The original intention was to prevent major damage by hurricane "Sandy" from the three-masted sailing vessel, which was built in 1960 for the movie "Mutiny on the Bounty" in an enlarged scale using original ship drawings from the British Admiralty archives. At her location in the port of New London, Connecticut, she would definitely have been destroyed by the storm. Therefore, the crew decided to set course to St. Petersburg, Florida, on October 25, trying to move the vessel around the hurricane. Further, during a storm, a ship is basically considered to be more save at sea than in a port. Damage should thus be minimized that way. Tragically, the "Bounty" sank in the hurricane on October 29 after loss of power and failure of the pumps about 100 miles off the coast of North Carolina. A report of the American amateur radio society (American Radio Relay League, ARRL) says, that according to the ship's electrician, Doug Faunt, N6TQS, all efforts to call for help using satellite phone or short wave voice communication failed. Finally, captain Robin Walbridge, KD4OHZ, sent a distress message to the US Coast Guard via e-mail using the PACTOR-based Winlink system. Within an hour, a Hercules C-130 plane arrived to sight the place of the disaster. Fourteen of the 16 crew members were able to make their way aboard one of the two life rafts and were afterwards evacuated by two rescue helicopters. The captain and a female crew members did not arrive at either of the rafts. The woman was later found unconsciously and also transported to the hospital where she died. Captain Walbridge is still missing at sea and considered to be dead. The remaining 14 crew members returned home healthy in the meantime. They survived thanks to the reliable PACTOR link. As Doug Faunt, who's hobby it is to sail on rebuilds of historical vessels, told the ARRL, he is already looking for a new boat to continue his adventures at sea.

http://www.arrl.org/news/robin-walbridge-kd4ohz-missing-at-sea-after-sinking-of-tall-ship-em-bounty-em-ship-s-electrician-dou  (Quelle: ARRL-News, USA)