The Berserk Incident

[Fish 0]

Interesting article on the sinking of the Berserk in the Ross sea.

3 theories put as to why the boat left the bay into a storm.

Something that is really peculiar. The leader took all of the existing footage with him on the attempt to quad bike to the South Pole. Surely, if you have a yacht as support, you would leave anything behind that didn't add to your chances of success getting to pole? Unless you thought you would loose the yacht?

https://interactives.stuff.co.nz/2022/01/the-berserk-incident/

[Psyche 483]

Read it this morning, sounds super dodgy.

The NZ navy would never order a boat to sea in a storm, then spend 8 hours in the most atrocious conditions trying to get to the site that would take less than an hour in usual weather to rescue them. 

[waikiore 321]

There is a follow up to this when they bought an Auckland yacht and took off south again, the skipper just a publicity seeking twit.

[CarpeDiem 327]

1 hour ago, waikiore said:

There is a follow up to this when they bought an Auckland yacht and took off south again, the skipper just a publicity seeking twit.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarle_Andhøy

[Above-the-Fold 14]

The Stuff piece is excellent.

 

[ex Elly 152]

This interview with his crew mate gives another perspective:

https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/exploration-survival/rough-passage/

It took me weeks to reach Jarle. When I did, I mentioned that captain Don McIntyre, one of the most accomplished seamen in the Antarctic, spoke highly of him. “Don McIntyre is a stuck-up self digging fool who was the first to judge fallen men,” Jarle replied within hours. He would be going to court soon, he wrote.

[waikiore 321]

I wonder what happened to Busby Noble the Maori guy that they met in a bar who left NZ on Nilaya with them without bothering to tell his family, then when they were captured in Chile claimed to have been taken hostage by Jarle when they left Auckland -surely his 'tale' would be a cracker to read.

[B00B00 290]

Interesting post from Jarle on facebook just now replying to the stuff article. 

I actually did a bit of sail work for him before both voyages. He was a likable guy but clearly a cowboy who loved defying the rules.

 https://www.facebook.com/101634540870/posts/10159564377035871/?sfnsn=mo

Text pasted below.

Hi sailors and adventurers out there! 
Here comes todays conspirational from a New Zealand journalist who contacted me in regarding to speak about the Berserk incident. Interesting reading for those who do not believe in a government cover - up.

Lee Kenny writes that he has worked with this case in 6 months and has discovered nothing new about the actual circumstances leading to the accident of the Berserk 22.2.2011. He collects different thesis from different bureaucrats and crew givving various glimpse of information. I thanked No to partisipate in this interview and urged him to read through the existing documents released through the coartcase and the documentation the logs, fotos and reports that the government of New Zealand has.

Again I want to give my deepest thanks to Paul Watson Sea Shepherd for their incredible efforts of SAR to find Robert Burro Skaanes Leonard James Banks and Tom Gisle Bellika and the crew on the Berserk Sergey Smirnov Juan Manuel Hernández and Busby Noble and Sam for choosing to search the last traces of the Berserk and depots in Mc Murdo Sound. 

Too bad that Antarctica New Zealand under the leadership of @lou sanson, NZ had made a strategy against the Berserk and  stole the equipment from the depots and removed / locked down the logbook from Shackeltons hut. He also ignores that his department refused to welcome the missing Berserk crew days before the storm hit from the Ross Shelf. 

https://interactives.stuff.co.nz/2022/01/the-berserk-incident/

- I outline the key point to the official parties that Lee Kenny failed to reach out to. Nor ask why NZ government did not release it : -  Release the logs, communications with and about the Berserk period 4.11- 22.11.2011 without lies. 

The claim against New Zealand Navy, and NZ Antarctica and Norsk Polarinstitutt continues to release the logs, documentation and photos from the period of 16 th to 22.11.2011 continues. 

"Dont run with the big dogs if you piss like a puppy" Lenny used to say. I agree and live that quote together with the philosphy of the missing Berserkers and brothers of the sea every day.  

The story of the Berserk sagas is to be seen at Goalive.tv for those who wants to see the story of what happened in the sail to Antarctica 2011.

[Psyche 483]

I'm not big on his conspiracy theory mainly because the chance of a disparate group of people keeping a lid on something like this would be about zero. Nzers are by and large fair and decent people including those working on the ice who are also bonded together by the harsh environment. Sailors share a common adversary against the elements and many of the navy crew would have " alternative" mates if not family being from NZ. Plenty would sympathise with the adventurous spirit.

Someone would have cracked if the Berserk story had substance, but no one has.

You have to ask yourself, who is more likely to be telling the truth; the captain of the boat that spent 8 hours in the worst Antarctic storm in years putting his own crew at risk searching for the Berserk after ordering the vessel to sea? Or do you believe the proven publicity seeker with a record of lawbreaking, questionable seamanship and bad decision making.

Jarle stands to benefit from this accusation which seems consistent with everything he has done in the media to date.  He alone is ultimately responsible for the loss of the Berserk as commander of the expedition. He cant handle the loss since it doesn't fit into his narrative.

I have some sympathy for his views, that the world is bound up in bureaucracy and why cant he sail where and when he likes? But the loss of Berserk put the lives of the many other people at risk in the SAR, cost a pile of taxpayer money and Jarle doesnt appear to care unless its about Jarle.

 

[DoT 31]

1 hour ago, Psyche said:

I have some sympathy for his views, that the world is bound up in bureaucracy and why cant he sail where and when he likes? 

 

I got none. Antarctica doesn't need tourists.

[Psyche 483]

The procedure doesn't seem to hard for a stroll to the pole

 

https://www.mfat.govt.nz/assets/Environment/Antarctica-and-the-Southern-Ocean/EIA-form.pdf

 

What was Jarles contingency plan? So many failures on his side, getting to Antarctica is easy but staying alive is another story altogether.

[waikiore 321]

His history is full of conjured up adventure videos with no factual base-so whilst an entertaining fellow to meet in a bar anything he says must be taken with a large dollop of salt.  

[Ex Veladare 95]

I saw the Berserk in Port Fitzroy, it looked in poor condition and had what Im sure were motorbikes strapped to the bow, not quad bikes. But I must have been wrong.

I thought at the time it didnt look like it was capable of getting back to Auckland much less Antarctica, which at the time I didnt know they were going to attempt.

I remember it being very low to the water and clearly looked overloaded and generally in a poor seaworthy state