Pete Bevington

19 February, 2007

ROUND the world sailor Andrew Halcrow yesterday (Sunday) stepped aboard the yacht he was forced to abandon after his appendix burst off the coast of Australia.

The 48 year old flew out from his home in Burra, Shetland, on Wednesday after local coastguard officers told him his self-built boat Elsi Arrub had been spotted just 250 miles from where he last saw her in December.

By Friday he had landed in Perth, Australia, and yesterday he was on the shore at Albany to watch her come in.

"Andrew was there to catch the rope. It was really quite poignant," said his girlfriend Alyson Keillor, who has been following events closely from their Shetland home.

Ms Keillor said that after the spotter plane identified the Elsi Arrub on Tuesday, a local fishing crew had gone out to fetch her. However on Saturday when Mr Halcrow himself hired an aircraft to see what was happening at sea, he could not find either his boat or the fishing vessel Kiama which had gone to fetch her.

"I think he was really a bit down at that point, wondering what he was going to do," she said.

"Then they got a call from one of the crew and they told him they had got her in tow, though the weather was quite wild. It was a force seven. They were planning on getting in at midday their time, but didn't arrive until about 7pm."

She added: "Andrew says the boat is in pretty good nick considering what she's been through. Very little water had got in below, but he hadn't had a proper look when I spoke to him.

"He's very, very excited and very happy to have her back. I'm just exceedingly frustrated that I can't be there with him."

It was a few days before Christmas last year that Mr Halcrow called his partner saying he was having severe pain in his stomach and asking her to contact the coastguard for help.

An international rescue operation swung into action, which saw the lone sailor taken on board a passing freighter and dropped off at Albany were he underwent an operation for a burst appendix. Doctors told him that he had just 48 hours to live before they got to him.

Mr Halcrow, who had set off on his life's dream of sailing round the world single handed last summer, went in search of his lost boat as soon as he was out of hospital. But two air searches proved fruitless and he returned to Shetland last month empty handed and in need of rest and recuperation after the operation.

However last week a spotter plane took a photo of Elsi Arrub when it was searching for two other yachts which had gone missing in the area, south west of Western Australia. Mr Halcrow identified the boat as his and wasted no time in setting off to find her, this time taking his 12 year old son Lowrie with him.

Ms Keillor thanked the Wright family, originally from Sparl, in Brae, for looking after her partner when father and son arrived in Australia.

The next challenge will be how to bring the boat back to Shetland. Mr Halcrow has dismissed any thoughts of continuing his trip, in the knowledge that had he not come down with appendicitis he and the boat would have made it the whole way.

Several offers to bring Elsi Arrub back to Shetland have already been made.