JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #100 - Special JEC Asia - October 2015 - 62

core material

Rowing solo across the pacific
in a 24-foot boat
Imagine crossing the Pacific alone in a 350-kilogram rowing boat.
Add one brave woman, a devoted shore team and several science
partners and you get Expedition Pacific, an amazing adventure that
started in June 2015.

By
louise eriKsson JacKa
technical writer
Diab grouP

n Sunday, June 7 at 17:10 JST, Sonya
Baumstein departed from the Choshi
Marina in Japan to row 5,700 nautical
miles non-stop to San Francisco. Arguably
the hardest open ocean crossing in the
world, she planned to be on board a 24-foot
rowboat for 150+ days supported only by
land-based advisers via satellite phone.

29-year-old girl
What makes a 29-year-old girl from Florida
go on a solo row across the Pacific? Supported only by land-based advisors via
satellite phone, with no follow vessel, she
will spend 150+ days aboard a 24-foot boat
facing 10-metre-high waves and winds
above 50 knots.
Rowing and competition were her life. But

after a bad car accident ended her athletic
career prematurely in 2004, she had to find
a new path. The ocean brought her back to
life.
In 2011, she rowed across the Atlantic to
the Caribbean. After that, she kayaked from
Washington State to Alaska. In 2013, she
paddle-boarded across the Bering Strait. For
her, the success of an expedition is measured
in the number of people who are encouraged to make new discoveries of their own
because of it.

Collecting oceanographic data
Sonya's current project is not just a row
for the conquest. Along the route - from
Choshi in Japan to San Francisco - she will
be collecting oceanographic data that will
help scientists understand El Nino and
climate change. The journey will take up to
180 days and, once on the expedition, Sonya

Working with the team at SpinDrift Ocean Rowing, Sonya Baumstein spent months designing her boat to fit
the needs of this expedition with the help of America's Cup naval architects Paul Bieker and Eric Jolley. This
unique one-off carbon and Kevlar boat design weighs less than 300 kg

62 jec composites magazine / No100 October 2015

Outfitted for science
Integrated into the boat's design is a
unique system of equipment from Liquid
Robotics. Samples of salinity, temperature,
depth, wind speed and GPS location will be
taken every 10 seconds, then sent back via
satellite every hour throughout the entire
journey.

plans to row three hours on, three hours off.
If she finishes, she will be the first woman
to row across the Pacific Ocean and the first
American.

A carbon and Kevlar boat design
The boat used for the crossing took three
years to design and during this process,
Sonya had help from two America's Cup
naval architects. The boat weighs 350 kilograms loaded up and there is no motor or
back-up sail option on board. Its low weight
is partly the result of using Divinycell core
material for the hull. The mould and design
were donated by Carbon Craft in Tampa,
Florida, and the boat was built and outfitted
by SpinDrift Rowing in Port Townsend,
Washington.
Onboard the boat are 900 dehydrated meals,
180 drink supplements, an electric desalinator that produces 30 litres of water per
hour, 60 litres of backup freshwater and 75
kilograms of scientific equipment. n
More information:
http://expeditionpacific.com/

http://www.expeditionpacific.com/

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #100 - Special JEC Asia - October 2015