Not positive messages attached with todays position report:
At approximately 0200PDT OEX suffered catastrophic rudder damage,
which caused some further undetermined damage to their hull.
MAYDAY was issued.
The decision was made to abandon ship to the the life raft.
Within the hour Pyewacket was in touch with OEX
crew, and they have the entire OEX team aboard Pyewacket and all are
returning
to mainland. Good Samaritan Pyewacket has also retired from the race.
To all luck, also everyone on the other, now total 8 retired boats are good, although the Transpac 19 didn`t turn out as planned. There have been several boats with rudder issues, and one with mast failure.
During the day we have lost our Mast head VHF antenna, the theory is that a bird has robbed it. There are no big consequences for us as we have connected the back up instead, but of course, we will not have as good range on our VHF.
Were we are now it is fantastic sailing, 20 kts of breeze from perfect angle, pointing straight at Honolulu between 8 and 14 kts of speed!