水手之旅

On October 19, 2014, a brave sailor determinedly set out to sea. His goal was to sail around the world alone, without the help of any fossil fuel or additional supplies, other than what he brought with him for the entire 50,000 nautical mile journey. What would a sailor bring along in order to survive such an ordeal? This sailor, the Italian Matteo Miceli, decided on a fishing rod, two chickens, a plot of dirt to grow vegetables, a machine to desalinate drinking water and three Leica Geosystems’ GNSS GR25 receivers and three Leica AS10 antennae.

To sail around the world self-sufficiently was Matteo’s motivation for undertaking this journey, however he was just one member of a group working together on the project, “Rome Ocean World”, and they had other goals as well, such as being the first sailboat to accurately record the water and boat’s movement throughout the trip using GNSS technology.

在旅途结束时,罗马大学的Paolo di Girolamo和Mattia Crespi教授和Polytechnic都灵的Allessandro Pezzoli将通过计算基于英国的MET(Meteorology)数值模型来分析数据,以分析这些数据。ECO40路线;improve the structural design of the Class 40 boat by calculating the dynamic stress and durability of the vessel during the trip and finally, to produce a polar diagram of the boat’s speed after recording wave characteristics, which will be especially useful for future Class 40 racing boats.

从罗马附近的Di Traiano港口起航后,Matteo有三天的天气,使他能够与他的团队一起回到罗马,他每天接触。然而,当冈萨洛飓风的残余物以大雨和大风的狂风袭击地中海时,他很快就面临着许多海洋道道测试中的第一次。After several intense and expectant hours of lost contact, the Eco40 team received an automatic data transmission on the boat’s position, confirming it survived 80 km/h (50 mph) winds and six metre (20 feet) high waves, and that it was on its way towards Gilbratar.

This storm left the Eco40, the sailor and his chickens in bad shape. The garden was ruined, with its dirt full of salty water and vegetables dead. The chickens had been traumatised and wouldn’t lay eggs for some time and the sea was still so stormy that fishing was out of the question. For just such emergencies, the sailor kept 100 bags of freeze-dried food on the boat and for several days Matteo survived on 100 g (0.22 lbs) of carbohydrates, a handful of fried fruit and some salted fish he had managed to catch before the storm hit.

After the storm passed, Matteo had time to think. A professional sailor by trade, it was a challenge for him to stop and fix damaged boat parts. Matteo wanted to push the high-performance Eco40 to set record speeds but instead, he had to wait, either for the repairs to dry, or for wind. The sailor had time on his hands and was confronted with the commitment he had set for himself when agreeing to take part in this adventure. The lack of wind got to him, and even with the daily tasks of running a boat, data collecting or just plain day-to-day survival, he was sometimes lonely and often doubtful. Luckily the chickens, whom he nicknamed Blondie and Brunette, needed encouragement to lay eggs and they became fast companions. He also had daily support from his Facebook fans to cheer him.

数据是由Leica GR25 GNSS接收器和Leica AS10天线收集的,并通过地理固定卫星发送而没有任何问题。ECO40的水力,风能和太阳能按计划提供。这次旅程的真正问题是关于人性和存在的目的更平凡。例如:水手只能睡几个小时,然后被风阵风唤醒,这引起了船的严重刺激。或自动驾驶员的声音唤醒他,告诉他一些路线的改变。如果他可以在一段时间内入睡超过20分钟,那么他仍然必须关注晴雨表,因为他的生活取决于知道一场暴风雨是否正在临近。当然,食物总是一个很大的关注点 - 只是在湿纸巾上钓鱼或种植豆芽是主要的胜利。鱼,芽或鸡蛋,这是Matteo的饮食几个月 - 如果他很幸运 - 他很乐意拥有它。金发女郎和布鲁内特的陪伴使Matteo分散了孤独的注意力,对于水手来说,这是悲伤的一天,因为没有明显的原因,金发女郎去世了。有时他很幸运地伴随着鸟类或海豚,但是他独自一人在这段旅程中,对他来说,生活中最重要的是生活中的小事。

Unpredictable weather patterns were also a major concern. One night, a sudden wind change caused the boat to do a death roll. Matteo woke to an almost capsized boat, halfway under water. Alone, in the dark and with water rushing into the cabin, the sailor had to think fast. It’s a situation many of us wouldn’t want to be in. Sometimes the boat sat in fog for days on end. Another time, a massive wave hit the boat while the sailor slept, causing a very bad head injury and severe anxiety. Nonetheless, Matteo had to go on tending the boat in order to survive.

