MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) – A rowing boat lost at sea in the Atlantic Ocean was finally found three years later in France.
The Mobile-based vessel capsized in 2022 with four military veterans on-board. They were racing in the ‘World’s Toughest Row’ competition.
The weather capsized their boat, forcing them onto the spare life boat until they could be rescued.
The four-man, Air Force veteran crew rowing for the nonprofit based Fight Oar Die saw their journey cut short because of a winter storm in the Atlantic.
Bryant Knight, co founder and president of Fight Oar Die said, “They had a capsize in the middle of the night. They were unable to upright the boat and so they deployed their life raft and abandoned ship and spent about 18 hours in a life raft before rescue by a freight liner that was coming from South Africa.”
Knight, an army veteran, himself co-founded Fight Oar Die in 2016.
He wasn’t on the Woobie vessel in 2022, but had raced the 3,000 nautical-mile journey from the Canary Islands to Antigua before.
Once he got the call his crew had been rescued, he thought for sure the Woobie was lost for good.
Until now, nearly three years to the date the vessel went missing, it has turned up.
“We got the call that they had found Woobie off the coast of France. So she’s currently off the port of La Rochelle. I’ll be the first one to head over there and lay eyes other and collect some personal items,” Knight said.
Knight said one of the rower’s irreplaceable items were still onboard the vessel all these years later.
“His dog tags, his dad’s dogs tags, his grandfather’s and his great grandfather’s and of the few items that survived. They actually survived the three years adrift,” Knight said.
Knight said he’s secured the boat to be shipped back home to Mobile.
“She’s our first boat. Mobile’s her home and we want to bring her back home to Mobile,” Knight said.
Knight said ocean racing is a dangerous sport.
He hopes to study the boat to find out how to make it safer.
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