After an epic week of foiling at Coronation Beach, WA, on the very last day, after about 5 hours on the water, I suffered catastrophic board failure. I fell onto my board after stacking on a wave while winging. The board was out the water and the foil in the water, and I felt it give way as the bolts ripped through the tracks and the foil, consisting of an axis ART 999 with advance fuse 325p tail and HM mast, separated off. I then looked up and got a final glimpse of my foil ghost riding off on it's own before turning down and sinking to the bottom, a sacrifice to the wind gods at Corro's.

It's been pretty windy lately, but it might be that my foil is just sitting there. I was wearing a GPS watch at the time, and based on that I am able to pinpoint exactly where I was when it happened. Unfortunately as it was my last day I didn't get a chance to go out and look for it.

I hope that someone one day might find it and return it to me . I made contact with the Geraldton divers, the shop and the facebook group, but they were not able to help. They did say that it could move around significantly, especially when there is big swell. There's even a chance that it could wash ashore. That may take a long time if it ever happens, as I was about 3 or 400m out. I don't know how deep the water is there, I was reasonably close in at the time, but that also means there's going to be some movement on the bottom as well. I think the water there is at most 2-3m deep there depending on the tide, so on a clear day it should be possible to see the bottom with goggles.

Anyway just putting it out there. If anyone at Corros finds themselves on a calm day, bored waiting for wind and is up for taking a look, please DM me for the exact GPS location. Who know's maybe it's still there, stuck against a rock or some sea grass. I'll give a substantial reward for its recovery. And if it turns up in a few months washed up on the beach, hopefully it will get back to me somehow as well.

OUCH!!! Especially if HM stands for High Modulus. Never thought about what could happen if I fell on the board while the foil was still in the water. Hope it turns up.

DC

Oooops!
Doesn't sound too good to me. Hopefully it'll turn up again.
As a matter of interest, I'd really like to see the board as your description of the foil ripping out of the tracks has created a mental mage which might be absolutely wrong.

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Dcharlton said..
OUCH!!! Especially if HM stands for High Modulus. Never thought about what could happen if I fell on the board while the foil was still in the water. Hope it turns up.

DC

Sadly to say, yes it does- thanks!

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ZeeGerman said..
Oooops!
Doesn't sound too good to me. Hopefully it'll turn up again.
As a matter of interest, I'd really like to see the board as your description of the foil ripping out of the tracks has created a mental mage which might be absolutely wrong.

Thanks! Not really the objective of this thread to analyse the failure, but rather to recover my foil, but since you ask...

That's a bummer man. Sorry to hear about this.

Damn! That's a bummer. On the plus side, it happened last day of your trip.

I think I'm going to tag my new HM mast with my contact info just to be safe.

Bummer! Hopefully somebody find it.
A fellow foiler who is also a diver found my foil one month after it came off from my board and sank to the bottom. He found it lodged on the reef near where I lost it.

Thanks for the condolences
I'm still hopeful!

its shallow there. only a couple of m at most, unless it found a hole. i'll keep a lookout, i could use a HM mast

This is a +1 for alu mast! Sorry for your loss.

If it isn't reef bottom, it is very likely to wash up onshore fairly quickly. I lost a foil and found it a mile down the beach the next low tide. I dove for it for a few hours and then decided to take a walk before I gave up and there it was at the high tide line.

I'm going back up to Corro today (light winds last 3 days) forecast is pumping next 8 days so I'll keep a look out and ask around for you. Looks like you were on the reef near the windmill. That area is really shallow so I wouldn't be surprised if your board broke when it hit the reef after you fell. Anyway bad luck I'll sail down that way and pm if anything turns up . I'll be here until the wind dies again.

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KB7 said..
I'm going back up to Corro today (light winds last 3 days) forecast is pumping next 8 days so I'll keep a look out and ask around for you. Looks like you were on the reef near the windmill. That area is really shallow so I wouldn't be surprised if your board broke when it hit the reef after you fell. Anyway bad luck I'll sail down that way and pm if anything turns up . I'll be here until the wind dies again.

Man you are gonna be there a while. !!

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KB7 said..
I'm going back up to Corro today (light winds last 3 days) forecast is pumping next 8 days so I'll keep a look out and ask around for you. Looks like you were on the reef near the windmill. That area is really shallow so I wouldn't be surprised if your board broke when it hit the reef after you fell. Anyway bad luck I'll sail down that way and pm if anything turns up . I'll be here until the wind dies again.

Thanks a lot!
I definitely didn't hit the bottom.
I know the shallow section you're talking about, at the time I was riding a little north of that where it's a bit deeper.
Such a great spot. Enjoy the next 8 days!

Something similar happened to me but in flat water. I hit the board as it came up with my ribs and the impact destroyed the 'lips' of the foil boxes. The box itself remained intact in the board. Luckily for me I was using a large foil and it semi floated so I grabbed it and I had an impact vest on which helped!

Wonder if a small length of something like spectra from board leash attachment to a small hole at the top of the mast could prevent this, I've heard of a few people loosing foil assemblies now.

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MrFish said..
Wonder if a small length of something like spectra from board leash attachment to a small hole at the top of the mast could prevent this, I've heard of a few people loosing foil assemblies now.

I reckon thats a good option ( for future setups )
Always good to have some redundancy, and should be easy to set this up. Even just some thin line like kite line around the top of the mast would do.

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MrFish said..
Wonder if a small length of something like spectra from board leash attachment to a small hole at the top of the mast could prevent this, I've heard of a few people loosing foil assemblies now.

I've been doing that for a while now. Spectra kite line in a slipknot loop around the mast, through the leash plug and tied off at a footstrap insert.