他穿越了南极以下的冷极空气和冰冷的水,冰山一片迫在眉睫。严重的水供一艘船进入,而在旅行的这一部分中,Eco40失去了汽车。它被闪电击中后,它与他的大部分电气设备一起损坏了。幸运的是,他的团队(Cecilia Angelelli,Valerio Brinati,Allesandro Farina与Leica Geosystems的技术支持Pierpaolo Pecoraro)“使他”穿越了这一旅程,还恢复了他的PC软件,船的乐器,并通过卫星电话帮助电池问题。即使只是暂时,也需要尽快纠正这种伤害。

With icy rain and freezing temperatures, Matteo remained strong. But stress took its toll on the sailor. At this point, he had been sailing alone for over 100 days. Lack of sleep, too little food and constant cold had its effect. He endured near-fatal storms and heavily damaged electrical equipment – and was very worried. This was certainly a bleak part of his journey – and it was somewhat noticeable in his communications. He started eating chicken feed to survive and had to pull out his own tooth. Yet, he did what he had to – to survive.

In early March, Matteo discovered the Eco40’s rudder under 300 litres (80 gallons) of water. These bushings holding the rudder and almost caused the journey's end however Matteo had managed to repair them. This time bolts holding the boat's keel in place caused Matteo to lose the keel in March, on Friday the 13th, and wind capsized the Eco40. Alarm systems warned Matteo and alerted the Italian Coast Guard, who then sent word to the nearby merchant ship, Aramon, to pick up the sailor, who patiently waited in an inflatable raft he managed to fish out of the Eco40 before it sank. The sailor also tried to rescue Brunette but sadly, he was too late.

Yet Matteo was lucky. The area where the boat capsized was known for its calm waters and he had, eight hours earlier, closed the double-crossing of the equator. He accomplished what he had set out to do. He rounded the Cape of Good Hope, Cape Leeuwin and Cape Horn; crossed the equator twice and crossed all the meridians he planned to. The Eco40 travelled, from start to its tragic finish, roughly 25,000 nautical miles (approx. 46,000 km /28,600 mi) and at the time of its capsizing, was approximately 965 kilometres (600 miles) from the Brazilian Coast.

Matteo还成功地完成了他的目标,从出发点到到达点,全世界不停地航行,并以7.4节的平均速度在海洋上进行了112.4天的eco40。在被Aramon救出后,Matteo被其船员宠爱。他损失了30多公斤(66磅),并花时间放松,进食和利用船的健身房。

Matteo Miceli arrived back in Italy on March 19th at Rome’s Fiumicino Airport. Upon seeing the professors for the first time since he left Rome, the sailor presented them with the all the SD cards containing the data that the receivers collected during the trip with the exception of the very last cards that were still in the GR25 receivers as the ship went down. These cards were last exchanged on February 28, when the Eco40 was off the Argentinian Coast.

Almost immediately, the professors and the sailor began planning how to recovery the boat. A satellite tracker was still sending out signals from the boat, which was drifting with underwater currents. The tracker's batteries would soon be empty so with little time to spare, the team flew back to Brazil and organised a boat for the rescue, while also planning the stabilisation, and transport of the Eco40 once it resurfaced. Unfortunately some 30 hours before reaching the recovery area, the tracker stopped sending a signal. The area was too large to search and on April 4th, the search was suspended and the team went home.

However, the journey is not over yet. Just seven days ago, word reached the professors that a Spanish fishing vessel spotted what was thought to be the Eco40 floating off the coast of Brazil, 350 nautical miles from where the team expected to find the boat. A photo was taken and posted on Twitter.

不幸的是,从那时起,没有人跟踪其位置,但是根据教授的计算,它已出海……
接下来是什么?旅程继续。敬请关注 …
Good winds to all!

由凯瑟琳·雷穆勒(Katherine Lehmuller)和马可·莫佐(Marco Mozzon)撰写

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