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Leg gashed, adrift, sailor saved at sea

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published January 6, 2007

PUNTA ARENAS, Chile - An American sailor who spent three days adrift after a storm dashed his round-the-world voyage was headed toward land Friday after being rescued in treacherous waters off the southern tip of South America.

"I'm okay," Ken Barnes told loved ones by satellite phone.

The Chilean navy said Barnes, 47, was being taken by a fishing vessel to a lighthouse in the Straits of Magellan, where a helicopter would fly him to Punta Arenas, Chile's southernmost city. He is expected to arrive there Sunday.

"He is in good general condition, but the first thing upon his arrival will be a complete checkup at a hospital," said Capt. Ivan Valenzuela, maritime governor of Punta Arenas.

Barnes' only injury was a long gash in his right thigh, but Valenzuela said the wound had been treated and covered.

His yacht was heavily damaged by a storm with strong winds and 40-foot waves that thwarted Barnes' attempt to become the first American to circumnavigate the world in a solo, nonstop voyage from the West Coast. He left California on Oct. 28.

After his rescue, Barnes spoke briefly to relatives gathered at his condo in Newport Beach, Calif.

"I'm okay and everything's okay," he said in a calm voice.

His mother, 21-year-old twin daughters and longtime girlfriend huddled around the phone, trying to make out his words over a broken connection that lasted less than two minutes.

The Polar Pesca 1 fishing vessel picked up Barnes shortly before 8 a.m. Friday, the navy's Operations Department said in Punta Arenas. He was aboard his disabled 44-foot ketch Privateer, some 500 miles from the western entry to the Straits of Magellan.

The U.S. Coast Guard and Chilean maritime officials monitored signals from Barnes' distress beacon on Tuesday, minutes after he called his girlfriend on his satellite phone to report he was in trouble.

A Chilean navy plane spotted the disabled yacht after Barnes fired a flare on Wednesday. At first the pilots only saw the flare, then they spotted the sailor wearing a yellow jacket and waving. The plane guided the fishing trawler to the yacht, and four men boarded an inflatable boat to rescue the American.

Barnes wore a survival suit and ate Pop Tarts and granola bars while waiting to be rescued, his family said. "He was very well equipped," Valenzuela said.

[Last modified January 6, 2007, 00:32:26]