An official report regarding the yacht disaster in the Atlantic, where 4 British sailors went missing, suggested that this might have happened because of a structural weakening of the yacht. In the part, groundings as well as subsequent repairs to Cheeki Rafiki might have triggered the dampening at the point where the stagger was bonded to the hull, said the report.
A report from the Marine Accident Investigation Branch reported that one or more bolts on the vessel might have deteriorated and it was likely that the crew was exhausted and their performance was impaired accordingly. MAIB concluded that in the absence of survivors and material evidence, the reasons of the tragedy remain a matter of speculation.
The 4 men lost in the 2014 May disaster were captain Andrew Bridge (22), from Farnham in Surrey, crew members James Male, (also 22), from Southampton; Steve Warren (52), from Bridgwater in Somerset and Paul Goslin (56) from West Camel in Somerset.
They had been participating in a regatta in Antigua and they were coming back to Southampton when their yacht capsized around seven hundred and twenty miles east-south-east of Nova Scotia in Canada on 16th May.
MAIB report added that it was around 4.05 am on 16th May, an alert broadcast by the personal locator beacon of Cheeki Rafiki’s captain appealed a major search for the vessel involving US Coastguard aircraft as well as surface vessels.