157 Days Into Race, Her Boat Turned End-Over-End

The only woman in a 30,000-mile solo race around the globe saw the "total loss" of her boat—with help two days away. One of 18 skippers, Brit Susie Goodall was in the 4th place 157 days into the Golden Globe Race when her 35-foot vessel was pitchpoled (meaning turned end-over-end) and lost its mast during a storm, leaving her stranded 2,000 miles west of South America's Cape Horn. "I was thrown across the cabin and knocked out for a while," Goodall explained via satellite phone after noting the boat had righted itself, per the Guardian. "The only thing left is the hull and deck which remain intact." The 29-year-old Cornwall woman activated her emergency beacon around 11am Wednesday but told race authorities she was not in need of immediate assistance.

Which is a good thing, because the Hong Kong-registered cargo ship dispatched to retrieve her is some 500 miles away. It's expected to reach Goodall Friday morning in a rescue operation coordinated by Chilean authorities, per Cornwall Live. Estonion racer Uku Randmaa is technically nearer Goodall, about 400 miles away, but he's expected to confront the same stormy seas. Goodall's misfortune actually came after she'd emerged from another storm. "The seas were coming from four directions and I kept being knocked down," she said at the time, noting "it took me a week to recover." "TOTALLY AND UTTERLY GUTTED," "CLINGING ON IN MY BUNK," "IN NEED OF A GOOD CUPPA TEA," read her recent tweets, per the BBC. (This is the longest sailable straight line.)