• Patrick, ON4HIL is the first to land on Rockall!
• Rudi, ON7YT is now also on top of Rockall and they are now moving equipment from the cdt Fourcault to the rock
• Equipment now on top. MM0RAI/P EU189 now active opr. ON4HIL. Operation started on the 1st October at 1545 UTC
• Patrick & Rudi are going to stay on the rock until tomorrow around noon, if weather permits

Foto’s have been taken just before landing

This morning we had a little interview with Theo, ON4ATW about the plans for the next days…..

Audio files must be played with Windows Media Player. The Windows Media Player’s plugin can be downloaded from this link for windows and at this link for Mac.

We believe we have some good news to report ….
The rockall team is going to undertake a second attempt to reach and climb the rock!
They left St Kilda this afternoon, it will take about 14 hours to sail back to Rockall. They carefully studied all the swell and wind charts, and concluded that Saturday morning is favorable to go on the rock. The plan is to activate the rock for only 1 day because they lost a lot of time, in returning to St Kilda. The team had a nice break and had some recreation  over there at St Kilda:

Here you see Rudi, ON7YT having a good time with water skiing and fishing

You can examn the weathercharts yourself. This link for the wind forecast and this link for the swell forecast
We wish the Rockall team all the luck in the world to get the job done in the coming days…..

The Cdt. Fourcault has reached Rockall at a distance of about 10 miles, and sailing very slowly. About 3 crew members suffer from severe seasickness (ON4HIL; ON5TN and Tom). About 3 crew members are probably mentally en physically strong enough to do an attempt to reach the rock. In the comming hours they are going to deliberate about the forthcoming situation. The storm of 12m high waves is going to pass in the next hours. Late in the evening weather will be better. Winds are now around 50 to 70 knots! They can’t see the rock at the moment. They can only see as far as 100 yards. An update will follow….

This picture was taken yesterday, leaving St Kilda behind….

At 11 o’clock local time, the Commandant Fourcault left the harbor of Antwerp. A bit later than was planned but with good humor and bright weather conditions. Hopefully this will not change in the next days to come. More pictures can be found at this link.