Charlie Girard Fails Again

A couple of years ago, I told the story of Charlie Girard the Frenchman who

boasted that he had the physical strength, the mental toughness, and the maritime technology to row 3,600 miles across the steely Atlantic, from Cape Cod to France, faster than any human in history

but who had to be rescued by the Coast Guard fifty miles from shore.

At the time, I thought M. Girard had learned a valuable lesson about himself. Here was his resolution after his rescue, according to the Globe:

“The sea was very, very hard,” he said. “I was very tired, too.”

He said he would never try to cross the Atlantic in that rowboat again.”I’m too scared to try another time,” he said. “It was very difficult at night. I think it will take many days to stop the nightmares.”

But it seems that self-knowledge is fleeting. The Coast Guard had to rescue M. Girard again this morning. This time, he had made it 130 miles out to sea, though it took him ten days, and for part of the time he was rowing the wrong way. After calling it quits early this morning:

He alerted Coast Guard officials in Boston at 8:25 a.m. that he was suffering from fatigue, activated an emergency locator beacon, and waited for a Falcon jet and Jayhawk helicopter to come to his rescue.

Poor Charlie Girard. Friends said he “probably” wouldn’t try again.

“It kind of blew a big hole in his dream,” said Williams, commodore of the Orleans Yacht Club. “He found out once you get out into the ocean like that and you’re out there by yourself, you’re at the mercy of the ocean.”

TedF

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