNEY (AFP) – An Australian schoolgirl bidding to become the youngest person to sail solo around the world admitted Sunday that a brutal storm which upended her boat in giant waves has made her question her trip.

Sixteen-year-old Jessica Watson faced the toughest conditions to date on her non-stop, unassisted circumnavigation when she endured hurricane-force winds and waves up to 10 metres (33 feet) high in the South Atlantic Ocean Friday.

The Queenslander was left bruised and feeling "like I've aged a good 10 years" while her yacht, Ella's Pink Lady, suffered minor damage during the eight-hour storm which tossed the boat beneath crushing waves.

"It was certainly one of those times when you start questioning exactly why you're doing this," she wrote in her blog.

"But at no point could I not answer my own question with a long list of reasons why the tough times like that aren't totally worth it."

Watson left Sydney in her bright pink yacht more than three months ago and during the storm passed the 11,000 nautical mile mark on her voyage.

The tempest was the first time the schoolgirl had experienced a "knockdown"—when the mast goes below horizontal and dives into the sea.

Watson, who was strapped into a seat below deck throughout the ordeal, said she spent the storm "with my whole body clenched up holding on, various objects flying around the cabin and Ella's Pink Lady complaining loudly under the strain."

"We experienced a total of 4 knockdowns, the second was the most severe with the mast being pushed 180 degrees in to the water," she wrote.

"Actually pushed isn't the right word, it would be more accurate to say that Ella's Pink Lady was picked up, thrown down a wave, then forced under a mountain of breaking water and violently turned upside down."

Watson, who said gusts had reached speeds of up to 65 knots before she lost her wind instruments in a knockdown, said the storm made it too dangerous to be on deck and she relied on her electric autopilot to hold the vessel on course.

"We didn't come though completely un-scathed though, as there's plenty of minor damage, but luckily nothing bad enough to stop us," she said.

Watson said the solid, inch-thick stainless steel frame that supported the boat's solar panels had been bent out of shape and the starboard solar panel distorted while there were a few tears in the mainsail.

Down below, the cabin was "a disaster zone, everything is wet or damp," she said, adding that the toilet had fallen apart and her stove refused to light.

She said by Saturday, the swell had dropped to a more comfortable three metres and dolphins were swimming beside her boat.

The Queensland schoolgirl's supporters believe her 23,000 nautical mile journey, which she hopes to complete in eight months to break the record set by fellow Australian Jesse Martin, then aged 18, in 1999, is the maritime equivalent of conquering Mount Everest.

She rounded South America's challenging Cape Horn earlier this month and is now making her way east towards the Falkland Islands and the Cape of Good Hope before tackling the vast Southern Ocean and returning to Australia.

When Watson left Australia on October 18, controversy raged over whether she was too young and inexperienced to undertake the challenge after she smashed into a massive coal freighter during a test sail in September.

Hi,

How are you Dear gkisseberth?

nice topic

I think it is so brave & her skills in sailing is perfect or something like that.

hope she can do her trip safe.

as you may know we don't have any sea around my city (Tehran) so I don't know anything about saling.

but I think it needs a lot of money & skills & great courage to do that.

let me say something as the answer to Dear friend Ryo94t:

as you may know when they say it is a solo sail it  means no one can't help her in her duties as a sailor (she has to do all the stuff about sailing by her own skills)

so you can see many people who follow her ( by another boat or boates) to do some emeragency stuff if she needs.

have a nice time.

regards