Home At Last

Not that they'd been away all that long. But theirs was a harrowing experience. Not quite the exotic adventure in learning they had anticipated. But it was most definitely a learning experience. Those 64 students, teachers and crew aboard their floating school, the 57-metre steel tall ship with its 11-storey height masts, the SV Concordia, comprising their Class Afloat, learned that all is not as it often seems, and it is never good to give up hope.

And they had the adventure of their lives, one that might very well have taken their lives, but in the end, did not. And that in and of itself seems a miracle, so they learned about miracles, as well, in their floating classroom. They learned about nature's tantrums, her tendency to spring surprises whenever and wherever she deems them advisable to ease her pique, and how vulnerable puny humans are in contrast to her might.

They learned endurance and the practicality of taking certain lessons, such as evacuation procedures very seriously indeed. They learned that they were capable of enduring 40 fearful hours adrift on the high seas. They learned first-hand how a microburst with tornado-like emphasis could capsize a steel tall ship in 20 seconds, and flood and sink it within a half-hour.

But that half hour gave them the opportunity to practise what their teachers had preached in awareness and action, giving them the impetus to pull on their emergency suits, and leap overboard into the rafts that the ship's captain had dived into the water to free from their moorings. And then they witnessed the amazing spectacle of that huge vessel declining into the sea.

Did they, might they ever have been able, in their wildest dreams - or nightmares as the case may be - imagine that they might have the fortitude to remain hopeful and alert for 40 miserable hours of wondering whether the beacon that their ship had emitted would be picked up to enable their rescue?