‘Fried’ NZ boat ruled out of regatta

A ‘‘fried’’ New Zealand SailGP boat is being rushed back to Auckland for urgent repairs and has been ruled out of the next regatta in Sydney.

The red-hot Kiwis will have to use a loan boat for the Australian league of the global league after investigations revealed the extensive damage from the lightning strike to their F50 Amokura following the recent regatta win in Singapore.

While the league is contested in one-design 50-foot foiling catamarans, the loss of the familiarity with their own boat is an unwanted nuisance for the Kiwi team led by Peter Burling and Blair Tuke as they look to consolidate their second placing on the points table and the need to make the top three for the season-ending US$1 million winner-takes-all race in San Francisco.

There are just three regattas left – Sydney in three weeks, Christchurch’s debut on March 18-19 and San Francisco on May 7-8.

‘‘Since [the strike] we’ve realised that the damage to Amokura is pretty significant. Quite quickly we discovered that all of the electronics on board were fried,’’ wing trimmer Tuke said.

‘‘On a lot of the hydraulic components – especially the titanium parts – you could see where the current had been, leaving scouring. More and more issues started to crop up and that’s when the decision was made to bring Amokura back to Aotearoa. Very thankfully everyone on board the boat was OK, and that’s absolutely the most important part.’’

The distinctive black and blue boat left Singapore yesterday to be shipped to Auckland and then trucked to the SailGP Technologies facility in Warkworth, to undergo further testing and repairs with the hope of having it on the start line in Christchurch.

‘‘The reason to bring [Amokura] back to New Zealand is that we have the facilities and resources here to do the investigation that we need to do.,’’ SailGP tech team director Brad Marsh said.

‘‘In the marine industry, boats do get struck by lightning regularly – but not often a boat as complex and advanced as the F50.

‘‘So, we are a little unsure of exactly the testing we will need to do, but we know we need to put it under structural load testing, which is a test we do for every new boat. We will do some thermal imaging, tap testing and some core testing.

‘‘It’s going to be a relatively compressed schedule to do all this – a full electronic refit, hydraulic refit and all new components and parts – in order to get Amokura down to Lyttelton and ready for sailing.’’

There will now be a shuffle in the boats used in Sydney amongst the nine-boat fleet.

The Kiwis will race on boat six – formerly the Japan boat, which has been used by the Canadian team throughout Season 3.

Canada will finally get behind the wheel of their own F50, boat 10, which was recently finished in Warkworth and is now en route to Australia, where it will undergo a fit-out and commissioning next month.

‘‘One of the cool things about SailGP is that when you’re lining up, you know you’re racing against a boat that’s exactly the same as yours,’’ Tuke said.

‘‘We have in the past sailed other teams’ boats in training days – it’s been awhile since we’ve done that, but you can hardly notice the difference other than some of the visual references.’’