Darren Zimmerman, NSRI Simons Town station commander, said: At 14h01, Saturday, 14 March, NSRI Simons Town duty crew were activated following a request for assistance from a local yachtsman, a solo sailor, reporting that his sailing yacht had suffered rudder failure while sailing South of Cape Point.
At that stage he was approximately 15 nautical miles South of Cape Point in the vicinity of Rocky Banks.
NSRI EOC (Emergency Operations Centre) were assisting in the plotting and coordination and Telkom Maritime Radio Services were maintaining VHF marine radio communications with the local sailor.
Our duty crew responded to our NSRI Simons Town station 10 rescue base where the NSRI craft Donna Nicholas was launched.
We arranged stand-by crew for our second rescue craft in the event of additional call-outs.
We rendezvoused with the sailing yacht at 16h07 finding the sailor safe and his sailing yacht adrift with rudder failure.
A towline was rigged and in an operation extending into the night we towed the sailing yacht safely to Simons Town without incident.
Our NSRI rescue craft Jack&Irene was launched and assisted to help with the mooring of the sailing yacht at the International jetty at False Bay Yacht Club.
Once safely moored no further assistance was required. The operation completed at 20h57.
During this operation, at 16h10, NSRI Simons Town stand-by duty crew were activated following eyewitness reports from a retired SA Navy Admiral, residing in Seaforth, Simons Town, reporting 2 paddlers on a double surf-ski in distress, capsized offshore 500 meters East of Ark Rock, and that the paddlers had deployed a red distress flare.
At that same time NSRI EOC (Emergency Operations Centre) intercepted a NSRI SafeTRX emergency alert from the same paddlers.
Our NSRI rescue craft Jack&Irene was launched and on arrival on the scene the 2 paddlers, 2 local ladies, were taken onboard the NSRI rescue craft and their surf-ski was recovered.
They were brought safely to our NSRI rescue base and they required no further assistance.
