Having been involved in delivering over 500 new French-built catamarans to our customers since our formation in 1989, we like to think that we are the most experienced company in the business and have generally seen or been involved in more issues than other companies. This experience allows us to share our expertise with our clients in order to prepare them, to protect them and to give them the comfort that they have professionals involved. 

While people immediately think about the dangers faced with hurricanes or severe weather, we have also had to endure conditions where the sea was so flat calm that the crew had to motor the entire way across …… and inevitably ran out of fuel! In that particular case, the crew got really lucky and came across a large freighter who resupplied them with enough fuel to get them to the nearest port. As a Thank You, the crew decided to give the freighter crew one of the cases of Bordeaux that the owner had ordered and put onboard for his collection. As luck would always have it, the crew managed to give away the most expensive case of Pauillac Grand Cru onboard and the owner pointed out that he paid the equivalent of $75 a gallon for the fuel! Luckily for us he was pretty understanding and appreciated that the safety of the crew and the vessel was of much more importance than his palette …. but he still reminds us of it every time we meet!

As if a delivery crew does not have enough issues to deal with when exiting a foreign country to sail 6,000 kilometers, the last few years have introduced a whole new obstacle……Orcas! It seems that adult orcas are now taking the opportunity to teach their offspring how to attack prey using a catamaran’s rudder as the replacement target, a prey that cannot get away quite as quickly as the tuna they will be going after for dinner! Their favorite catamaran hunting grounds are off the coast of France, Spain, and Portugal, the same route that boats sailing to the US generally cruise through. And we discovered this for ourselves only last month when one of our new boats got to meet a pod up real close!

In November 2024 we had just launched a beautiful new Samana 59 at Fountaine Pajot’s factory in La Rochelle, France. Clive, our Quality control consultant in France, met with the crew when they arrived on schedule to pick her up and he went through the boat with them in detail. He reported back to us that all was good and that he was very pleased with the captain and his approach, words we love to hear as we know well that no matter how much planning and preparation we do that something will always go wrong and the attitude of the captain is really important in how things get handled.  The crew completed their prep, provisioned the boat, and set off to deliver her to Pier 7, our marina in Annapolis, Maryland. 

From the beginning the weather cooperated and a few days later they were sailing south, about 50 miles off the coast of Portugal, about 150 miles south of Porto when they felt not much more than a few bumps. While it was obviously something to be checked, it was not something that gave any real cause for concern …. and then they saw the Orcas!

While the entire incident was over in under 30 seconds, that was long enough for the whales to knock both rudders clean off their rudder posts before they simply disappeared off into the distance, probably looking for the next victim or their next meal. 

The captain went over the side to check the damage and discovered that while the rudders themselves were nowhere to be seen, the rudder posts were not only still intact but they were still straight, meaning that replacing them would be a lot easier than if they had been hit so hard that the posts bent and had to be forced out of the rudder sleeves. In addition, it meant that the rudders could also be replaced in the water and the boat would not need to be hauled out to complete the replacement. Finding a maintenance yard that can haul a 59-foot catamaran can sometimes be difficult, and expensive, so this was a real win. Additionally, there appeared to be no damage to the bottom other than a few scratches from the love taps from the oversized dolphins. 

While the crew headed for Nazare using the sails and the engines to steer, our US aftersales team were in contact with the after sales department at Fountaine Pajot and within 24 hours they confirmed that they had a new set of rudders available for us at the factory. The crew safely made it into Nazare and made plans to replace the rudders themselves. Things were all falling into place nicely, but isn’t that always when it usually starts to go wrong? We then discovered 2 major issues, firstly that it was going to take almost 10 days for the rudders to arrive in Portugal and secondly that the Portuguese authorities would not allow the crew to replace them themselves in the marina and insisted that they hire a team of local divers to do it.  

As highlighted previously, no obstacle gets in the way of a good captain, so he went out and hired a van and drove 13 hours back to La Rochelle to pick them up. The after-sales team at Fountaine Pajot even came into the office on a Sunday to help him load them up so within 36 hours they had the new rudder in Nazare, ready to be installed. Interestingly enough, when the captain questioned the dive company about the number of hours they were quoting to drop the ‘old’ rudders and simply slot in the new ones, they highlighted that they were now very experienced in doing this repair/replacement and this was the 20^th time they had done this recently!  We are starting to think that these orcas might actually be getting a commission from these locals for all of the business they are providing them! As expected, the old rudder posts were roped off, dropped out and the new ones hauled in with the same rope and later that same day, the crew were on their way after only a 6-day delay.

Fortunately, one of the tenants in our marina in Annapolis is Multitech Marine who are an authorized warranty and service center for most major catamaran builders. They specialize in servicing catamarans and operate a catamaran haul-out facility so the vessel will come out of the water soon after its arrival. We would do this for most of our boats that have completed a delivery like this so we can check the thru hulls, bottom paint, sail drives and zincs before handover to a new owner but in this case there may be a little touch up needed also….but we got really lucky!