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Yacht Gets Snagged On House
An unfortunate turn of events left a $200,000 yacht aground with its spinnaker wrapped around a chimney in North Queensferry, England.

"I saw the yacht and this big white sail. The sail started to break away from the boat and blew right onto one of my neighbor's roofs," Molly Sinclair, a local resident, told the Dunfermline Press. "In the meantime, the boat had banged right against the rocks." The sail wrapped around the house's chimney.

The 29-foot yacht, the Jezebel II, ran aground in the rough weather. A mayday broadcast was sent leading to the arrival of the coast guard. A rescue boat was launched and two rescue teams arrived at the scene. By then, six of the seven people on board, all but the owner of the yacht, had scrambled to shore. "They were all soaking - the waves were crashing up on them too," Sinclair said.

Rescue teams attempted to get onto the roof to cut the sail free. "This big sail was drawing the boat into the rocks," Sinclair said. "I feared the coast guard would get blown into the rocks as well."

After resorting to cutting the spinnaker from the yacht, the rescue boat attempted to tow the vessel, owner still on board, into the bay, but the yacht began to sink. The 61-year old was at this point loaded onto the rescue boat. "The coast guards were going to pull the yacht round to the bay but the next thing I hear them shouting, 'There's a hole, there's a hole!'" Sinclair continued. "They started to tow it. They were pulling like hell but nothing was happening.

"It was horrible seeing the boat go down."

The yacht sank rapidly in 10 feet of water, its mast still sticking out of the water.

"It would appear that this incident was caused by equipment failure," Gwyn evans of the Forth Coast Guard, said. "This highlights how even an experienced sailer with a new boat can find themselves in a difficult situation when their gear fails."

The only injury, according to a spokesman, was a cut finger to one of the crew aboard the yacht.

To see previous Spotlights in our new, easier to read Spotlight archive, click here, or discuss this story on our new message boards.


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